Motorsport

RANDY LANIER was a motor racing champion who won Rookie of the Year at the 1986 Indy500.But just a year later he was sentenced to life in prison without parole for drug smuggling.
Randy Lanier lived a double life as a race driver and a drug smugglerCredit: NETFLIX
He founded Blue Thunder and became IMSA GT champion in 1984Credit: NETFLIX
Lanier fulfilled his dream of racing the Indy500 in 1986Credit: NETFLIX
Born in rural Virginia, Lanier dreamed of becoming a race driver from the first time he heard a live broadcast of the Indy500 on the radio.
The 69-year-old fulfilled his dream in 1986 following a rather unconventional path into the world of motorsport.
It began when he moved to Florida in the 1960s when his love for cannabis turned into a money-making scheme.
Lanier and his close associates began to smuggle in the drug from the Bahamas and his operation grew and grew.
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After overcoming a setback in which Lanier was robbed at gunpoint in his home, the soon-to-be-racer was importing cannabis from South America, and with it he built an impressive fortune.
Going straight to the suppliers meant Lanier began smuggling hundreds of thousands of pounds of cannabis worth millions of dollars.
His scheme involved hiding the contraband in hollowed-out ballast tanks of barges, and the more he shipped in, the better his race car became.
Lanier was already an amateur racer by the time he became a drug kingpin but his career never took off.
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He blamed that fact on not owning and running his own team, so once he had the money he set up Blue Thunder and worked his way onto the IMSA racing scene.
As Lanier put it himself: “To really be an up-front runner in racing, it takes not only a team, but a team with quite a bit of funds.”
His own wife Pam described him as not the most “elegant” driver with Lanier following the Jeremy Clarkson handbook of power first, ask questions later.
But it was a recipe for success and Lanier became one of the best young drivers on the circuit, thanks in part to the wisdom he no doubt learned from one-time Le Mans star Bill Whittington, his co-driver.
Together the pair beat Indy500 legend Bobby Rahal to win the IMSA GT Championship in 1984, and with that brought further racing opportunities.
Lanier then had the chance to walk away from his drugs empire for good when two representatives from Ford, who he had believed to be FBI agents, visited him at a race to offer him the chance to join their factory team.
But he turned them down for one simple reason – friendship.
Lanier stated: “My mind was already made up. I wanted to keep Blue Thunder together. That’s what friends do.”
Lanier threw champagne and coke-fuelled parties before racesCredit: NETFLIX
His secret life caught up with him and he was sentenced to life in prison in 1987Credit: NETFLIX
Naturally, a self-funded racing champion with no discernable income raised eyebrows, but that did not prevent Lanier from expanding his operation – on and off the track.
He began paying off the mob for access to ports with one job costing him £500,000 alone, and another involving one ship being diverted from landing in Louisiana to San Francisco – some 1,500 nautical miles.
Lanier ploughed most of his money into his race cars but there was plenty of excess which was spent on speedboats as well as champagne and cocaine-fuelled parties before races.
He then took things up a notch when he set his sights competing at the Indy500 by racing alongside professional daredevils like Rahal, Mario Andretti and AJ Foyt.
Lanier fulfilled his childhood dream of racing the Indy500 in 1986 where he placed ninth – the highest ranking rookie in the race.
But authorities were closing in and when his bookkeeper Charles Podesta was arrested, the game was up.
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Podesta confessed to his part in the smuggling racket and gave details on how the operation was ran by Lanier and his associates.
In 1987 Lanier was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole but he was released after 27 years thanks to a presidential pardon from Barack Obama.
He turned to yoga and despite claiming the US prison system was set up for recidivism rather than self-reflection, Lanier became a yoga instructor and a suicide watch volunteer – trained to sit and talk with people who tried to take their life – in prison.
Following his release in 2014 he established Freedom Grow – a charity designed to help those sent to prison for cannabis-related charges regain their freedom.
He remains passionate about cannabis, which he views as “just a plant”, and wants people to be given their lives back.
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Lanier said on the subject: “These people should not be currently incarcerated when there are 38 states, and all these corporations, making millions of dollars selling thousands of pounds of cannabis, legally, every week.
“These people need to come home.” More