Posts Tagged ‘Norton’

John Surtees’ Formative Years…

Posted: September 9, 2024 in F1, Fotos, Icons & Iconoclasts
Tags: , , , , , ,
0
surtees
(Central Press)

John Surtees and works-Norton Manx 500 prior to the start of a race at the International Meeting, Silverstone 9 April 1955…

Born in 1934 (11 February 1934-10 March 2017) at Tatsfield, Surrey, Surtees famously grew up working in his dad’s South London motorcycle shop. Jack Surtees was a former bus driver turned sidecar racer, it was on his father’s Vincent 1000cc sidecar-outfit that John first competed at 14.

As a school leaver at 15, John contested grass track races at Brands Hatch on a Excelsior-JAP B14 500, soon graduating to road racing, initially aboard a Triumph Tiger 70 250, at Brands in April 1950. After commencing his apprenticeship with Vincents’ Stevenage factory the same year he soon commenced racing a self-prepared Vincent Grey 500 single, taking his first win at Aberdare Park, South Wales.

Jack and John Surtees on Jack’s Vincent 1000cc outfit at Brands Hatch in 1952 (J Topham)
On the Vincent Grey Flash 500 single, circuit folks? (John Surtees World Champion)

In 1951 he hit the headlines after giving World Champion Geoff Duke’s factory twin-cam Norton curry on his pushrod single at Thruxton, soon establishing himself as one of Britain’s future stars, graduating from the Vincent in 1952 to a 500cc Manx Norton on which he contested his first World Championship race, finishing sixth in the Ulster GP.

In 1953 John made his Isle of Man debut having been loaned a pair of factory Nortons by race chief Joe Craig. But he got himself in Craig’s bad-book as he’d already committed to run Dr Joe Ehrlich’s works 125cc EMC two-stroke, only to crash it in practice and break his wrists after front-fork failure.

John Surtees at right during the June 1954 IOM TT weekend: 15th in the Senior and 11th in the Junior TTs on his privately entered machines. #5 is perhaps the 350

Craig cracked the shits when he couldn’t race his Nortons so John raced a pair of customer Norton 350/500s with great success in 1954. On these bikes he was 11th in the IOM 350cc Junior race and 15th in the 500cc Senior, also taking the British 250cc championship that year by winning 15 races of 17 starts on the unique R.E.G. 250 DOHC parallel-twin built by talented businessman Robert E Geeson.

As a consequence of that great season, Craig finally gave Surtees his first works Norton rides in what proved to be the British manufacturer’s final season of racing what were by then outclassed singles in 1955. John won 69 of 75 races that he started in Britain and raced regularly on the Continent, but it was on an NSU Sportmax that he recorded his first GP win, the 250cc Ulster GP at Dundrod on August 13.

Surtees, NSU Sportmax, 250cc Ulster GP winner, Dundrod August 13, 1955 (unattributed)
Surtees, works-Norton Manx 500, Ulster GP, Dundrod, 1955 Senior TT. Led until his fuel stop then DNF with mechanical failure. Bill Lomas won both the 350 and 500 races on Moto Guzzis (A Herl)

With Norton’s end-of-season retirement from racing imminent, John finished the year by twice beating reigning 500cc World Champion Geoff Duke’s Gilera 500-4 at Silverstone and then Brands Hatch. Gilera, Moto Guzzi and BMW (for whom he’d ridden in the German GP on an RS500 Boxer) all chased his signature on a contract for 1956.

