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NHRA
Champion Sampey to Retire
Angelle Sampey, who is the
winningest female in professional motorsports history, is
hanging up her helmet and leathers as she announces her
retirement as a professional drag racer. Sampey, who totaled 41
victories during a 13-year NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle career,
said she’s planning to pursue other career opportunities while
looking to start a family with her fiancé, Seth Drago.
“I’m ready for a new challenge, including opening Coral Fever, a
store specializing in fish, coral and aquariums,” said the
39-year-old. “I made the ultimate sacrifice to postpone starting
a family when I began racing. Now, I’m going to make the
ultimate sacrifice to stop racing to get married (in June) and
then try and start a family.”
The Louisiana native made her NHRA debut in 1996 at Bandimere
Speedway outside of Denver and immediately raised eyebrows by
advancing to the semifinals. She recorded her first win in her
first final round later that season at Reading, Pa. in the
fourth event of her career.
“I will take away so many great memories from racing,” she said.
“I’m certainly going to miss being around my fellow racers and,
of course, the fans. I really enjoyed meeting the fans at every
race. They were always there for me through the good times and
the bad times.”
To be sure, Sampey did not experience many bad times since ’96.
In fact, she captured three world championships and banked 18
wins between 2000 and 2002. “Obviously, that was an
extraordinarily exciting time period,” she offered. “I never
imagined I could have that kind of success. I was very fortunate
to be surrounded by a lot of talented people including George
Bryce (her crew chief during each championship season).”
It was in 2001 when Sampey became the winningest female in NHRA
history, moving past Shirley Muldowney on the list. She went on
to pocket seven wins that season which remains the most wins
ever recorded in a single season by a female competitor in NHRA
history.
“To be honest, it was tough to comprehend what I had done after
I surpassed Shirley’s win total (18),” she said. “After all,
Shirley is one of the sport’s legends. I look up to her.” Among
Sampey’s final stats will be a staggering 364 round wins out of
506 total rounds of competition or a win roughly 72 percent of
the time she blasted down the quarter-mile.
“Again, I want to emphasize that I had a bunch of people help me
along the way,” she related. “I could spend a day or more
thanking each and every one. I’ll never forget any of them.”
Perhaps, the one mark Sampey wishes she could have broken before
exiting the sport was the most wins in the Pro Stock Motorcycle
class – 45 – as established by the late Dave Schultz. “That’s
probably true,” she said. “I clearly could’ve hung around just
to try and break that record. But, as I stated, it’s time for a
change.”
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