University of Colorado Student, High School Softball Standout, Cheerleader for the Colorado Mammoth, Miss Grand Prix of Denver: there have been a lot of titles that Lauren Gardner has held in her life time, but as the Champ Car World Series campaign shifts into full gear she is preparing to embrace her newest title, 2007 Face of Champ Car. source: champcarworldseries.com - Kelly Brown Lauren was a fan of the Champ Car World Series long before the Face of Champ Car contest made its debut at the Grand Prix of Denver last season. She inherited her love of racing from her father who took her to her first Champ Car race when the Grand Prix first rolled into the Mile High City in 2002. "Having the Grand Prix in town taught me a lot about racing," Lauren stated. "My dad loves racing and he is also a big fan of open wheel racing in general. When I was little he owned a 1972 Corvette Stingray that he used to show, and a 1971 911 Porsche, which he would race just for fun. Sometimes I would tag along and watch. He would go to Laguna Seca (Calif.) every year to watch races. "Every year since the series came to Denver, he has taken the whole family. We would always sit in Turn 9, because that seemed to be where most of the crashes happened. At first my sister and I thought it was the coolest thing, but the more we learned about the series and drivers we didn't want to see them crash. So I was into Champ Car before the contest." A senior at the University of Colorado in Boulder studying Political Science, Lauren did not find out about the Face of Champ Car contest until it was almost too late. One day while reading Mile High Sports Magazine, a publication she had interned for in the past, a picture struck her eye. "There is a feature in every edition called 'Girl in your Corner,'" Lauren recalled. "It usually features a cheerleader for a local team or someone like that. In that issue Brandi (Latimer, the 2006 Face of Champ Car) was profiled, and in it she mentioned the contest. I immediately went online and saw it was too late to enter, so I thought maybe next year. "It just happened that I was talking to a friend and commented that it would be fun to enter. Ironically she knew the guy that was organizing the Denver competition, so she gave me his contact information and told me to call him, saying that it was the first year of the competition, and they probably could use a few extra girls. So I talked to him and he had me go through a qualifying interview and turn in some head shots."
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