Instead Surtees began a five-year association with MV Agusta – after Count Domenico Agusta’s elderly mother had inspected him to decide whether she liked the cut-of-his-jib – winning his first seven races on the sonorous Italian in early-season British national races before winning the Isle of Man Senior TT, his debut World Championship Grand Prix race on the MV 500-four. And the rest, as they say, is history…click here for my article on the champion: https://primotipo.com/2014/11/30/john-surtees-world-champion-50-years-ago/

Surtees testing an MV, date and place unknown (unattributed)
Surtees on the way to winning the Senior TT at Kates Cottage on the Isle of Man in 1956, MV 500 (ttracepics.com)

Credit…

Central Press, ridersdrivemag.com, A Herl, ttracepics.com, ‘John Surtees-World Champion’ by John Surtees and Alan Henry, J Topham-TopFoto, Rodger Kirby

Etcetera : R.E.G. 250…

(R Kirby)

Robert E Geeson built R.E.G 250cc twin-cam, two valve, parallel twin racing motorcycle shown here at Silverstone in April 1962. See here: https://cybermotorcycle.com/marques/british/reg.htm 

(R Kirby)

Finito…

Longford ‘bikes…

Posted: March 2, 2021 in Fotos, Who,What,Where & When...?
Tags: , , , , ,
0

Reg Hay, Blackburn, on his way to victory in the 1925 unlimited championship, Longford (K Hay)

All too often we car blokes forget the trail blazed to create or use racetracks by our motor-bike racing buddies.

I knew it was the leather clad brigade who are responsible for the first Longford road-racing meeting in 1953 (and were a key part of the meetings until 1966). Bless them. I didn’t realise their Longford contribution dates back to the twenties- thad’ll be the 1920s folks.

Some of the earliest social runs organised by the Tasmanian Automobile Club (membership 50/50 cars/bikes) were from Launceston to the Blenheim Inn at Longford. Shortly thereafter, inevitably, members wanted to see ‘how fast she would go’. The long, straight road from Perth to Longford, starting at the Perth end was the chosen stretch for these one mile timed runs.

Fifty years later, the other end of that straight stretch (Pateena Road) formed Longford’s Flying Mile.

Quickest car during the first of these meetings was a Mr Heathcote’s Coventry Humber, a heady 72kmh, fastest bike was Percy Harrison’s Griffon, which did 83kmh.

Charles King and L Rosevears, Longford 1925 (K Hay)

 

While I’m getting all misty-eyed about Longford again. Tasmanian Govt Railways H3 crossing the South Esk River at Longford enroute to Devonport, April 17, 1965. Eight of these heavy-freight locos were built for the TGR by The Vulcan Foundry, Newton-Le-Willows, England, and delivered in October 1951. 6 of the 8 were preserved but not this one (G Oliver)

 

Starters before the 5 lap unlimited championship, Longford 1925. #4 Reg Hay won on his Blackburn (K Hay)

Into the twenties race meetings were held at the Longford horse racing track. Built in the 1840s, the thoroughbred track is one of the oldest in Australia, it is 3km from ‘Pub Corner’ in Longford village.

Even though the roll-on, roll-off ferry from Devonport to Port Melbourne only commenced in the late fifties plenty of riders from the North Island made the trip on the smaller ferry with their ‘bikes to race in these twenties meetings “where Victorian star Charles Disney had to fight for his victories against some very quick local first-timers.”

Reg Hay travelled the other way and did much winning on Victorian speedways in the summer, returning to Tassie to win other events including 24-Hour Trials in the cooler months. Later he moved to the UK just before the war to captain the Australian Speedway Team.

When he returned to Tasmania after the war he was the chief starter at Quorn Hall and Valleyfield and then later at Longford and Symmons Plains, I wonder if he ever did some practice laps on the Longford road course…

Rolling start for the 600s at Longford in 1924 (Weekly Courier)

Credits…

‘The Examiner’ Launceston, Kevin Hay, Geoffrey Oliver, Weekly Courier, Sydney Morning Herald

Tailpiece…

Rolling the Longford clock forward 35 years, Australian international Jack Ahearn, with Long Bridge in the background, lines his Norton up for the uphill Newry Corner during the March 1961 meeting.

The Bondi born veteran aces best result was second in the 1964 world 500 championship behind MV’s Mike Hailwood. See here for a piece on Ahearn; https://www.oldbikemag.com.au/jack-ahearn-man-reasons/

Finito…