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‘Survival of the Fastest’, Randy Lanier’s Story


Image for article titled & # 39;  Survival of the Fastest & # 39;  The Sports Car and Cannabis Smuggler Story You've Been Waiting For

image: Elizabeth Blackstock

The 1970s and 80s were a wild time in the sports world. Big rivalries, career-defining moments and rapidly evolving technology have paved the way for a wild era, but there’s a part of the motorsport world that stands out equally in the minds of fans. Grave: drug smuggling. There came the chaos Randy Lanierpeople – along with AJ Baime, among Walk like hell famous – just published an autobiography titled Survival of the Fastest: Weed, Speed, and the 1980s Drug Scandal That Shocked the Sports World. And if that title tells you anything, this book is an excellent read.

The mark of a great book is its ability to draw you in and never let you go, and Survival of the Fastest do exactly that. From the opening detailing the moment Lanier was arrested to the ending about his activism while he was already serving a prison sentence, I never wanted to put this book down. And I didn’t – I devoured it in less than 48 hours, sneaking in some early morning and on my lunch break just to see what happened next.

Of course, if you are a fan of motorsports, you may already know some Key features of Lanier’s story. He began racing in 1978, winning the SCCA E Production class in the 1980 season. He debuted in the IMSA series the following year, then competed in the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1982 to replace the ailing Janet Guthrie. He competed at Le Mans, then went on to form his own racing team, the Blue Thunder, in 1984 – dominating the championship as an independent, sponsor-free team. He went on to compete in the CART series, winning the Indy 500 Rookie of the Year in 1986. And he did it all when he smuggled large quantities of marijuana into various ports around the United States.

In Survival of the Fastest, Lanier talks about discovering weeds when he was 14 years old, went on to sell plants in his construction business when he was 15. By age 20, he had the money to buy a fast boat Magnum – and quickly realized he could use it as a vessel to smuggle weed. Before long, Lanier had established himself as a formidable drug lord in the South Florida drug scene, with his cannabis distribution network reaching across the country.

Despite watching just about every possibly documentary I could on Lanier throughout the years, I didn’t really realize the scope of his smuggling until reading this book, when his operations were laid out in detail. Suddenly, you start to realize that one single smuggling operation is not only the work of several months, but of an entire lifetime. In order to smuggle 165,000 pounds of weed into America, Lanier needed to know people around the world. He needed those people to be both loyal and quiet. He needed them to have the right legitimate connections. He needed to have successfully completed all those smaller hauls.

For me, though, the most interesting thing is the peek behind the emotional curtain. Other stories or documentaries on Lanier have never really captured his headspace in the way that Survival of the Fastest does. When Lanier talks about his youth and his initial smuggling operations, there’s a sense of nostalgia to them — but as both his racing and his smuggling grew in intensity, his emotions got more conflicted. Both motorsport and drug running could be a full-time career; Lanier was trying to do both at the same time, all while managing a family and indulging in the high life his massive amounts of money allowed for.

The highlight of this book for me is Lanier’s Indy 500 debut. He was competing in the biggest race in the world knowing that it would likely be his last chance to do so; he’d already been indicted in drug investigations, and the feds were breathing down his neck. Prison time was imminent, and with the Reagan administration’s push to end the so-called “War on Drugs,” Lanier knew there was a chance he’d never actually live a free life again once he was behind bars. His friends and fellow racers were being arrested left and right. His wife was pregnant with twins, one of whom had died while the other was still healthy enough to carry to term, and she knew nothing about what was going on; meanwhile, Lanier was trying to hide money and assets to set her up with a good life without him. All this while trying to practice, qualify, and compete in the Indianapolis 500.

You really get the bittersweetness that Lanier was feeling. With all this going on, he wasn’t able to enjoy the very race he’d longed to compete in. So much of his smuggling was designed to earn him the money to establish his racing career so he could contest the Indy 500 — and there he was, anxious, jaded, paranoid, and unable to soak up the experience.

It is, truly, an incredible story, especially for the fact that Lanier used his prison time to its fullest. He writes that he regularly volunteered in prison psychiatric units, spending hours speaking to suicidal inmates while learning how to appreciate the little things in life that made he never would have noticed while free but that made prison life bearable. Upon his release, he remarried his childhood sweetheart and ex-wife Pam and has become an activist for the release of nonviolent marijuana prisoners.

Survival of the Fastest is, without a doubt, one of the most incredible motorsport books I’ve ever read. I can’t recommend it enough — but if you’re not totally convinced, we published a excerpt here on Jalopnik. It will be more than enough to change your mind.



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