Brocky

David Hassall began writing about motor racing for magazines while still a teenager at school and has since worked exclusively as a professional motoring journalist. His work has been published in most Australian newspapers and motoring magazines over the past 36 years.

Born in Melbourne in 1955, David became infatuated with motor sport as a 13 year-old after watching the great Scottish driver Jim Clark race at Sandown. Less than three years later, encouraged by the late Peter Wherrett, he started writing articles for Racing Car News magazine and at the age of 17 left school to work for the Light Car Club of Australia, the Sandown circuit promoter.

He spent most of the next 15 years working for The Age newspaper's magazine division, editing titles such as Auto Action and Australian Motor Racing. After a three-year stint as media manager for the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport and another three years writing motoring for The Australian, David became the founding editor and co-publisher of the fortnightly Motorsport News magazine in 1993. For the past decade he has worked exclusively in the general motoring field, mainly for the GoAuto website.

David first met Peter Brock while reporting motor racing events in the early 1970s and they soon become close friends. From 1976 to 1984, David was Peter's part-time 'ghostwriter', producing hundreds of columns that appeared in magazines and newspapers throughout the country, and worked closely with Peter producing an authorised biography of his career to that point.

In addition to writing The Peter Brock Story in 1983, David has edited a number of motor racing annuals, produced an early account of Allan Moffat's career - titled Moffat: The Making of a Legend – and even wrote a book about the Australian Open golf championship. He also co-wrote and produced a highly-regarded family history book in 1998 to coincide with the bicentenary of his family's arrival in Australia as missionaries.

David has three adult children (Shawn, Ariana and Kim) and lives in Melbourne with partner Sue and her two teenage daughters (Kellie and Brooke). When not working or reading, mostly about car racing, music or running away to France, he can be found keeping fit and satisfying his competitive instincts on a tennis court or golf course.