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Post by charleselan on Nov 2, 2017 18:01:55 GMT
A while ago when in discussion with Mikael about motocross I mentioned my introduction to motor sport as a small boy in the late 1950's. My first event was a local (half mile from my home) motorcycle scramble which had a very good quality entry featuring some of the best national and some international riders.
The course was typical of the time running through several large fields on one side of a valley, which was typical terrain for The Cotswolds. Taking place in early may the ground was soft but not featuring any glutinous mud as some events did. As I write this I can still smell the wonderful aroma of Castrol 'R' the vegetable based racing oil that was mixed with the fuel on both four stroke and two stroke machinery. That combined with the cut grass perfume created by the "knobbly" tyres as they ripped through the ground finding grip. I was sold as a little 6 year old, and my destiny sealed........ Two of the stars of the event in the bigger category were brothers from the Midlands, Peter & Paul Taft. Both rode factory supported BSA Gold Star bikes of 350 & 500cc. Peter was the older and quicker rider and of international quality, having later found out that he rode in MX Grand Prix in Europe from the mid 1950's. Peter Taft won most of the races although he did have a strong challenger in local Cheltenham based rider Roy King who was also top quality. Peter captured my young imagination with his elegant and stylish riding, the imagery which is fresh in my mind even to this day some 60 years on! The following year the event had much the same entry and that saw the beginning of a family following of scrambling and motocross, as we took in some more local events that year. In 1959 we as a family unit travelling to many events across the Uk on my fathers motorcycle combination. While thinking about writing this I did some investigation and found the attached film from the 1959 Cotswold Scramble (not 1956 as titled, you may note my correction on YouTube). The film is superb and clearly shows how things were back then and how very different it is to MX today. While looking through my magazine collection which is store I came across a box which contained all of the event programs that we attended, I saved them all and attach the one from this meeting. Incidentally Paul Taft went on to become a very successful national one make touring car racer in the 1980's winning the MG Metro series and Honda Civic Championship. Not a spring chicken when he did so either! Anyway i hope that you enjoy the footage even if motorcycle scrambling and motocross is not really your interest. Attachment Deleted
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Post by mikael on Nov 4, 2017 12:57:50 GMT
JC,
thank you very much indeed - I really enjoyed watching this. In a sense this is much more "real racing" than modern motocross, since modern motocross tracks by-and-large are "Mickey Mouse" tracks in comparison with the long, sweeping high-speed track of the Cotswold Scramble.
By the way, I wonder if scramble existed side-by-side with motocross (shorter, permanent tracks) in UK in those years?
I am asking because my father was active in motocross in the period 1955-1961, and also at that time it was, in Denmark (and also in Sweden and Germany), called "moto-cross" (or "moto cross", without a hyphen; I have just confirmed this from his scrapbooks which I am keeping).
With best wishes
Mikael
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Post by charleselan on Nov 4, 2017 13:25:32 GMT
Mikael,
Many thanks and I did think that you would find it of interest, and as you so correctly point out it was much more real racing then. Today as you mention MX is very Mickey Mouse, and very much a show of stunt riding.
Back in 1959 the machines in the 500cc & 350cc class were big heavy bikes derived from road motorcycles, and they took some man handling. The Cotswold Scramble circuit was a long track and must have been very demanding to ride. It did change over the following years and wasn't as good in my opinion but the farmer who owned the land obviously wanted to use some of the fields for different farming methods other than just grass pasture.
Incidentally following my research and coming across this film I came into contact with the guy who posted it on YouTube. It turns out that he is the younger brother of the two brothers who i saw all those years ago in 1957 competing in the Scramble near my old home in Gloucestershire, England. He informs me that Peter Taft my very first motor sporting hero sadly passed away last year at the age of 80. That did surprise me as it would have made him only 19 years old when I first saw him ride, and that would have been very young for a top line competitor in the 1950's.
Unfortunately his career was ended very prematurely due to shoulder and back injuries at the age of 22; he would have been a great star in the 1960's otherwise having gained his first world championship points at a mere 17 years of age.
The term "scrambling" is a long used one in the UK going back to when this form of off road competition began back in the 1920's. Motocross is very much a European term that came across to the UK following British riders competing in Europe in the 1950's. As a result the term Scrambling began to disappear, and was replaced by Motocross.
Did your father race in motocross or did he have some other position within the sport?
