This Enthusiast Focuses Efforts on a No-Boundaries Car Community

Cars, community, culture, chasing dreams—these are themes we’re all familiar with amongst our enthusiast set. But you have to start somewhere, and not every kid (or adult) knows where the trailhead is. Rashod Bacon is offering a platform where people can meet, greet, and, most of all, learn from others with a familiar face.

By familiar, I don’t mean famous faces. Instead, the focus is on people who look like you. Maybe they have similar backgrounds; maybe they don’t. But they are faces you recognize from your childhood, from your neighborhood, from when you look into the mirror. And that sense of familiarity brings comfort, even confidence, to approach, to ask, to be yourself.

In the latest episode of CARISMA, The Drive sits down with Bacon, a passionate car collector who often found himself as the “only” in the room and wanted to change that. He started Motoring While Black as an avenue to connect people of color within the car community. What he found surprised him.

There wasn’t a lack of POC interested in the car scene like he thought. Instead, there were many folks interested in cars, but they were separated, almost clique-ish, into different groups that rarely overlapped or networked.

“The reason I started Motoring While Black was to acknowledge and put a spotlight on other people of color in the scene, and [who] are advocates and allies,” said Bacon. “It’s not just about Black people. It really is a group effort to make the scene more inclusive, more diverse.”

Bacon was born in South Central Los Angeles but later moved to Atlanta during his youth. However, his “internal compass” brought him back to L.A. He says he’s always been interested in cars but that his automotive tastes have evolved from the ’64 Impalas of his childhood to tuners and now to his current interest in European cars, specifically vintage BMWs.

“My love for cars ebbed and flowed throughout the years,” he says. “I was really always into variety.”

His personal collection has included a Volkswagen GTI, a Porsche 911 (“a dream car for me”), and Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 (“my pandemic purchase”). As for going vintage, the experience didn’t go as planned, but he says the early failings are what makes connecting with people, giving them hope in continuing to be part of the car community, so much easier.

“I feel like a lot of us that come from the have-not side of it, we’re looking at these things as if they’ll become true,” said Bacon. “And I’m here to say, ‘Naw.’ I came from the ghetto.”

Catching the vintage car bug, Bacon purchased a 1969 BMW 1600. The vehicle was patina-laden, had “sketch tires,” and probably hadn’t been driven in at least a decade but wore a “light green color that I’d never seen before.” Of course, he bought it.

“There was no better feeling in the world driving down Highway 14 in…my first classic car,” Bacon reminisces. “That moment was interrupted by the temperature gauge going hot. It overheated and amazingly broke down on the way home.”

But that was just the beginning. Weeks later, a wonky spark plug caused the engine to go “bang” while he was driving. The solution: an engine swap. Out went the 1.6-liter M10 four-cylinder and in went a 2.5-liter M20 straight-six sourced from a 1991 BMW 325is.

So, while the 1600’s interior and exterior remain original, underneath “from the radiator to the differential” is a BMW E30. The faded green Bimmer has received a host of underbelly updates: a reinforced chassis, a custom exhaust, and upgrades to the suspension, brakes, and fuel tank.

“It’s a perfect daily driver here in Los Angeles,” Bacon says. “In the heat, on the freeway, in the traffic. It’s such a beautiful driving experience.”

“And that’s why I share so much about my own experience with the cars and breaking down and giving just really a true perspective,” he adds. “The hope is to inspire someone that is looking at a certain lifestyle and see, ‘Oh, there’s a person of color that’s doing it.’ There’s not that much mystique around it. If you want it, you can get it.”