Vehicles of all shapes, sizes

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/04/2023 (1264 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It was 1965, and a young Ray Kozak was sitting crossed-legged on the floor watching television when a commercial stopped him in his tracks and set him on a course — all because of a horse.

“I remember seeing this Mustang ripping down the gravel road with all the horses running in the field beside it. I don’t remember how fast he was going, but it seemed fast for me when I was a kid,” Kozak said. “And that’s when I said to myself, ‘I gotta get me one of those.’”

He did get one of those Ford Mustangs. In fact, it was his first car soon as he turned 16, with a bank loan of $1,500.

“I had that 1972 Mustang coupe for 37 years. It was my high school car, a cruiser, and I also did a bit of drag racing with it at Gimli, and then I did the car show circuit before I decided to sell it.”

Buying and selling cars is not uncommon for someone like Kozak, who loves them, especially Mustangs. He’s on his fifth one — a 2011 Shelby GT 500 that so far, he’s not selling. The car is a bit of a rarity, he said — information that was confirmed in the Marti Report.

Kevin Marti is an American mechanical engineer who created a database of all Ford vehicles made between 1967 and 2014. Car owners can send in the vehicle’s VIN, and for a fee, will receive a personalized report that provides all the information about the vehicle’s original equipment.

“My Shelby GT — they only made about 260 of those cars in that particular trim. The report I received told me the date my car was built, when it was shipped and the options that came with it, so I realized that the racing stripes on the Shelby’s hood were added by the previous owner. I’ve had reports for my last four cars. It’s an added value,” said Kozak.

For this car guy, life-sized vehicles aren’t the only wheels that Kozak said he is interested in. An admitted sentimental softie, he’s a car enthusiast as well as a toy collector, mainly Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars.

“I still have my Hot Wheels from when I was eight years old. I remember going to the store with my mom, and she might buy me one. I grew up in the small town of Roblin, and people didn’t have a lot of money, so now I’m able to afford to buy those collector cars I wasn’t able to when I was a kid,” Kozak said.

Online auctions, eBay, flea markets, and TV shows like “Pawn Stars” are some of the places that Kozak checks and places bids on — on a regular basis to add to his collection of about 600 Hot Wheels and 300 Matchbox cars.

“Hot Wheels is my main item from the era 1968 to 1973. They are probably one of the few items that haven’t lost their value. In fact, the record for a Hot Wheels car is the 1969 Hot Wheels Volkswagen Pink Beach Bomb currently listed at $150,000, and only 40 of them are known to exist,” said Kozak.

Other rare Kozak collectibles include almost a dozen vintage snowmobiles, with all the accessories that go along with them.

The bright red 1974 Alouette Jr. Brute he owns was manufactured in Canada and promoted as “any youngster’s dream come true.” Kozak said it’s about the size of a coffee table and a few years ago, won best in show in the restored snowmobile category at Brandon’s Super Run, Western Canada’s largest classic car show.

But the real prize is his 1972 Silver Bullet Skidoo model that was only manufactured for one year. Back then, Kozak said he was only 13 years old playing marbles and street hockey, but he knew he would get one — eventually.

“The older ones are just more fun to ride, you know, smelling two stroke oil burning,” he said as he laughed. “It just brings back old times, you know what I mean? When I fire up one of those old sleds, I have to open the door so I can see.

“But that’s the fun of it.”

Vacations with his wife Rose are built around everything “racing and automotive related,” including attending NASCAR almost 15 times, experiencing the annual collector car auction hosted by the Barrett-Jackson company in Arizona, and in Las Vegas, the largest automotive specialty-equipment event in the world called, the SEMA Show.

Rose laughed and exclaimed, “I’m used to it, we’ve been married for 43 years! Whatever makes him happy, and we get to do it together.”

The next adventure together will be on their 2016 Harley Davidson Street Glide for a trip down to Sturgis, S.D., for the motorcycle rally promoted as the biggest biker party on the planet.

Kozak won’t confirm or deny if it’s a trip to buy another bike or to simply enjoy the ride.

» mmcdougall@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @enviromichele