Paul Newman drove a Mustang to pick up a Rolex watch at Daytona in 1995; want to buy it?

Paul Newman had few peers as an actor, and frankly, he wasn’t swimming in them as a racer, either.

While often taking breaks from Hollywood to scratch his racing itch, Newman filled a big trophy case. One of his most prized trophies wasn’t actually a trophy, but still a very recognizable symbol of racing victory — a Rolex Daytona watch he won as part of the GT-winning team in the 1995 Rolex 24 at Daytona.

You want it?

You can have it, assuming you outbid others who are expected to bid upwards of $1 million when Sotheby’s offers some 300 Newman mementos at auction in June. A Wall Street Journal article this past week said the watch Newman received in Daytona’s Victory Lane is one of two Rolex Daytona timepieces going to auction — the other was a gift from his wife, actress Joanne Woodward.

Newman, who died in 2008 at age 83, was no mere hobbyist behind the wheel. Though he didn’t start racing until his 40s, he made a deep dive and, at his best, captured championships in the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) while also spending time at the highest levels of sports-car racing.

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Co-driving a Porsche 935 with Rolf Stommelen and Dick Barbour, Newman finished second overall at the 1979 24 Hours of Le Mans. There were also Daytona ties with that Porsche — the team’s main sponsor was Ron Rice’s Daytona Beach-based Hawaiian Tropic.

Newman was also a championship team owner. Partnering with fellow racer Carl Haas, the Newman/Haas IndyCar team won eight series championships — including in 1984 with driver Mario Andretti — in its nearly 30 years of open-wheel competition.

In pop culture, Newman enjoyed a late-life return to some prominence that combined his two loves — he voiced the 1951 Hudson Hornet, Doc Hudson, in the 2006 movie "Cars."

Given his relatively late entry into auto racing, Newman was in no hurry to wind down that career. At age 70, he was clearly the star attraction at the ’95 Rolex 24, where his Jack Roush-built Ford Mustang carried an age-inspired number — 70 — and sponsorship from Paramount Pictures, hyping the newly released Newman film, “Nobody’s Fool.”

Newman’s co-drivers were well-known racers — Mark Martin, Tommy Kendall and Mike Brockman. In a field of 74 cars, the No. 70 Mustang finished third overall and won the GTS class by 27 laps over a Porsche co-driven by Rolex 24 legend Hurley Haywood.

Newman was behind the wheel when he drove the Mustang to the lead in Hour 5. After that stint, the News-Journal’s Godwin Kelly asked Newman if fellow competitors had been courteous in traffic.

“Courteous is what you find in office buildings and dentist offices,” he replied.

Though pronouncing himself done after another stint in Sunday’s closing hours, Roush convinced him to return to the cockpit to finish out the class victory.

Twenty years later, Roush recalled the scenario.

“I said, ‘No, Paul, this is your race car, you’ve got to be in it for the last hour when we finish,’ ” Roush said. “So he reached down and did something that an American hero would do, and got back in the car for the last hour.”

Shortly thereafter, he took part in what has become a familiar Victory Lane tradition at Daytona.

Rolex, a Swiss watchmaker since 1905, became title sponsor of the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1992 and has been passing out high-end timepieces ever since — every driver on every class-winning team gets a Rolex Oyster Perpetual Cosmograph, steel and yellow gold with a pear-white dial.

Winners of the Daytona 500, as well as the Daytona 200 motorcycle race, also receive a Rolex watch.

Some online shopping suggests you’d pay about $15,000 today for a Rolex Daytona, but if you want one with an inscription dedicated to Paul Newman following the 1995 Rolex 24, expect to spend considerably more.

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Paul Newman once drove a Mustang to get a Rolex at Daytona; want it?