updated 4:34 p.m. ET May 17, 2008

INDIANAPOLIS - Despite vastly different personalities and resumes, the women of this year’s Indy 500 share a common goal: Each believes she can change the face of auto racing in her own way.

Danica Patrick, Sarah Fisher and Milka Duno work just yards apart in the Indianapolis Motor Speedway garages, but they all have their own approach to the sport, even if they face the same hurdles.

“It’s not like the sport is flooded with females,” Fisher said Wednesday. “You still have to be able to compete and drive and that’s the bottom line. You still have to do well.”

Increasingly, women in all forms of racing are succeeding.

Since Janet Guthrie and Shirley Muldowney started knocking down gender barriers in the late 1970s, there have been more women drivers, more women owners and, yes, even a growing list of women winners.

The encore to Patrick’s historic IndyCar win in Japan last month came the following week when Ashley Force beat her dad, John, to become the first woman champion in drag racing’s Funny Car division. Less than 24 hours after Patrick’s victory, Simona De Silvestro became the second woman to win a race in the developmental Atlantic Series, joining three-time winner Katherine Legge, who now drives touring cars in Europe.

Even Formula One teams are talking about finding women to compete in the series.

Next week, the 33-car starting grid at Indy could include three women for the second straight year, with Patrick again creating the biggest buzz around the 2.5-mile oval. She’s even this week’s cover girl on Sports Illustrated.

It’s a far cry from the early days when Guthrie, the first woman to start at Indy in 1977, acknowledges it was difficult for women to find sponsors or chances.

“Back then, I predicted it might be two generations (before a woman won),” Guthrie said last month. “But it turns out to be just a generation and a half.”

Patrick’s success has changed everything.

Her glitzy photo shoots opened the door to new marketing opportunities, and her driving savvy and tenacity have proven she’s every bit as talented as the boys. A win May 25 at Indy would be considered the most significant achievement for women in this traditionally male-dominated sport.

That’s not how the 26-year-old Illinois native views it. While winning in Japan may forever change the perception of women in racing, Patrick insists it has only fueled her passion to win more often.

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“I still get nervous,” she said last week. “I feel just as much pressure to do well every time I get on the track. It’s nice to have that win. It’s nice to answer new questions. That’s kind of what that does. Really, it’s just good championship points.”

If Patrick has proven anything, it’s that anyone can win races given the proper equipment, the right skills and a level playing field. Patrick drives for Andretti Green Racing, one of the Indy Racing League’s best-funded teams. Aside from Ashley Force, Patrick faces — and is meeting — perhaps the largest expectations of any woman driver in history.

Andretti’s four drivers were expected to contend for the pole last weekend, and Patrick wound up as the team’s top qualifier with a four-lap average of 225.197 mph. She even spent 34 minutes on the pole before getting bumped to fifth in the field, the middle of the second row, a run that drew praise from team owner and longtime IndyCar favorite Michael Andretti.

“She was pretty impressive because the car was not real great and she hung on,” Andretti said.

But Patrick isn’t the only woman driver at Indianapolis with historic accomplishments.

Fisher was the first woman to ever win an IndyCar pole back in 2002, at Kentucky, and produced second- and third-place finishes during her first two full seasons on the circuit. Since 2004, she has struggled to find a full-time ride in IndyCars, so this year she started her own team, Sarah Fisher Racing.

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The 27-year-old from Ohio is now learning the nuances — and pitfalls — of doing business in the sport. She spent the past two weeks scrounging for cash after her two biggest sponsors didn’t come through with the money they had promised after Fisher and her husband, Andy O’Gara, invested their life savings in the team.

That’s meant more time meeting with potential sponsors, more appearances and, thanks in part to persistent rain at Indy, less time on the track. But Fisher showed her business acumen by locking up two deals Wednesday to help her get through the month.

“I’m always busy, I never have a day off because I’m in charge of the business matters and it takes a lot of time,” she said. “But I enjoy it. I enjoy learning, and I enjoy it when something goes completely right.”

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