Who Is Katherine Legge? The Double Driver Talks Dogs, Food And Being Fearless

Indianapolis Motor Speedway (Speedway, Ind.) — Katherine Legge has been around long enough in racing that folks in motorsports know how to pronounce her last name. It’s “Leg.” Not “Leg-EEE.” They know how to pronounce her name because she has built a resume over the last 20 years, racing primarily in sports cars, along with 47 career INDYCAR starts. She also has dabbled in NASCAR, with 19 national series starts. She has been an Acura factory driver in sports cars (including four victories) and has run nearly three full INDYCAR seasons. She has a couple of Formula E starts as well. The 45-year-old native of England has built a reputation as a capable, versatile racer who doesn’t have much fear. It is what will allow her to hopefully become the sixth driver ever to compete in the Indianapolis 500 and Coke 600 this Sunday when — if it all works out — she’ll compete at both tracks in the same day. But who is Katherine Legge? What makes her like you and me and what makes her different? She sat down with me for a chat during the Indy 500 qualifying rain delay on Saturday. Who is Katherine Legge? Legge: Katherine is an English girl who has assimilated into the United States of America. A race-car driver, an adventure junkie, a foodie. And probably has a little bit of a screw loose and chases the highs of doing adventurous things. How would your friends describe you? My friends would describe me as having no filter, direct, fun, silly. I’m silly sometimes. Adventurous and particular about some things. And they’d probably say something about my dog, Barley. What type of dog? He’s a mutt. I’ve always taken her with me, but this year obviously I didn’t take her with me, and so now I miss her dearly. And Conor [Daly] has his new puppy in the RV lot, so I’m getting my animal fix … There’s a lot to be said for emotional support animals. I told [former. driver] Sarah [Fisher] the other day that she’s my emotional support teammate because I don’t have my puppy with me. But they make a big difference, even to my dad. My dad even said, “I miss Barley because it’s nice to be able to go back to the bus and then just walk her around for five minutes and decompress and relax, and she’s always happy to see you.” She doesn’t care where I qualify. What is the most adventurous thing you’ve done outside of racing? Outside of racing, I’ve done the usual crazy stuff. I would say inside of racing, you’ve got Pikes Peak, right? That’s pretty crazy. I’ve skydived, I’ve mountain biked down big hills. I’ve done an Ironman [triathlon]. I’ve traveled to really cool, interesting places. I try and do things that scare me or that make me feel alive. So I would say if anybody says, “Hey, what do you think about doing this?,” Then I would say, “I’m in.” Is there anything you’ve ever said no to? I don’t know that I would bungee jump because I’m scared of heights. Somebody would have to push me, and then I would want to do it. But that’s probably about it. As far as being a foodie, what food do you miss the most when you’re in the U.S.? England is not renowned for its cuisine. However, we have really good pies and things … like shepherd’s pie, sausage pie, sausage rolls, that kind of thing. But I really miss chocolate-covered pop-ups. Will Buxton always rails that U.S. chocolate is not chocolate? It’s not chocolate. But English chocolate is no longer chocolate, either, which is really disappointing. It has to be like back-in-the-day English chocolate. Sign me up. Most recently, you have been doing a lot of endurance racing. Are you a big fan of the 24-hour races and do you love getting in and out and getting an hour of sleep? Or is that difficult for you? I love endurance racing. I love sports-car racing in general. It adds another element, with having different teammates, different strategy, different planning. You get to drive really cool cars. I’m used to this sleep deprivation. I am a control freak, so I’m not used to going to sleep and letting the others take over without worrying about what they’re doing. I’ve got a radio, I can’t sleep. It’s a whole process. I feel most comfortable and confident, actually, with sports-car racing because it’s been the bread and butter of my career. I’ve spent a decade doing either prototypes or GT racing, and I’m pretty good at it. I would say I could jump in one of those cars tomorrow and feel right at home and know what I’m doing 99 percent of the time. Do you love racing because of the speed, because of the competition, because you love automobiles? What is it that brings you to this profession? I love racing because of racing. I am not a huge car nut. I can’t tell you what a car is just by the engine noise like a lot of these guys can. But I love racing for the competition. I love it for the speed and the adrenaline. I love