Fernando is a 1935 Austin 7 Special. Officially owned by Russell Dickson of the Austin 7 Club, Michelle has become custodian of the car after sitting in it and discovering she fits.
Much of Fernando’s history is unknown, but with recent tales aplenty the lack of history isn’t seen to be a significant issue.
The Beginning
After helping to return cars to Austin 7 Heaven on a hot summer day in 2025, Michelle sat in Fernando and commented that she found it a good fit. Thus began the journey to get Fernando back into competition (not that he had this name yet).
With Historic Winton due to be held about 4 months after this fateful day, Michelle started attending the Austin 7 Club “Tool Up” days and working on “the race car”. Word quickly spread around the club and it wasn’t long before people were preparing the car for her. In true vintage racer style, everyone assumed the car was just as good as the day it was last used (over 5 years prior) and focussed on important things like polishing the radiator cowl.
Michelle joined in and started treating the leather bonnet straps, but with not to much tension applied, one of them broke. Michelle’s knowledge of leather from her interest in horses quickly came to the fore and it wasn’t long before new bonnet straps were purchased. New air filters were also ordered and the car was given a general clean.
Michelle had been taught how to start the car and had driven it up and down the centre aisle of Austin 7 Heaven, a journey totalling just under 25 metres.
The First Drive
The car was loaded on a trailer and taken up to Winton Motor Raceway in preparation for Historic Winton. Michelle and Michael arrived on the Thursday to help set-up the event and Michelle took the opportunity to drive the car around the paddock. Michelle’s caution was about to pay off, before changing to second gear it was time to test the brakes. Nothing happened!
Michelle rolled to a stop and the car was put in the display area for the weekend. Thankfully, not all was lost; Michelle managed to find a fellow Austin 7 Club member who was willing to let her drive his car in the parade laps and he provided some useful coaching to help her understand Austin 7s a bit better.
Don’t Give Up
After returning to Austin 7 Heaven Michelle worked with some others to rebuild the brake master cylinder.
Michael noted that the BMW Driver’s Club Melbourne had a Come ‘n’ Try day scheduled for around 6 weeks after Historic Winton. With some emails and phone calls it was arranged that Michelle could join the parade laps and if the car was too slow special allowance would be made so she could get some experience.
Ready for her first time on track Michelle donned her beanie and followed the safety car out on circuit. Michelle completed her first few laps and came back questioning some weird noises from the car.
Noise? What Noise?
Back at Austin 7 Heaven and the noises at Sandown were mentioned. Once again, in-keeping with historic racer mentality, it was determined the noises must be normal and the problem was a lack of a helmet. As such, a helmet was ordered in the hope that if Michelle couldn’t hear the noises then they must not exist.
The next event on the calendar was the Vintage Sports Car Club’s Vintage Hillclimb at Rob Roy.
What’s in a Name?
It was around this time “the race car” started being called Fernando. Russell, the owner of the car normally names his cars after the person he purchased them from, but in this situation and with a lack of comprehensive records, he accepted that Michelle has called it Fernando and that shall be its name. Of course the name conjures up a song by Abba, but also reminds Michelle of chicken (for Nando’s, it’s Peri Peri fast).
The Visor Comes Down
Finally, at Rob Roy, Fernando got race. Although the attempts to get him into 3rd gear were quickly followed by a shift back to second, Fernando was being driven like a racer is meant to be. Foot to the floor on the accelerator, Fernando roared up the hillclimb and managed to beat the Model T Ford that was in the same class. It seemed like Fernando was coming back to life.
The next event was Mt Tarrengower. With a last minute entry and some strings being pulled, Fernando was given a place on the entry list. The first runs went well, but then a little cough on the start line turned into a large puddle of rusty water on the ground and Fernando being pushed back to the paddock. Thankfully Walter helped Michelle to replace some of the cooling system and the next run was about 10% quicker than the first few. Fernando returned to Austin 7 Heaven feeling much cooler, but even so, Michelle cleaned out his entire cooling system.
With a clean cooling system, Fernando found himself entered in the 33rd Historic and Classic Hillclimb. The weather was atrocious, but like all good race cars, Fernando still went out on track. Vintage cars with suspension like Fernando’s rely significantly on their tyres for suspension and grip; although traction wasn’t lost, new tyres have been added to the shopping list, and some additional attention to the brakes is in order.