Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach Pro Celebrity Race

LONG BEACH, CA -- One of the highlights of the 33rd Annual Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach weekend, the 31st Annual Toyota Pro/Celebrity Race was held on Saturday, April 14th, 2007. Celebrities and Pro Drivers competed in the same 10 lap race through the streets of Long Beach in their custom Toyota Scion cars.

This year's celebrity participants included producer/director George Lucas, actress Kathryn Morris (Cold Case), actress Emily Procter (CSI Miami), actor Joshua Morrow (The Young and the Restless), Kendra Wilkinson from The Girls Next Door, actress Kelly Hu, X-Games champ Dave Mirra, actress Aisha Tyler, tennis great Martina Navratilova, basketball star John Salley, and Howard Stern sidekick Robin Quivers. Competing in the Pro category were Mike Skinner, Scott Kelley, and Bucky Lasek. Hugh Hefner presided as Grand Marshall of the race.

Practice and qualifying took place on Friday, April 13th with the actual race being run the following day. Normally a 10 lap event, this year's race consisted of only 8 official laps due to a collision between George Lucas and Annamarie Dean. Fortunately, neither was injured in the accident. However, the resulting yellow and red flags caused an early end to the race due to time constraints. Dave Mirra wound up winning the race with Martina Navratilova finishing second and Joshua Morrow coming in third. Mike Skinner finished fourth and took top honors among the pro drivers.