Kind regards
John Charles
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Post by mikael on Nov 5, 2017 9:38:15 GMT
John Charles,
Thank you again - very interesting reading.
Yes, my father raced in motocross during those years. He started out in great style by taking the Danish junior 500cc national title in his first full year (1955). However, somehow he never managed to take a title in the senior category; yet he did well enough to enjoy full material support from the various Danish motorcycle importers throughout those years.
He was on Triumph (Trophy) in '55 and '56, on B.S.A. in '57, and on A.J.S. and Matchless in '58 and '59 (all in the 500cc class). In 1960 he switched to the 250cc class, riding a Greeves in '60 and '61. (Maybe this switch was done as a bid to take a national senior title, finally; yet he ended up as #2 in both of those two seasons.)
When looking through his scrapbooks as I write this, I cannot help but to marvel at the technical progress that took place from the end of his active years to "my own time", in the early '80s. A newspaper clipping from 1960 says that the Greeves 250cc he had for the '60-season produced 20 hp. The Yamaha 125cc I had in '81 and '82 produced 30 hp! (The 250cc produced, I believe, 42 hp.)
Returning to the '50s, motocross could attract huge crowds in Denmark during those years. According to newspaper clippings, the Nordic Championships at the "Volk Moelle" track in Mid-Jutland attacted in 1955 a crowd of 20.000 spectators. The following year, the European 500cc Championship Finale at the same track attracted a crowd of close to 30.000 spectators.
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Post by charleselan on Nov 5, 2017 12:10:40 GMT
Mikael,
That is fantastic to read. Your father must have been a very good rider and your "Scrap Book" must be delightful to look through and understand what happened all those years ago.
Denmark must have had a similar interest in Motocross to us in the Uk back in the 1950/60's. it was incredibly popular with crowds of similar proportions to those you describe. the annual 500cc & 250cc British Grand Prix events (two totally separate meetings and venues) attracted huge crowds. One just has to look at the footage on Youtube to see that.
The bikes your father rode were truly iconic machines, the BSA must have been a Goldstar an all time favourite of mine, and now fetching huge money in the classic market place. The Matchless & AJS were also great machines but only really successful when full factory bikes. Incidentally i only discovered quite recently that the Matchless had quite a shady history. When it competed in the 500cc class it was rather lacking in power compared with the BSA or Triumph's, even when ridden by works ace's like Dave Curtis. So Matchless had what was known as a special which had a 600cc motor fitted. In National UK events this went unnoticed as the scrutineering was rudimentary then.
So when the great Dave Bickers had some factory rides for Matchless he did very well in Uk Nationals, and then he was entered for a World Championship event in Europe in which he was most perplexed at the apparent lack of power. He later found out that the bike he rode in the Uk had the 600cc motor fitted, the motor used in Europe was a normal 500 which lacked power!!
The Greeves your father raced would have had the Villiers two stroke motor which was a unit used by many different Scramble/Motocross manufacturers in the UK at that time, such as Dot; Cotton; James & Francis Barnet. It started out as a 197cc unit but was gradually enlarged to 250cc and in its early years had a round finned barrel cast in steel, later versions had a square finned barrel in alloy. My first bike was a Dot with the round barrel and was a truly unreliable thing; the Dot "chassis" was good but the motor was not so good.
John Charles
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Post by mikael on Nov 6, 2017 9:42:02 GMT
John Charles
Thank you very much indeed for your very interesting post/reply. (I continue to be most impressed by the breadth and depth of your knowledge of motorsport!)
Quite a story about Matchless! Yes, that's a quick and unfailing way to find both horsepower and torque - but the consequences could/can be severe ...
I have attached photos of the mentioned Triumph, B.S.A., and A.J.S. (It is some photos my father scanned-in by himself.) Beautiful motorcycles, those British machines of the 1950's.
(I will include a photo of the Greeves in a following post. I failed to find a Matchless-photo - I will have to look more careful into the material I have.)
