Ensign, who hails from Sebastopol in California, is an experienced sprint car racer.

“I’ve been racing since I was 14 and I’m 28 now. I got into sprint cars when I turned 18,” he said.

It is his third time competing in Australia and he said it was great to be back.

“These guys put a team together and invited me down to race their car,” he said.

“I love it down here. I can’t wait to jump back in the car.”

Downs teamed up with Terry Black from Toowoomba in Queensland to bring Ensign to Australia, an idea he said they first spoke about more than a year ago.

“It’s a big job – Terry and I talked about this maybe a year ago and spoke about getting an American down here to run the car,” Downs said.

“I knew of Geoff and spoke to him about a couple years ago about getting him to come down and race but it didn’t work out.”

Plenty of work goes into maintaining and preparing sprint cars for races, with the team having travelled down from Queensland via Sydney before arriving in Lower Norton on Sunday night.

“There’s a lot of work involved, in between races there is a lot of engine maintenance and that’s if you don’t have any crashes,” Downs said. 

This is the third American driver Downs has brought to Victoria over the past five years to race sprint cars, something he said is an expensive hobby. 

“The engine in the car is worth $90,000 – it isn’t cheap,” he said.

Downs, Ensign and the team will travel to Avalon on Wednesday for the President’s Cup before heading across the border to Mt Gambier for the King’s Sprint Car Challenge the following day. 

Ensign will then race at the Grand Annual Sprint Car Classic in Warrnambool from January 19-21.

He said he was expecting some tough competition.

“It’s the best of the best down here and some of the guys from the States come out here and it’s a tough competition,” Ensign said. 

“I will be racing 130 cars at Warrnambool and 50 odd at Avalon. There are a lot of great drivers down here.”