IF you look up at the back row of Premier Speedway’s grandstand this weekend, you might spot a couple of familiar faces.
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Charlie and Jean Burley will be in the seats they have called their own for the past decade, alongside good friend Stewart Owen, and surrounded by scores of other long-term speedway enthusiasts.
“There’s quite a few around us up there,” Jean said. “There’s an ex-president, a couple from Laang.”
The Classic is a familiar stomping ground for the pair.
They have attended every staging of the race since it launched in 1973. Charlie raced at that inaugural meeting, making it through to the final where he started from 13th spot.
“I reckon there was about 40 entries for that very first one … and 30 turned up,” Jean said.
“Charlie drove a Valiant 6.”
A year or two later, he produced his best finish, running “about eighth” in the feature.
It was a proud moment for the man who had known he wanted to be a speedway driver after attending a Mount Gambier meeting with mates back in 1956.
“When I was around 16, I went to Mount Gambier with two guys from Warrnambool – Jack Brittain and Ian Sheppard,” Charlie said.
“We saw a hot rod race … and we came home and we built a car, an Oldsmobile.”
While Charlie was too young to race at the time, he got his opportunity four years later, launching his career in a 1937 Ford V8 Coupe.
He competed almost exclusively at Warrnambool in his debut season, but also raced twice at Hamilton.
Speedway was a different experience to what today’s drivers are used to, with the cars weighing about two tonnes.
Charlie moved on to the smaller sportsman class in the late 1960s, before progressing to a super modified, which he raced for about 10 years.
His days of competing were brought to an abrupt end after an accident at the speedway. Suprisingly, it didn’t occur during a race.
“In 1977, I broke my hip in a working bee at the track,” Charlie said.
“I broke my hip in five places. Fell off a ladder – one step (the bottom rung).
“That ended my racing.”
While he would no longer be tearing around the track at Premier Speedway, Charlie found another way to stay involved, becoming an announcer.
He’d had his first taste of calling a racing back in 1972 when the track hosted the Australian titles.
“BTV6 were filming it and they didn’t have anyone to call it, so he stood on the back of a Volkswagon Kombi out in the open,” Jean said.
Charlie had missed out on making the final by one point that day, but his knowledge of the drivers was exactly what was needed for the job.
“The president said, ‘Do you know all those cars out there?’, and I said, ‘Yeah’, and he said, ‘Get out and commentate’,” Charlie laughed.
“I just went and did it. I knew all the blokes; I’d raced them all weekend.”
The Burleys now sit alongside 90-year-old Stewart Owen, who co-commentated with Charlie for a decade, when they attend race meetings at Premier Speedway.
For Jean, also a former competitor, speedway was a world she was brought up into.
“I followed speedway racing in the old form, in England – I was born in England – and I went with my father as a toddler,” she said.
“I started with those heavy-weight hot rods back in the early ’60s, then I went to saloon cars, an FC Holden and a mini in later years.
“I won the ladies’ aggregate a few times. That was about as good as it got for ladies back in those days. Back then, you only got one race a night. Ladies’ racing was different; you didn’t race with the men.
“Most of my time was spent as an official out here at the speedway.”
Her daughter Katrina followed in her footsteps, racing street stocks and saloon cars, and Jean’s grandson Steven Watts has continued the family tradition.
He secured a podium finish in the Australian Street Stock title, finishing fourth as a 19-year-old.
Jean and Charlie have put in countless hours as officials and volunteers for speedway, and both have been recognised with life memberships.
In an era before computers made an appearance trackside, Jean would painstakingly tally up points during meetings. She has also done canteen work, been a gate-keeper and was secretary of the ladies “for a long time”.
She also typed up programmes for race meetings and printed them with a handheld printer at her table .
Charlie’s involvement in speedway has been comprehensive, ranging from a car builder and designer, through to a driver, announcer, pit manager and foundation member, as well as writing articles for newspapers and magazines.
The Burleys, who have a copy of every Grand Annual Sprintcar Classic programme since the first in 1973, will be proudly cheering on south-west representatives at Premier Speedway this weekend.
