Richard Buttrose is a real-life Walter Mitty and one of Australia's great characters — with a past as colourful as they come. He's been a private investigator, stockbroker, restaurateur and race car driver, and — infamously — spent nine years in prison. He's now graduated as a lawyer and he's back winning races on the track. He tells his own story with a grin, not an apology, and that's exactly what makes him magnetic.
Richard Buttrose was a well-known name in Australian motorsport, with success across national championships like the Lotus Trophy and the Australian Performance Car Championship. Driving for Lotus Australia, he won a class victory at the Bathurst 12 Hour — two days later, he was arrested.
With one of Australia's most famous names — Richard is the nephew of Ita Buttrose — it was a hard fall from grace. His arrest made headlines, and his incarceration took racing off the table for the best part of a decade. Richard doesn't dodge it, doesn't dress it up, and doesn't perform remorse for the cameras. He tells it the way it happened, with the wit and self-awareness of a man who's genuinely at peace with where he's been and exactly where he's going.
While the world had written him off, Richard was busy rewriting the ending. He recently completed a law degree — a genuinely brilliant feat, earned through sheer discipline and a mind his own aunt, Ita Buttrose, has called "terrific." Somewhere in there he also stepped back in front of the cameras, taking on Celebrity SAS Australia and reminding everyone that he's never been one to take the easy version of any story. Now he's found his way back to where it started: behind the wheel, racing again, winning again, and loving it. In April he scored a class win at the Bathurst 6 Hour, and he's currently leading the State Touring Car Championship.
He's a rare combination — the sharp, disciplined mind of a newly minted law graduate and the instinct of a born racer, all wrapped up in a character full of stories, one-liners, and a past he wears with a smile, not a shadow. Public perception has never quite caught up to the brilliant, larger-than-life man he actually is.