Opinion: Why everyone should try grassroots motorsport

Perhaps I got overexcited in my column last month, as it was only afterwards that I realised – in my haste to rant about the exorbitant prices of once-cheap JDM dream machines – that I never properly introduced myself to you, the MOTOR clan.
So here we go: Hi, I’m Alex. And I love track days!

The bug bit me hard many moons ago and, while there’s little logic in spending significant amounts of money and time so you can drive around in circles racing nobody but yourself, I’ve truly found it to be one of life’s greatest pleasures.

The events I primarily take part in are club level sprint days, and grassroots time attack events. But I think there’s a universal attraction in whatever your chosen poison is, be it drag racing, drifting, rallying or autocross.

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It’s not always smooth sailing, however. The days can be incredibly long and taxing, the car maintenance is never ending, and – even if you never bin or break anything – it’s never what you’d call a ‘cheap’ hobby. But being alone in a car on a race track can be one of the most liberating experiences you can have.

Of course, from the outside, the consequence of speed and risk can seem unnerving, but that quickly fades away once you have an event or two under your belt. A colleague once asked me whether there’s much pressure at these track days, but I’ve found it to be quite the opposite.

In fact, track days to me are one of the few instances in life where there isn’t any pressure. It’s just me and my machine, constantly trying to best my own lap record on a never-ending quest for incremental self-improvement.

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And I do believe it’s a universal appeal. I never ‘understood’ the appeal of drag racing, until the first time I had to performance benchmark a car at Heathcote. It’s that same dopamine hit you get from time attack, that process of making repeatable movements with fine adjustments and trying to get the best result. Except you get that hit every 13 seconds at the drag strip, instead of every minute and 40 seconds at Winton. It’s true what they say, don’t knock it ’til you try it.

The best thing is, though, you’re not thinking about work, or the home life. You’re not trying to be the fastest (believe me, you won’t be). But it will teach you more about driving, and about your car, than you’ll ever learn in the public domain, no matter how flash your vehicle is, or how ‘spirited’ your Sunday morning drives are.

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There’s an incredible social aspect at track days, too, with a tight-knit and supportive community that is increasingly absent elsewhere in the car scene these days. Even at competition days: I’ve been in the garages at World Time Attack and have seen competitors lending tools, even pairs of hands, to help their opponents get back out on track.

Of course there are rivalries, but we’re all trying to push each other. And the driver whose lap times you’ve been side-eyeing because you’re both close to setting a PB, will be the first to come up and give you a high-five when you finally break that barrier.

Grassroots motorsports isn’t as inaccessible as many would think. Modern cars need little in the way of prep to stand up to a day at the races, with most needing little more than a fresh service, perhaps some brake pads, and a mounted fire extinguisher.

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My friends at Nugget Nationals have been holding a budget time attack league for years, complete with an upper limit cost cap of $5000; which includes cost of vehicle purchase and modification, excluding safety items, with further limits on engine capacity, forced induction and certain modifications.

There’s even romance in the pre-dawn slog to Winton. Everyone from Melbourne stops at the Wallan BP for fuel and breakfast.

It’s still dark, but about 30 minutes further along the Hume Highway, the sky begins to turn a deep murky blue, then purple, then pink. And then daylight breaks, and the world turns gold. It’s soul cleansing stuff, like going on a camping trip with your mates – but with race cars instead. What could be better?