John was remembered at a memorial service on July 14 and I was asked by the family to say a few words about John and his Bantam racing. My qualifications for this invitation - I joined the Brunel Bantam crew in '69, the same year John left the College after being instrumental in developing a Racing Bantam for the Brunel Motorcycle Club. He left College with a Physics degree but the bike stayed with the club so John began campaigning his own bike, well at least the half he could afford to buy and fellow Brunellian, Colin Armett, funded the other half. I met John in '69/70, we became friends and often travelled to race/practice days in John's old Ford Thames van. I raced for 5 seasons until other committments came along but John and I stayed good friends.
It was a sad farwell but each of the people speaking at the Memorial highlighted John's willingness to contribute and get involved, he was BRC treasurer for 5 or so years, he wrote most of the SE center news letters in the early 70s and contributed many articles to enlighten or elicit reactions from the reader. More recently he was secretary and main odd-job man at the local village hall. Always happy to fix anything for anyone, often before being asked!
Tenacious was a word used about John's riding style and whilst he never quite managed to win the championship, he was 'bridesmaid' on a number of occasions. He was certainly a better rider than me and the only time I managed to get to the the finish line just in front of him was a meeting at Llandow. Back at the van I learned that John had lost his footrest just after the start!
It was good to hear that John's Bantam had recently been passed on to Les Eggs who now has it beautifully refurbished and back on the track. It was also great to meet up with some of the old SE centre riders after 35 years or so, Pete Tibbitts, Dave Outred, Colin and Elaine Hall , Mick Bridges as well as Les and a 'younger' rider, Derek from Brum. Many of the photographs the family had put on display were of John's racing years and these certainly stirred a few memories and stories. My most unexpected moments came when Les first produced an old, but colour, photo taken through the windscreen of John's van with John driving and me in the passenger seat. He then went on to return my racing leathers - I had passed these on to John and he had passed them on to Les, apart from the damage where someone had slid down the track on their ar*e and the odour of spending decades in various sheds/garages, they are not too bad - but you were right Les - they do not fit any more.
The Bantam Racing fraternity has lost a great supporter but gave John a great deal of enjoyment and a great send off.
Jim
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Wed Jul 13, 2011 10:26 pm
