Leilani Munter is a race car driver. Leilani Munter is an environmental activist. It's not as big a contradiction as you might think, she says. Oh, she understands that a lot of environmentally conscious people will never support her racing. And she feels like a lot of racing fans will never embrace her either.
But she's not giving up either any time soon. Even though it conflicts her somewhat, she loves racing and sees it as a special chance to reach people in need of a green education.
There are millions and millions of race fans, and even competing in a lower-level series puts her in front of thousands of people where her message is a whole lot different from most, if not all, other drivers in the garage.
Still, when she's on a plane, such as a recent trip to the Gulf Coast to see the effects of the oil spill after the Deepwater Horizon explosion, she thinks carefully before responding to the person next to her who asks, "So, what do you do?"
"It is hard because it is a complicated thing, because if I bring up both and say I'm a race car driver and an environmental activist, I'll get a big question mark, a big whaaaat?" she said recently by phone from her home in North Carolina. "I oftentimes pick one or the other unless I have a lotta time on my hands like on the plane."
Unfortunately in her racing career, she has had too much time on her hands this year. She's raced in one ARCA event, getting caught up in an early race melee at Daytona, Florida, that knocked six cars out.
It's difficult getting sponsors, and not just for Munter, who wants to assemble a team of green for the decals on the car.
"It's hard for anyone for anyone to get sponsored with this economy," said Mark Gibson, who owns one full-time ARCA team and one part-time team in which he hopes to get Munter next season for all the races that are televised.
"It used to be that a woman with everything going on that Leilani has going on could get a bunch of sponsors. But right now, there's a lot of uncertainty with the economy."
It's disappointing for Munter, who dreams of getting the green message out to an audience that is often unfamiliar with it.
She wants to have five main sponsors instead of the usual one, leaving the prime spot on the hood for a message that she terms a call to action, whether it be buying more efficient light bulbs (CFLs or LEDs) or using canvas shopping bags instead of plastic ones made from petroleum.
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