You may not know her name, but if you watch any NASCAR races, or heck, any television at all, you know Judy Fleming. She’s the redhead who is always driving in the Allstate commercials with the three women wreaking havoc as they drool over Kasey Kahne.

What you may not know is she’s a Richmond native. She grew up here before moving to Los Angeles about 10 years ago. She attended VCU, and her family now lives in the Bon Air area.

She’s spent those years plying her trade in commercials, some of which she thought would be her big break.

“I’ve been doing them for so long, and there were so many I thought were great and would be this huge thing, and they weren’t,” Fleming said by phone from L.A. this afternoon. “I’d never met Kasey before and we had a really good time shooting it. When it was voted NASCAR’s No. 1 commercial, I was like, ‘Wow that’s really cool.’”

These commercials were a big thing, and the two newest ones are set to debut this weekend during the Las Vegas race. In one, the girls dream on using their newfound wealth to sponsor Kahne’s car, and in their dream sequence Kahne dances to “Rock You Like A Hurricane” by the Scorpions. Here’s a still clip.

While the ad campaign has been successful, Fleming said there are no guarantees. She and the other two women in the ads (the brunette is Dana Gilhooley and the blonde is Jen Biederman) have formed a strong friendship and they e-mail several times a week. They have an open contract for two more ads this year and two next year, but nothing is finalized and they won’t know until Allstate calls them to come shoot.

A funny aside for the newest ad? The influx of money comes from the Allstate “safe driving bonus” checks. Fleming said the actresses never know their lines until they get to set, and she was told her line was going to be talking about how surprised they were to receive the checks.

“I was thinking, ‘This is really cool. I can’t believe they really are going to let me say this,’ and the director is saying, ‘That’s perfect. Deliver it just like that.’ But then it hit him and he was like, ‘Oh wait. We can’t give it to Judy!’

Why? Fleming is always the one behind the wheel in the commercials when everything goes wrong and something gets damaged.

She’s hoping to get into television, preferably in a sitcom. She said her favorite comedic actresses are Carol Burnett --- “She’s the reason I wanted to be an actress” --- and Debra Messing.

Perhaps it’s not a coincidence they’re both redheads.