Longtime vintage rally driver Richard Vojík died in a building fire last Saturday. He was 70 years old.

The fire occurred at 6 PM at a tire service station on Puškinova Street in Klatovy, a building that used to be a brewery. In particular, newspaper Plzeňská Drbna said it started in a workshop. Five brigades from the local fire department arrived on the scene and noticed flames had started to spread to the wood roof; they quickly had three hoses and used a hacksaw on the roof to open up holes for ventilation. The fire was fully put out by 10 PM.

Upon entering, they found Vojík on the ground with no sign of life, and he was pronounced dead.

According to a statement from AC Heating that confirmed Vojík’s passing, a collection of Italian race cars were also destroyed in the fire. Plzeňská Drbna noted the sports cars were only damaged by the smoke and soot, but there was a vintage motorcycle inside that was fully gone.

“Richard was a legendary veteran rally racer, an expert in restoring historic cars, and a man with a sense of humor who could inspire those around him,” reads the statement. “At the turn of the millennium, he participated in the creation of motoring programs for the regional television station ZaK and was responsible for rebuilding of a number of unique machines from historic buses to special transporters.”

Among Vojík’s projects was the restoration of a Škoda 706 RTO bus built in the 1980s by Jindřich Wloch to carry his yacht. Vojík and AC Company found both the boat and bus in 2022 in poor states, after which they began the rebuild. Once complete, they hoped to bring it to every dam in the Czech Republic.

Vojík was a regular in the Czech historic rally championship during the 2000s, often racing an Austin Mini Cooper and Morris Cooper S. He also brought his cars out to San Marino for the Rallylegend and the FIA European Historic Rally Championship.

Featured image credit: Petr Šedivec / eWRC.cz