Interview with Dr David Enderby

Dr David Enderby is an anaesthetist with a private practice in London, now retired from the NHS. Here he shares his love for fast cars.

I started my motorsport by taking part in Driving Tests (Autotests), Sprints and Hill Climbs in 1967 with my road car. Initially an 850cc Mini then a 1275cc Austin Cooper S.

In 1970 I bought a racing Mini and did my first circuit race. I’ve been racing now for almost 50 years. I don’t think I’ve ever had a season since when I haven’t raced and have had over 165 class or overall wins.

After the Mini I had a succession of Hillman Imps, most of which I built myself. Following that we built a Special Saloon VW Karmann Ghia which proved to be the best car and with it I had over 80 wins.
When I started racing there were two ways of going racing. You either had to arrive at a race-car factory with lots of cash, which none of us had, or learn to build a car from scratch. This is what I did. We watched mechanics and drivers and learnt our craft from there.

If something went wrong we had to fix it ourselves. Many mechanics in motor racing at that time were self-taught although we always benefitted from a network of friends who can help with various issues.
Ten years ago I bought my first new racecar a Radical Sportscar which I am still racing. Radical has made and sold more sportscars in this country than any other business.

Race cars are always evolving, being improved and developed. Drivers and mechanics will always be considering what else they can do to the car. I have friends who prefer to build the cars rather than race but I enjoy both construction and driving.
When you are racing you only have time to race one car. It is too time-consuming because of the constant maintenance – you have to check every nut and bolt, you can’t just open the garage door.

However, a friend is helping me to rebuild the VW Karmann Ghia I first built in 1981. It was VW’s attempt to make a sports car but it had a standard “Beetle” engine so was hugely under-powered. It had a rear engine which is what we needed so we could use a mid-engined lightweight sports car chassis instead of a steel one.

It took 1,000 hours and cost around £10,000 to build, but it was very fast from the beginning.  Over the ensuing years we used 3 different engines going larger and faster each time.

When my children were small I used to spend every night in the garage except Mondays when a friend would come to the house to talk about motor racing! My eldest son is now a very fast driver and my younger son is an excellent mechanic.
The technology is always evolving. The average road car battery weighs around 12 kg. Now we have lithium batteries which weigh 1.5kg and have three times the power.

There is a lot more money in motorsport now. Many drivers do not maintain their car themselves.  There are very many businesses that will run your car for you – at considerable expense.