Brett Lunger, American race car driver
Robert Brett Lunger (born November 14, 1945 in Wilmington, Delaware) is an American racecar driver and Vietnam War veteran.
Lunger was educated at the Holderness School, and Princeton University. He dropped out of Princeton after three years to enlist for service in Vietnam. He was a political science major. At the time he was preparing a thesis on U.S. policy on Southeast Asia. The Gulf of Tonkin Incident refuted much of what Lunger contended in his writing. A former US Marine lieutenant who served in the Vietnam war, his racing career was mostly spent in privateer cars, paid for by his family wealth, as Lunger's mother, Jane du Pont Lunger, was an heiress to the Du Pont family fortune and a prominent racehorse breeder. He is also known for helping to rescue Niki Lauda from his burning Ferrari in 1976 at the Nürburgring.
Lunger was not raised a car enthusiast. He was brought up to enjoy baseball, hockey, and football. He became interested in auto racing when a friend took him to a race in 1965. By 1966 he was the "rich kid" of the Can-Am series. Between 1972 and 1973 he faced the top competition in European Formula Two, from the likes of Emerson Fittipaldi, Ronnie Peterson, and Jean-Pierre Jarier. His best finish was a 4th place at Mantorp Park in Sweden, for Space Racing, in their March-Ford BDA 722. The machinery he was in at this juncture did not allow him to do better. On a single weekend in Rouen, France, Lunger blew three Ford BDA engines.He married Jo, the daughter of Sir Leonard Crossland, former chairman of Ford of Britain and an executive with Lotus in 1975. Lunger used his wife's English thatched cottage as a base to court a ride with Formula One teams in 1975.