After many years of watching from the sideline and getting my feet wet with high-performance driving schools, I’ve finally decided to commit and begin vintage racing.
The nice thing about vintage racing is that you can get going with as little as $10,000 or less, or go crazy and spend millions. In my case, I set a budget of $30,000 for buying and fully preparing a race car. Naturally, it had to be an Alfa Romeo.
I decided to go with a 1965 Alfa Romeo Giulia Ti that already had all the necessary modifications to get started in racing:
- Lightened bodywork (i.e. stripped of everything unnecessary including crossmembers, door panels, etc.)
- Alfa Romeo 2 litre motor with hot Petatori cams, Speri head, 11:1 compression, total 186 HP
- Marelliplex electronic ignition
- Shankle headers
- Side exhaust
- Limited Slip Differential
- Race oil pump and oil cooler
- Shankle sway bars
- Sparco race seats and 5-point harnesses
- Ward & Dean springs with Koni shocks
- Upgraded brakes
- Half roll-cage
- Fuel cell
All in, the purchase and setup has cost me $26,000, leaving me enough to eventually fix up the body blemishes and paint it properly.
So, how would you build your ideal vintage racer if you had a $30,000 budget?
Photography by Aaron McKenzie for Petrolicious
