70-летняя Вероника О'Шиша сразится на гоночном автомобиле в Лос-Анжелесе

Veronica O’Shea was born with the need for speed. This month, during the days preceding the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, the septuagenarian is racing a Huffaker-built 1966 MG Midget racecar she named “Sally” at Laguna Seca Raceway. Although her husband, 37-year racecar driver David Zurlinden, often drives his Huffaker-built 1964 MGB, this year, he will behind the wheel of a 1953 Tatum GMC Special. Together, they form “DZ & V Racing.” O’Shea actually grew up on a horse. Her dad was a cowboy, and she leaned into the rodeo lifestyle hard, competing in both barrel racing and team roping, a timed event where competitors attempt to rope and restrain a full-grown steer. She also came of age on a set of snow skis, becoming what she calls a “professional ski bum” at what is currently called “Palisades Tahoe.” “A professional ski bum means you are really good at flying down the mountain,” she said. “While in Tahoe, I also did a little Indy car driving. But one day, in my mid-30s, I realized I might need to support myself for the rest of my life and had to figure out how.” She chose to become a department manager for Nordstrom, followed by GAP. O’Shea was brought to the Monterey Peninsula in the early 1990s by an offer to serve as store manager for Banana Republic, which she ultimately left to open her own home furnishings store, Redeem, in Carmel. After a dozen years, she closed the store to pursue exclusive property management. In and through it all, O’Shea never let go of her need for speed. In fact, the only thing she took slowly was marrying her husband, David Zurlinden. While the quality of his dating app slowed things down, she admits, the initial attraction was his speed behind the wheel. “I appreciated that his app said, ‘No couch potatoes need apply.’ But,” she said, “he had kind of a bad picture. Then he emailed me that I needed to read his bio. It said he raced cars. That was the attraction.” The two met on a Sunday afternoon for cocktails, which led to dinner, she said, “which led to us.” The couple have been together for 14 years but married for just under three. Becoming a race car driver At first, O’Shea simply enjoyed attending her husband’s races and cheering him on around the track. Once she realized she’d gone beyond appreciating the sport to actually loving it, she understood she needed to get behind the wheel. “I rented a Miata race car with a 1275cc engine,” she said, “and went to racing school at the Sports Car Club of America’s Thunderhill Raceway Park in Willows. The first day, I was in tears. The second day, I was going to sell my car. On the third day I said, ‘To hell with it; I’m going to do this.’ And I did.” Getting out onto the raceway at Laguna Seca was a whole other experience – the scariest thing, she said, she’d ever done. “I kept looking in my rearview mirror,” she said, “at the cars coming at me, about to overtake me. I thought my head would blow off. I absolutely loved it.” O’Shea realized she couldn’t afford to rent a car every day, so she bought one and started participating in regular “track days” at Laguna Seca, where she found herself getting faster. “While I was leaning into racing,” she said, “I had some naysayers. Not everybody was patting me on the back and saying they thought I should do it. But I am really tenacious. When I first started riding horses, I didn’t love it, but I ended up doing pro rodeo and did love it. Same thing with skiing. I didn’t love it. Today, it’s still my primary passion, but car racing is slowly passing it.” While O’Shea readies her car for Laguna Seca, her husband, “DZ,” will be driving legendary local race car driver Rob Manson’s 1953 Tatum GMC Special. “Dave (DZ) and Veronica (V) have both driven my Pebble Beach Road Races California Specials. DZ has raced the 1953 Tatum on multiple occasions,” said Manson, “at the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion and at Velocity Invitational. In the Del Monte Trophy race, DZ, in the Tatum, will be the driver and the car to beat.” And V, he said, has driven the 1950 John von Neumann MGTD Special at Laguna Seca — which won the very first Pebble Beach Road Races — and has driven it very well.