My classic race cars

The Brisbane truck and bus driver now owns four historic race cars and has run out of room in his shed. "I live in the past, my wife (Joanne) tells me," he says. Moore, 58, only started racing karts about 20 years ago having got his thrills as a youth playing rugby league for Valleys in the 1970s.

"I only had a few first grade games, broke a few things and never took it seriously," he says. "After that I suppose I was looking for some new form of excitement. Racing is a completely different type of adrenalin." So after his daughters grew up and he had more disposable income, he started disposing of it on cars.

"I've always had cars. I could have been retired by now if I hadn't had that many cars," he says. "I've had a big Dodge Phoenix, Chevies and other cruisers, plus XT and XW Falcon GTs at one stage.
"The cars I've bought and sold over the years, you have no idea."

But they had to go when Moore started collecting race cars in 2000. His first was a 1964 EH Holden race car he bought for $6000.

"It had a bit of race history with it," he says. "It was raced in Sydney around the old tracks there and on the Central Coast. I'm doing a full resto on that. I've taken it back to the bare metal and painting it up in the original colours and I'll continue to race it."

The EH was followed by a 1953 FX Holden he bought in 2004 for $12,000.

"The first time I saw the Humpy I had taken the EH to Oran Park to race a long time ago and I approached (the owner) and said if you ever want to sell that I'll buy it. I had my cheque book ready in my pocket. Then a few years later I was unloading the EH at Eastern Creek and he came over and said, `Get your cheque book out'. I still had the XW GT in the shed and came home and told my wife and she said I had to sell a car to buy it. The first bloke that saw the XW bought it. Three months later the price doubled and another three months later it doubled again."

He ran the Humpy in the inaugural Cootha Classic last year and may give it another run this year. It was followed by a 1968 two-door Mark II Cortina belonging to a sick friend.

"He rang me asking me to buy it and named a price that I said was too cheap," he says. "When I rang him later to buy it at that price he said, 'No because you told me it was worth more'. "I ended up paying $7500 but it's a beauty with the original 1500cc four-cylinder engine running Webbers and hotted up."

His final purchase was a 1957 FE Holden he recently bought for $2000.

With his shed full of race cars plus his 1984 diesel LandCruiser and new Nissan Navara which are his daily drivers he has the FE "hidden in a mate's shed".

"It's stock standard at the moment. We're going to cut the rust out, do the suspension, put a roll cage in it, then do the brakes and engine and go racing. I've always been a budget racer doing the stuff at home with a few mates. Brakes are the big problems with these cars. I used to get two or three laps in and then have no brakes. But I got some new drums cast in Sydney with heavier materials and some new brake linings - I tried carbon and kevlar but that was just too expansive - and I've finally got the package right."

He races circuits up and down the east coast.

"I go ok. We have a lot of fun. There are races within races," he says. "There are the blokes up front with Falcon GTs, Camaros and Mustangs. Blokes like Jim Richards, Bo Seton and Andrew Miedecke but we don't play with those fellows. We're down the back in our own little battle group. There is a huge interest in these historic meetings now. I'd rather hang over the fence and watch the historics than watch the V8 Supercars go round. They're like slot cars."

Moore prefers the rush he gets from making old cars go fast and keeping them running.

"I'll keep racing as long as I can afford it. I still hope I'll be doing it when I'm 80," he says. "I also have a huge desire to get a Vincent (motorcycle) sidecar like they used to race at the Ekka speedway. I'd love to get one, put my leg over it and go for a few laps. I'd put one of my mates I don't like on the side as the swinger."

The Cootha Classic will be held on May 29-30 featuring more than 250 cars and about 50 motorcycles from the 1920s to today in timed sprints around a 1450m track up and down Sir Samuel Griffith Drive with seven corners and chicanes. Racing starts at 8.30am. Entry is $20 a day, $15 for concession, $30 for a two-day pass and $5 for parking in the J.C. Slaughter Falls carpark.