Grand-Am

Laguna Seca: TRG preview

triple threat TRG will field three Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars in the May 1 Rolex Sports Car Series race at Laguna Seca Raceway. Series GT championship leaders Marc Bunting of Monkton, Md., and Andy Lally of Dacula, Ga., will lead the charge in ...

Published: Apr 22, 2005, 4:26 PM

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triple threat

TRG will field three Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars in the May 1 Rolex Sports Car Series race at Laguna Seca Raceway. Series GT championship leaders Marc Bunting of Monkton, Md., and Andy Lally of Dacula, Ga., will lead the charge in the No. 65 Auto Gallery/TRG Porsche. Their new teammates Steve Johnson of Bristol, Va., and Robert Nearn of London, England, will share the No. 88 Porsche.

Dave Master of Houston, Texas, and Santa Fe, N.M., will rejoin TRG in the No. 63 Porsche he drove to an eighth-place GT finish in the Rolex 24 At Daytona in February. His co-driver Dan Pastorini of Washington, Texas, has roots in Master's home town -- he was quarterback for the Houston Oilers before he traded turf for track.

Johnson shares Pastorini's NFL history -- he played for the New England Patriots and Dallas Cowboys -- and his love of racing. "I believe in a balanced lifestyle with family and business coming first," he said. "But when it comes to a hobby, there is nothing that I would rather do than 'haul the mail' in a 911 GT3."

first and goal

Dan Pastorini has excelled in professional baseball and football, and in boats and dragsters. He set four world records in drag boat racing and was the third top-fuel racer to exceed 270 miles an hour. But he thinks sports-car racing is more physically demanding.

"When we played football, a play would average about four seconds. If you run 70 plays a game, you have a little more than four and a half minutes of total concentration," he said. "You do a two-minute drill to drive the ball the length of the field to get a field goal or a touchdown. Driving a race car is like that two-minute drill, but it lasts for an hour and a half to two hours. It's quite taxing."

Rolex rout

Andy Lally still cherishes the first of three Rolex watches he has won in competition though the watch no longer works, a casualty of a crash in his alter-sport, street luge.

"We had a race in San Diego and it was a practice run with a friend of mine who is one of the best lugers in the world," he recalled. "We got together in a fast 60-mile-an-hour kink. We both went for the same road and it didn't work very well. We ended up tumbling down the road as I high-sided it. I must have whacked the watch pretty good. After I stood up and dusted myself off and checked that everything was okay, the first thing I looked at was the watch. It wasn't ticking anymore."

-trg-

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