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Post by mikael on Nov 6, 2017 10:04:55 GMT
JC Herewith a photo of the Greeves - it is not my purpose to show the "portrait" (which nonetheless is a memory I treasure very much) - it is more because this is the most detailed photo of the Greeves that I have. Indeed it can be clearly seen that the engine says "Villiers". (I must admit that this is something I have never noticed before although I must have looked at this photo a thousand times ...) It can also be seen that this engine has a square barrel, as you mention. (It's very interesting for me to read about such details, and I thank you kindly.) Regarding Dave Bickers, I was aware that he passed away in 2014 (I saw it at the Danish Motor Union's site at the time). Below is a link to a short obituary in the American magazine "Motocross Action Magazine". I found that at this obituary, there is (at the end of the obituary-text) a link to another very nice British Scrambling movie - this one is from the 1960's. motocrossactionmag.com/godspeed-dave-bickers-1938-2014/A direct Youtube-link to the movie is here: The movie includes an interesting portrait of the Greeves factory. (There, I first thought that the manufacturing of the engine is being shown; but maybe what is shown is really the modification of the Villiers engine, from 197cc to 250cc, as you mention?) With kindest regards Mikael |
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Post by charleselan on Nov 6, 2017 17:45:59 GMT
Wonderful Posts Mikael, and such evocative photographs that typify a time I remember so very well as a child. The photo of your father with the Greeves is one to treasure and is a great picture.
Thank you for your overly generous comment about my "knowledge" for it is quite easy to have such when one has been around as long as me, and having spent a youth devouring anything and everything about all two & four wheel motor sport.
I could write pages on these times and scrambling/motocross in particular as we as a family unit attended so many race meeting from the late 1950's through to the late 1970's, also into the '80's as well but far less so as my priority had developed into cars.
The film you link is one I have seen a few times now, and is in my archive, and it is a superb film indeed but a shame the action soundtrack is that of four stroke bikes and not two strokes as the Greeves bikes were. The engines being built are in fact Greeves own engine which they developed for their new machine the Greeves Challenger. The Villiers engines had become outdated and could no longer compete with the Husqvarna and CZ bikes, so this all new bike was designed and built. It also featured a new frame and the tank and mud guards were made of glass reinforced plastic as opposed to aluminium on the older models.
The bikes in the film are later versions of the of the Challenger, which now featured the Italian Ceriani telescopic forks as opposed to the patent Greeves leading link design. The bikes in the film are 250cc machines but the company, like many of its European rivals made bigger engined versions to compete in the 500cc class, which has a displacement of 360cc.
In the film you will see one of the factory riders of the time wearing a yellow shirt and a white helmet with black lines across it; that is Bryan Wade, who actually moved from his home in the North of the UK to live very near my original home in the Cotswolds. He was nicknamed "Wild" Wade as his riding style was fast (very in his peak) and loose.
Dave Bickers was the original Greeves works rider of the Challenger and came close to getting his first World Championship on one, to go with his two European Titles. He later became disenchanted with Greeves and went to Sweden and bought a Husky on which he was very successful for a short time before briefly returning to Greeves and then on to CZ. Dave was a great rider and my fathers favourite without question, although he had great respect for Jeff Smith and Dave Curtis as well. My big favourite was always Vic Eastwood who was a bit younger than those three.
Vic was quicker over a lap than any of them but made too many mistakes later in the races in his early career, however he was outstanding in wet conditions all through his career. Finally he matured into the complete rider and in 1967 as lead rider for BSA and tied on points for the British National 500cc Championship. However at the end of the year he criticised BSA publicly about some obvious failings in managerial matters and was promptly sacked, which was a stupid decision by the team. Vic through the UK supplier of Husqvarna got a full factory machine for 1968 and once adjusted to suit him he won his first WC round and was challenging for the overall title.
Unfortunately during the winter TV series of races, on a frozen solid circuit which was deemed too dangerous to race on he was attempting to overtake another competitor and crashed badly breaking his leg. After a year long convalescence the leg never regained full movement but he continued racing with some success right into the mid 70's, however he was not the same rider.
I will end now as I have gone on for too long.
JC
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Post by René on Nov 6, 2017 20:36:21 GMT
Mikael, JC,
My preference has always been cars and I know virtually nothing about Motocross but I have really enjoyed your exchange on this subject!
Mikael, that is a wonderful photo of your father and the Greeves.
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Post by charleselan on Nov 7, 2017 18:52:27 GMT
René,
Really pleased to hear that you are enjoying Mikael and my own discussion on motocross/ scrambling. It really was fabulous sport and hugely popular in the 1950/60's; in fact so popular in the Uk that the BBC (known for its anti-motorsport agenda) ran a winter TV series throughout the 1960's. It was massively important and thousands watched it, bringing the sport to a whole new audience.
