Racing driver says husband DM'd her asking her to 'call me when you're 18'
NASCAR driver Natalie Decker has said her husband Derek Lemke DM'd her and told her to 'call me when you're 18'.
The driver, 28, appeared on the Speedway Sessions podcast where she talked about the first time she met her future husband at a racetrack in Wisconsin when he was four years older than her.
She said: "I was 14-years-old and I went to his home track at Elko and he was a few people in front of me in line checking in to get your pit pass.
"And he was wearing a baby blue Bauer hat - hockey brand - backwards. And I look at my dad and I said, 'Do you think that's a hockey player AND a race car driver? Cause if that's the case, I will marry that guy'.
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"And my dad was like, 'oh, whatever, whatever'."
Her dad might have wanted to pay more attention to what his 14-year-old daughter had been saying because several years later in 2023 she did end up marrying that guy, and last year they had their first child together.
Decker said that when she was 14 she became 'obsessed' with Lemke, who is now 32, and thought he was 'the coolest guy' while she was 'just like this little girl to him at this point'.
She said it was 'weird' because he 'has a girlfriend, he's graduated high school', but they kept meeting after that and eventually she said they were at Oktoberfest at the end of the racing season and by this point he knew she was 'obsessed' and 'madly in love' with him.
The driver said that 'maybe six months after Oktoberfest' he decided to DM her and told her 'call me when you're 18'.
"He messaged me on Instagram and he was like, 'Call me when you're 18'. And I said, 'Bet, I will'. I was like ok, deal... I'm pretty sure he still had a girlfriend when he told me that," she told the podcast.
Speedway Sessions host host Matt Tifft asked her: "Is that grooming? I feel like that's grooming."
Decker said that she and her now-husband had 'never talked about it', but he did message her after she turned 18 on Valentine's Day so she responded.
She said: "He texted me and he's like, 'How's it going?' And it was Valentine's Day, so Dad if you're watching this, I'm so sorry, but my mom already knows about it - so I'll say it.
"I sent him a very cute picture of my cute little butt and I said, 'Happy Valentine's Day, Derek. What's my present?' We've never stopped talking since that day."
Joe Harker