Mark ‘Frosty’ Winterbottom urges students to join PM’s Spelling Bee

Racing legend Mark ‘Frosty’ Winterbottom spells out the secret to his success as the father of three encourages Aussie kids to turbo charge their literacy skills in the PM’s Spelling Bee.

Fast machines, lightning laps and chequered flags made for a pretty distracting daydream when Supercars legend Mark Winterbottom was a boy.

As a young “westie” at Crawford Public School in Sydney, Winterbottom “just always wanted to race cars”.

“So how does English and spelling … relate to race cars?” he said. “You could never tell yourself as a student that you needed to have good English skills to race cars.”

But h-i-n-d-s-i-g-h-t is a beautiful thing, with the Bathurst 1000 winner eventually adding commentator, mentor and now writer to his driver CV.

Supercars legend Mark Winterbottom with son Austin (front) and his Keilor Thunder basketball teammates from left, Nathan, Jalen, Matteo, Elliott, Henry, Luca, Leon, Oliver and Jackson. Picture: Brendan Beckett

As the fifth annual Prime Minister’s Spelling Bee school round enters its second week with over 24,000 students across years 3-8 already registered, Winterbottom said Kids News’ free, online, classroom competition was “a great little challenge and life’s about challenging yourself”, adding that spelling was “so important … I never knew it was this important when I was at school”.

Raising his three sons Oliver, 14, Austin, 12, and Elliot, 6, in Melbourne with wife Renee, Winterbottom is laser-focused on the boys’ literacy skills. He loves watching them play basketball, building sportsmanship and camaraderie, but said the need for spelling and comprehension skills was everywhere, including the track, court and field.

“In (the boys’) basketball … we’ll get sheets of defence plays, attack plays, that they have to read, study, remember,” he said.

Mark Winterbottom. Picture: Brendan Beckett

An active child himself, Winterbottom said it wasn’t until he “got into the real world” that he realised how essential spelling, reading and writing skills were if he ever wanted to succeed.

“My first ever boss – at Tickford Racing when I raced for Ford – was a billionaire,” Winterbottom said. “He owned Aston Martin road cars, he owned a Formula One team, he flew in on a helicopter.

“He was a very, very well-spoken person. I remember as a 23-year-old thinking, ‘I have to pronounce every word correctly’, because although he knows I can race cars … otherwise I would feel like I was inferior.

“So I learnt very early on that you had to pronounce your words (well). You had to think about what you were saying, make sure the words that you were using actually meant what you (wanted) to say.

“You realise you’ve got to represent some of the biggest global companies, speak well in front of the camera (and) present well to CEOs of companies.

“You’ve got to have a certain high level of understanding of English, be articulate and pronounce and be representative of all those brands. I realised how important it was.”

Mark Winterbottom, left, developed the necessary literacy and language skills to move into Supercars commentary after his racing career. Picture: supplied

With an iconic turn in Cars 2 as his namesake character “Frosty”, Winterbottom said “you have to put in the effort at school”.

“That’s what I’m telling the kids: don’t rely on AI because on the spur of the moment, it’s not there for you.

“When you get into commentary, you have to be very (careful) with your wording and how you pronounce things on live TV; there’s no second take, what you say goes to air.

“I spent the 20 years while I was racing … trying to upskill. English was definitely one I wish I had spent a lot more time on. We push the kids very hard on English now and they’re doing very well.”

Cars 2 features Frosty, a character based Mark Winterbottom, who voices the car in the film. Picture: Disney/Pixar/All Rights Reserved.

With HarperCollins publishing his co-written memoir, Frosty, next month, Winterbottom said the process brought him “relief to just write stuff down”.

“Lots of people have very similar upbringings,” he said. “Motorsport might not be what they’re trying to achieve, but they might go, ‘Well, he turned that into a positive, maybe I can do the same’.”

A self-made Aussie success story from humble Doonside roots, for Winterbottom, the need for foundation literacy is elementary and universal.

“You always want to improve,” he said. “You become a better person and then you try to pass that on to your kids. (If) each one learns from the other one and upskills a little bit more, that’s how you build generations.”

Registrations and the school round of the Prime Minister’s Spelling Bee close at 5pm AEST Friday 22 August. Visit spelling-bee.com.au, kidsnews.com.au

Registrations and the school round close at 5pm AEST – BEE in it to win it!

ABOUT THE BEE

● The Prime Minister’s Spelling Bee is a free, online competition for students in Years 3-8.

● Students compete at their school in three levels: Green level for Years 3-4, Orange level for Years 5-6 and Red level for Years 7-8.

● They get 30 randomly selected words from their competition level and have 25 seconds to type each answer. The students with the most correct words in the fastest time progress to finals.

● Teachers can register their students until August 22, when the school round ends.

● State and territory finals will be held September 1-5 and the national finals on September 10-11.

● The national champion in each age group wins a trip to Canberra to meet the Prime Minister, an iPad, HarperCollins book pack and a $1000 voucher for their school.

Details: kidsnews.com.au, spelling-bee.com.au