Patrick puts on her best in Texas race, comes in second

FORT WORTH, Texas - Danica Patrick was finally leading again.

It was only one lap late for her lone lead this year, and she wound up finishing second at Texas. Still, her race on the high-banked, 1½-mile track might have been Patrick's best in her six IndyCar Series seasons.

Patrick was passing cars high and low, seemingly comfortable in any traffic. She was driving hard near the front pack the entire race Saturday night and spent many laps running wheel-to-wheel with winner Ryan Briscoe before settling for her best finish since her historic victory at Motegi two years ago.

"It was probably my best, cleanest race," Patrick said. "I've had races where there have been sort of awesome things that have happened. ... But this was probably my best race as far as top to bottom, not making any mistakes, being good in the pits, being good in and out of the pits, being good on the track."

Briscoe was still leading when he made his last pit stop, a lap after Patrick had come in for the last time.

When polesitter Briscoe exited pit road and drove off the apron onto the track, Patrick was already back to full speed and shot past him on the backstretch.

Crossing the line at the end of the 192nd of 228 laps, Patrick led and the crowd at Texas rose to its feet with the kind of loud, wild ovation usually seen when Dale Earnhardt Jr. is running strong there in NASCAR races.

"That was great to get into the lead again," she said.

As the two cars whizzed toward the frontstretch on the next lap, though, Briscoe used his push-to-pass button to move back around Patrick to stay.

"Surprised I didn't have anything thrown at me," Briscoe said, with a smile.

The Australian said he felt he had to be aggressive to get back by Patrick. He wasn't sure what might have happened had he not done it then.

"Danica, she did an amazing job. Had a lot of fun racing side-by-side with her," said Briscoe, who led four times for a race-high 102 laps. "Good on her for the race she had."