Auto racing: Potter, Tallman hope for sweet trip on home track

Tooele » Transplanted Utahns John Potter and Lara Tallman hope to parlay a home course advantage into unexpected success Friday and Saturday at Miller Motorsports.

Potter, who was born in St. Louis but moved to Salt Lake in 2005, will compete in Friday night's KONI Challenge Series and the Saturday Grand-Am Rolex Series' Utah 250 on Saturday afternoon.

Tallman, who moved to Salt Lake about the time Miller Motorsports Park opened in 2006, will race in the KONI Challenge Series.

Heading into the next-to-last race of the year, Potter ranks 10th in the KONI Grand Sport Class season standings. He is tied for 13th in the Rolex GT Class.

Meanwhile, Tallman is tied for 72nd in the KONI Street Tuner Class, thanks to a difficult start to the season.

While neither locally-connected driver is positioned to capture an overall championship, Potter and Tallman want to perform well in front of family, friends and sponsors this weekend.

"Its funny," Potter said. "People like to pile on expectations because it's my home track. And I probably do have more miles here than anybody else. But it's a tough field. ... It's not going to be easy. There is some tough competition out there."

Still, Potter admitted, "I think we will do OK -- maybe more than OK."

In the KONI Challenge, Potter will share driving duties with his Magnum Racing teammate Andy Lally of Dacula, Ga.

In

the Rolex Series, he will share the steering wheel with Craig Shelton of Long Beach.

"Everybody tries to put pressure on me," Potter said. "They say, 'You've got to do well, right? It's your home track.' But I'm going to do the same thing I try to do at every track -- my best."

Tallman's co-driver will be Vesko Kozarov, who also lives in Salt Lake and owns the CA Sport race team. Their car -- a Honda Civic SI -- is sponsored by citydeals.com.

Home course advantage or not, Tallman does not know exactly what to expect this weekend.

The season "started off bad," she said, explaining that a co-driver totaled her car at Daytona in February.

"It took until May to get another one built," she said.

Tallman finished 11th at Laguna before burned out brakes prevented her from finishing at Mid-Ohio.

The car, she said, remains "... a work in progress. We're still having a lot of computer problems. We have not gotten to where we want to be."

After practice on Thursday morning, however, Tallman sounded optimistic about the possibility of an improved showing at Miller Motorsports Park.

"We're hoping to do much better," she said. "The car, every time I get in, it's like a different car. Just now, it was like, 'Wow.' ... It was better."

Tallman grew up in southern California.

"My dad was a hot-rod guy," she said, smiling. "He rebuilds classics. My first car was a '57 Chevy. I worked on that with him and got to love cars."

Like Potter, Tallman plans to enjoy the role as hometown favorite.

"It's great to be here," she said. "We have the luxury of working out of our team garage and citydeal.com is bringing out a big group Friday and Saturday. So that's nice. They're trying to get more involved, as they start up that company, and they have been very good trying to help us. Hopefully we'll do well for them."

luhm@sltrib.com