David Bailey loves cars. He loves racing cars, and he loves fixing cars. He likes refurbishing old cars and he likes building them from scratch. With the Kiama Hot Rod Run coming to Kiama 6 -8 September, The Bugle spoke to Bailey about this insane lifelong passion.

Having caught the racing bug, Bailey began his journey riding motocross at 16. From there, he got a job as an apprentice mechanic. It was during the apprenticeship he realised that he loved fixing and toggling with cars.

In 1988, a new category called HQ racing was introduced for racers, who wanted to get into racing but couldn’t afford it. The aim was to create a class of racing that was both affordable and exciting. This was Bailey’s first foray into real car racing.

“ I thought, well that progresses my next step up into racing cars. So I built, from the ground up, a HQ Holden for this HQ race series which started in 1988 and is still going now,” says Bailey.

Bailey pursued HQ racin for a while, before taking a break to start a family. After 10 years away, he wanted to get back into it and began with motocross again. Although he enjoyed it, his body couldn’t handle it longer. 

This led him to production car racing, which is a racing category where unmodified (or slightly modified) production cars race each other.

“This is basically how it was in the 70s. Get them off the showroom, a few modifications and then let's go racing. So I bought a Toyota 86, turned it into a production car in 2012 and did production car racing right up to this year,” Bailey says.

A popular race within production car racing is the Bathurst 6 Hour. Bailey has competed in it four times and twice, raced in his own built car, a Toyota 86. He has been most successful in this car.

“I was lucky enough to get third in our division in consecutive years. And it felt amazing racing my own car and coming third after a six-hour race around Bathurst. It was really hard work. Then to come back and think I actually built that car and, not only did we race it, but it lasted. When there were bigger teams than us who had issues,” he says.

Then Bailey came across a 1970 Ford V6 GT Capri, one of the only cars of its kind still in running order in Australia. It sparked some nostalgia, and he just had to have it.

“It combined my two loves: old cars and racing. Also, my very first car when I was 16 was an old Ford Capri, a little 1600, and I had that for a year or so before I sold it and bought the V6 GT. But back in those days, you used to think it was just another car.”

He races the Ford Capri in historic races, which are races limited to a specific era. For Bailey that means cars that were used as race cars before December 1985. 

“This car has been a racecar since 1980, it has a proven history of racing. It raced against Peter Brock and Allen Moffat back in the early 80s. So I could build another car exactly the same beside it, down to the nut and bolt, but it will not be a historic race car because it has no history of racing,” says Bailey.

He raced the car down at Victoria’s Winton Raceway but didn’t test its limits too much as, he says, drivers have to get used to new cars. He was also wary of crashing the Ford Capri as the parts for it aren’t easy to find these days.

“By the last race on the weekend, the guy who owned it told me that the best time it had ever run around that course was around 1 minute 53s with racing tyres. We ended up going round in 1 minute 52s on non-racing tyres. I told him after, we could find another 2 seconds in this car easily. There's just a few maintenance issues,” says Bailey.

As to why he has dedicated his life to cars and car racing, especially historic racing, Bailey confirms that there is a little bit of nostalgia involved in reviving these old cars and bringing them back to life. 

But he also says that he has an enthusiasm for and appreciation for cars that he can’t explain. He just loves them.

“The amount of money that you spend is ridiculous. Some people make a spreadsheet with all of the money they spend on a car and that is the last thing I would ever do. I don’t want to know how much I spend on a car. I love fixing cars just as much as I love racing them. 

There are just things you can’t put a value on in money. Why do people go rock climbing? Surfing? Hang gliding? Because it's something they love.”

Apart from racing and building/fixing cars, Bailey gets to express his passion during car shows, where he meets like-minded people, is able to share his ideas and possibly steal some from fellow car lovers.

“Car shows are a great community event, it brings a lot of people into a town. Even people who aren't that into cars, will come because they like looking at old cars. And when you go to any car show, there is such a wide variety of cars. You’ve got everything from maybe a car that's ten-years-old to something that a guy spent ten years restoring, which is 50-years-old. 

There’s always stories to be told and you’ll find that people at car shows are very open and there’s no secrets, which is way different to racing where everyone has their own secrets,” he says.

The Kiama Hot Rod Run takes place in various locations around the Kiama LGA from 6 to 8 September. You can access the schedule via the Bugle app.