THE South Coast Raceway is now a staple of Portland’s summer sporting landscape, with events held at the throughout the warmer months attracting competitors and spectators from across the state, however it’s a place which wouldn’t exist without the phenomenal commitment of brothers John and Peter Cleary.

However, when the idea for a local drag strip was discussed almost 25 years ago, no one could have predicted that it would become one of the most prominent and successful drag racing locations in the nation, and that it would have reached this status off the back of volunteers donating countless hours and dollars to the cause.

The Cleary brothers, both of whom are life members of the South Coast Drag Racing Association, explained that the location of the drag strip, which sits just off Madeira Packet Road on the south side of Portland, came about as a result of nothing more than a “comment” all those years ago.  

“We were up at the Casterton drags… and we came back from that and decided we wanted to look into the airport to create our own track, but that ultimately didn’t work,” John said.

“We looked into a few other places in town owned by the shire, but none of them were any good, which led to a comment by me that they weren’t going to develop the land we’re currently on for another 20 years.

“One thing led to another purely over a chat, I wasn’t going to be doing anything with the land for a little while, so we figured why not do something out there.

“We certainly weren’t expecting that this many years later it would become one of the best tracks in Australia.”

However, finding an adequate location for the venue was far from the end of the challenges that laid in path to the eventual success of the track, with John explaining that “banks didn’t want to touch (it).”

“At the time we put a proposal through to the government via the council, and initially it came back with a few objections, so we decided to do it ourselves,” Peter said.

“John supplied the land… he didn’t get any money for it for a few years, we were racing here long before he got any kind of lease on it.

“John put up a part of the funding, and another 10 of our members put up as guarantors to put money against it… a lot of them stand to this day.”

“It had hundreds of pine trees on the land, and half the current pit area was scrub which had to be removed… it was a real challenge.”

The first race meeting at the venue was in 2006, almost a full decade after the plans had been set in motion back in 1997.

However, even after the raceway was up and running, the obstacles continued to pop up.

“We initially built the track with vehicles that could do it in seven or eight seconds in mind, but it wasn’t too many years later that we had to extend the braking area,” Peter said.

“We had to keep extending and extending, to the point now where it’s basically the only drag strip in Australia that’s got a bend in it.

“That was the only thing we could do, there was no choice unless we pulled the whole place apart.”

The story of the creation and development certainly demonstrates a level of ingenuity amongst the group as time and again they’ve been able to overcome the hurdles placed in front of them.

But the brothers say this success story wouldn’t have been possible without the assistance of the community around them.

“The neighbours have been great, obviously the smoke and noise which comes up from our events can be something to deal with, but they’ve worked with us,” John said.

“It’s all been voluntary, and we’ve been fortunate to have a great group of members… we’ve got carpenters, concreters, builders and plumbers who have all been willing to lend a hand.”

“Once we started running, there were other drag clubs around like Hamilton, Casterton, Warrnambool and Colac who all donated money to us which has been massive,” Peter said.

“That’s sort of the way it’s been all along; we’ve had individual donors come along who have helped us out.”

And as for what the future holds for the drag strip and for the association as a whole, both brothers said the signs are positive.

“We’re getting different varieties of cars coming through along with new members, hopefully it keeps going along the way it is,” John said.

“Obviously you can’t predict the future or exactly how fast and big Portland is going to continue to grow, but it’s on the right track.”