Just for you; check out this guy Gerrit Wolsink he was a very good motocross rider from late 1960's/ 1970's and from Holland. Also from the 1950's there were two Dutch brothers who were very good called Dirks.
Mikael,
The guy I worshipped in the 1960's (Vic Eastwood) was a factory Matchless rider in his very young days, and although quite small in stature rode those big machines with utter brilliance. here is an image of him riding the beautifully prepared works Matchless which featured an unusual blue coloured petrol tank. Hope you like it.
Attachment Deleted
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Post by mikael on Nov 8, 2017 1:45:20 GMT
JC
Thank you so much again for most interesting posts and enjoyable reads. And thank you for the photo of Vic Eastwood. Impressive how his eyes radiate *full concentration*! He does indeed appear to have been of small stature - especially for a 500cc rider (who typically had to be strong, athletic types). No wonder if he was prone to make mistakes in the latter part of races, as you mention. But of course, real riding talent - and the ability to ride smoothly and "economically" - can compensate greatly for the lack of stamina (relatively speaking - like in comparison with "strong as an ox"-type of riders).
It's interesting to muse on how the rise of a handful of great riders could enhance the level in a country, not just in their own time, but ever since. It seems that Jeff Smith, John Draper, Les Archer etc. did for British motocross what Ole Olsen later did for Danish speedway; they have, apparently, been sources of inspiration and "yard sticks" for generation after generation of great British riders.
In "my time", in the start of the 80's, Graham Noyce and Neil Hudson were among the superstars, the first was a 500cc World Champion, the latter a 250cc World Champion. There have always (since the '50s) been British riders among the absolute elite. In this respect, Denmark has been missing an "Ole Olsen of motocross". Hopefully he'll appear some day ...
The rise of some really good riders also has a self-sustaining effect in that they get the mass media (and especially TV) interested. Like, as you mention, British TV broadcast motocross, so has Danish TV been allocating quite a good deal of time for speedway ever since Ole Olsen's time, while motocross has for them been "non-existing". (But of course, it's not interesting to show that a Danish motocross rider comes home in 10th or 15th position - one rider (at least) on a proper level is a prerequisite.)
With best wishes
Mikael
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Post by mikael on Nov 8, 2017 1:52:49 GMT
Mikael, that is a wonderful photo of your father and the Greeves. Thank you very much, René. He passed away in 2013 at age 77, after quite a number of years of poor health, the last ones as a hemodialysis patient. |
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Post by René on Nov 8, 2017 12:54:42 GMT
Mikael, that is a wonderful photo of your father and the Greeves. Thank you very much, René. He passed away in 2013 at age 77, after quite a number of years of poor health, the last ones as a hemodialysis patient. Mikael, I am sorry to hear your father's life ended with such a poor health. That is very sad. But I understood from your words in previous posts he led a full life with lots of excitement. It is fantastic he had a career in motorsport and you have his scrapbooks now to go through. These are wonderful memories to cherish and be proud of. |
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Post by charleselan on Nov 8, 2017 14:14:09 GMT
Mikael,
I am very sorry to read of your fathers passing and at what is these days a young age, however as René son perfectly puts it, he lead a full and active life with some great times participating in motocross at a very good level. It is wonderful to have a scrap book full of memories which you must cherish and enjoy.
Some really interesting and excellent comments about British motocross and its history as well. John (Johnny) Draper was a European Champion in the 500cc class back in the 1950's, and in his time a great little rider; also small of stature. He was also local to my part of the world when I lived in England, as he had a farm near Cheltenham. Les Archer is an interesting character as he spent most of his career riding in Europe, and riding a Norton machine which was unusual in motocross. He now lives in southern Spain apparently, enjoying life.
Graham Noyce and Neil Hudson were top level riders and I have seen them both in action many times, even though I did not attend so many meetings from the late 1970's. Noyce was a Honda rider in the main and Hudson Maico, a machine that gained huge success from the early mid 1970's.
There are some really good books that have been written about British Scrambling & Motocross in recent years, the photographic content being outstanding. The last one I purchased was called "Motocross On Air" which told the story go the BBC Grandstand Trophy Winter Series that took place in the 1960's, a really good book.
JC
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Post by mikael on Nov 9, 2017 7:55:34 GMT
René and JC,
thank you very much for your kind words.
Mikael
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