JOHN Budgen, one of WA’s most respected motoring sportsmen, died last week, aged 71.
The genial Wanneroo veteran was a life member of the Vintage Sports Car Club of WA and was still active in racing until 2008. That year he drove his distinctive red Brudge Special to victory in several regularity events at Barbagallo Raceway and at Collie.
Tom Benson describes it on the Speedwest website: “Well, John Budgen clean-swept the regularity at both clubs, WASCC and VSCC, as I predicted. It has to be a record and it would have made him ‘The Oldest State Championship Series Winner’ ever! That is if we had (such) a championship.”
John left school and qualified as a painter and decorator, but had a deep involvement in motorsport from an early age.
His first self-built racer was a Fomo, so-named, son Greg told the packed chapel at Karrakatta, because it was “half-Ford and half-Morris.”
His last car, the Brudge, was built as a typical Aussie special of the 1930s.
He leaves his wife, Eleanor, and sons Peter, Paul and Greg.