NYORA local, Andrew Dike was born into racing, learning how to drive by sitting on his dad’s and grandad’s laps while they steered around the track.
By the time he was five and sitting in a booster seat, he was allowed to steer around the track and by the time he was eight, he was in the car by himself, racing.
“Pretty much the same way I’ll be teaching my son,” said Andrew, whose niece, Zara makes up the fourth generation in the car racing family.
Now at 33, Andrew still loves the competitiveness of the sport.
“In the car, it’s just me, I’m not relying on really anybody else, other than my machinery. I work on my car. I do everything on my car. So, it comes down to how good my workmanship is and how well I can drive.”
In August last year, Andrew bought an FG X Falcon and spent six months modifying it to create the perfect racing machine.
“Nothing on it’s standard anymore. Everything is handmade and I did most of it myself, and then my father-in-law helped me out for a little bit of it, because he used to work on V8 supercars,” Andrew explains.
“All the suspension is modified differently to standard, which makes it handle amazing. The motor has been heavily modified, which makes it ten times quicker than what it would be for standard. Then we use racing rubber, which is not what you’d use in your road car, and it makes a huge difference.”
Andrew has raced in ten meetings with it and won seven of these and set a new record for the eight-lap track in the modified sedan class, which is a national class.
The racing season has just begun for this year and Andrew plans to give it a red hot go and attend 15 or 16 race meets.
“My plan for this season is, I’ve got racing in Victoria, and then I go to South Australia, and then I’ll go up to Queensland and I’ll have a couple of races in New South Wales, so pretty much do the entire east coast plus South Australia.”
The first race meet however will be held in Nyora over the long weekend in November which will be two nights of racing for Andrew and he’ll share the car with his mum Trish, who’ll be racing on the third night in the sports sedans class.
“I share my car with my mum, which is, I reckon pretty cool. I don’t think many people do that,” said Andrew.
“It’s even more funny because there’s a little bit of a height discrepancy between me and my mom. My mom’s five foot six, and I’m six foot.”
As there’s no moving the seat, Andrew made a couple of pads for Trish, who is a two-time state champion, to sit on and they have compromised on the steering wheel height.
Andrew’s dad and his brother will also be racing that same weekend – all three competing against each other in the same event, but Andrew is confident that the win will be his.
The Nyora race meeting will run the standard saloons feature, which includes the Dougo Memorial 44 lapper, wingless sprints, sports sedans, modified sedans, outlaw karts, there will also be the Miles Cup, V8 dirt modifieds and junior races.
The Nyora Race Meet will be held on Saturday to Monday, November 2, 3 and 4 at the Nyora Raceway. To find out more go to nyoraraceway.org.au.