1960 Austin Healey Bugeye Sprite

(The car that got John Saccameno into Vintage Racing)

After a year or so back into the classic car world I wondered what I was going to do next. I went to another British Car Union show was restless pretty early on. I had been looking into vintage racing, but knew if I wanted to get into it, it wouldn’t be in the 3000. I wandered over to the North Suburban Sports Car Club tent and started talking to the nice folks there who were promoting the Midwestern Council of Sports Car Clubs Vintage / Historic racing program. I would soon turn 40, and figured it was now or never. My research led me to Sprites as being great first race cars.

I found this one at a dealer in Florida. It was an ex H Production SCCA car that had run some vintage races, even though it had the big flares front and rear. It did have all of the safety gear, and a roll cage that NASCAR would approve. I immediately took it apart and cleaned it up, and made it mine. It took a while, but after a few seasons it became a very reliable car. It has well over a hundred races in MCSCC alone. It was built to be ultra reliable as I didn’t have any spare time due to my travel schedule to do much between events other than bleed the brakes and check the pads. I upgraded to a 1275 to take advantage of an o-ringed block, installed a close ratio gearset, and upgraded the brakes. I still take the car out at track days from time to time and recently rebuilt and upgraded the front and rear suspension. It’s still a really fun car to drive!

– John