it for the fact that you never reach the optimum. You’re always searching when getting out of the car where you’re saying, “Nobody else could have driven that car better than I did today, minimizing all the mistakes.” I love the challenge that it is mentally. I love the challenge that is with yourself. I love the engineering aspect. It’s all-encompassing. It takes over your life. Once you’ve been bitten by the racing bug, I think you’re bitten. I’ve driven everything in my career — electric cars, NASCAR, INDYCAR, sports cars, touring cars. I’ve done Pikes Peak. I’ve done so many different things that I just love the racing element of it. It makes you feel alive. I would think being a control freak in racing doesn’t exactly match because you have to rely on so many people and so many factors that are out of your control. No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t always serve me well. I want to know that I’m as prepared as I can be. And everything’s been thought of and organized. I’ll give you an example down to doing the double, and I’m [telling] Clint [my manager], “You’ve got the logistics, right? I don’t want to have to think about the logistics.” But I can’t help myself. So today I’m like looking at the schedule, and I’m like, “How do we do this, and how do we do that, and how do we do the other?” He’s like, “Katherine, you told me you’d let it be.” And I can’t. What do you hope is the legacy of this double? Honestly, I’m doing it because it’s a really cool thing to do, and it’s kind of like this old-school epic badge of honor that you get for doing both races in one day. I’m not doing it to leave a legacy. Because of e.l.f. [Cosmetics] and their partnership, I think it is a legacy in that it’s showing that there are not the perceived barriers that you think there are. And you can do anything that you put your mind to if you want it enough. It would be remiss of me to not take that responsibility seriously, but at the same time, that’s not why I set out to do it. I set out to do it because I love to race. I found a newfound love in NASCAR, and to get to do the Indy 500 again, it’s just a dream come true. So if I can tie all those things in and look back in 10 year and go, “Hey, I did that.” Not many people get the opportunity to be the sixth person in history. That’s really cool. Is there anything you feel that’s occurred in your life that drives your passion for this? I think racing was such an integral part of my life from age 9 [starting in go-karts] with my dad. It was every weekend. It was all I thought about. I sleep, I eat, I dream about racing, about having a better car. What would Roger Penske do? All the different elements. Once your life has become about that, I think it’s really hard to then think about what your life is without that in it. And I was actually having a deep, meaningful conversation with Sarah Fisher the other day, and I was like, people say, “Who is Katherine Legge?” And you want to say “race-car driver” because that’s who you are. And there should be more to you than that, right? You should have whoever you are outside of racing. But really racing and I are tied together at the hip. It’s just been my entire life. I’ve been very lucky. Did you ever think that you wouldn’t be a driver in racing — like if you want to be involved in racing, it’s not going to be behind the wall? I have thought about what I’ll do post-racing. I have two parallels, like trails of thought. One is I still want to be in racing, and I want to help other young female drivers, like [17-year-old prospect] Lanie Buice, for example, and be part of GM’s diversity projects and driving development. I think I would get the same kind of kicks from doing that as I do from driving. And then the other part of me thinks, will it be too painful not to drive because I want to drive so much that I should just get out of it all together? So many people have helped me, like Janet Guthrie, Lyn St. James, Sarah Fisher. You have the progression. I want to be part of the next generation coming up. Well, you could race Cars Tour and ARCA with Lanie, where she is racing now. Yeah. Trans Am [too]. Finally, you’ve driven in the Indy 500 before. Just what is it that makes that race special for you? You get asked as a driver — you get asked a lot — what it’s like to drive in the Indy 500. And it’s the hardest question to answer because unless you’ve been here and you’ve experienced it, it’s kind of indescribable. As you drive in, you get goosebumps. The energy of the crowd … it’s like the place has a personality of its own. And once you’re on the grid and you’re driving around, it’s not like any other race on the planet. It’s like all the history and stories of the ghosts and like the power of it. There are 110 years of history to this one. There are 110 years of history. It’s so immense. It gets under your bones.