A discipline close to Jordaine Penick‘s Virginia residence served as her first race monitor when she was 13 years previous.
That‘s the 12 months she received her first race automobile, however since she was nonetheless too younger to actually compete, she took the automobile round a do-it-yourself dirt-track. It was there the place she earned the nickname “Peach Picker.”
“I had advised dad to video me as I went round my little monitor within the discipline, and subsequent factor I knew I used to be in a tree,” Penick stated. “It was a peach tree. All of the peaches had been in my automobile as a result of there was no windshield in it, in order that’s how I received the nickname Peach Picker.”
You’d assume that will be a scary expertise for a younger woman.
“No, it didn’t scare me,” Penick stated. “It was extra of, I blinked and it was there, so I wasn’t actually reacting about it. I used to be extra scared about the truth that my dad was going to be mad at me.”
Three years later, the now 16-year-old Penick continues to be racing that fearlessly.
As one of many youngest rivals and the one woman within the Hornets Division at South Boston Speedway, Penick didn‘t present any worry this season racing towards veterans. She completed within the prime 5 in 9 of 10 races on the best way to her first monitor championship.
Penick grew to become the second lady to win a championship on the NASCAR Advance Auto Components Weekly Collection monitor in South Boston, Virginia, and the primary since Terri Marks gained a Grand Inventory division championship in 2004.
“It’s actually superior being one of many first ladies in 20 years and the second woman out of the entire lifetime of South Boston Speedway to ever win a championship,” Penick stated.
Penick completed fifth on championship night time to lock up the title by 13 factors. Marks was in attendance on the race that night time to congratulate her, and Penick later received to fulfill former NASCAR Cup Collection driver and South Boston native Ward Burton, who signed her race automobile.
“I don’t actually assume it actually hit me,” she stated of the championship. “Sitting again and really realizing I received it. I imply, it was good developing there and seeing how proud my household was of me and all the pieces.”
Penick is a 3rd era driver, starting together with her grandfather who raced within the Sixties and ‘70s. He handed the custom on to his daughter — Penick‘s aunt, Cheryl — who competed round Jap Virginia.
Cheryl taught the game to Penick.
“She actually tries to assist me out, giving me pointers, however it’s an entire lot completely different anyone sitting there attempting to inform you the right way to drive the automobile versus you really being behind the steering wheel and driving the automobile,” Penick stated.
Penick‘s brothers all are also in racing, although they‘re all in several rides. Her two oldest brothers drive mud vans and compete in mud bogging races, and the one closest to her in age drag races.
Penick was the one one in her speedy household that gravitated in the direction of circle tracks. She and her dad all the time preferred going to look at races at South Boston, and he or she wished to do the compete in the identical fashion of races as her grandfather and aunt.
“I simply advised dad, I need to get into racing, and he was like, ‘OK, nicely, if that’s what you need, then that’s what we’ll do,‘” she stated.
“My brothers and I, we’ve all the time been tight. We’ve all the time had 4 wheelers rising up, so we all the time raced or no matter, so velocity has all the time been one thing I really like.”
Penick has grown as a driver since she started racing competitively three seasons in the past. When she started she admits she was a “unhealthy competitor,” she stated, by no means actually racing close to the entrance.
“I used to be simply attempting to get used to the monitor, and I wasn’t driving the quickest automobile on the market,” she stated. “It was only a automobile I might race with and say I used to be getting expertise.”
The second 12 months she began getting extra aggressive, and by the tip of the season she was fairly constantly ending third and fourth each race.
By her third 12 months, she had gotten the hold of the right way to get round South Boston, and was now determining the right way to decide up velocity.
The enhancements stemmed from Penick, “realizing that it doesn’t actually matter if I tear my automobile up, and to simply push as laborious as I might to get the place I used to be,” she stated.
“Studying once I wanted to let off the fuel and when to speed up again after I received out the curves, as a result of I’ve all the time raced 4 wheelers and stuff like that across the fields,” she added.
Being in a race automobile as an early teenager had its benefits when it got here to getting her actual driver‘s license, which Penick received through the summer time. However she hasn‘t fairly been capable of take the race automobile driver out of her system with regards to the street.
“It was fairly simple, however Dad, when he first received within the car with me, he stated I held the curves means too quick,” she stated with amusing.
“I truthfully love racing, like simply being on the market and with the ability to go quick with out getting a ticket.”
Penick stated she isn‘t prepared to maneuver up out of South Boston‘s hornets division fairly but, as a result of she nonetheless desires to study slightly extra about the right way to be the very best racer she could be, and get to victory lane.
She‘s spending this offseason persevering with to work on her craft, whereas additionally taking delight in what she achieved through the 2024 season.
“I’m actually happy with myself,” Penick stated. “I’ve come a good distance due to my father, my aunt Cheryl, and all of the sponsors.
“It’s superior. It’s an enormous honor for me. Being a champion, that’s an honor. There’s 4 champions at South Boston, so to be a type of 4, you‘ve received to be actually, actually good, and it’s good.”
