Thursday March 31st 2022
Thursday, March 31st, 2022In 1969 the Calgary Motorcycle Club put on a Moto Cross race at Blackfoot Park. - This was televised on “Wide World of Sports” - promoted by Roy Healy - It was a Big deal. - I was there to check out this Canadian version of “Scrambling” which I was familiar with in the UK. - I must say I was impressed by the local lads who rode that day - I remember Eldon Eady and “Hoot” Gibson - the latter in particular, as he was wearing one of the American Football style face guards as shown in the pic below. - It is interesting looking back at both the old bikes, but also the riding gear of the time. - Did you know that the first face mask used in a Moto Cross was a homemade job by John Banks of England - he fashioned it out of a kitchen vegetable strainer!!!
Of course after the war most of the Brits wore old army gear ( myself included) these were readily available and cheap. - Later leather pants were replaced by modern fabrics, and a whole new world of bright colors emerged.
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I don’t know who this rider is in Scotland, but I did notice that he only has a glove on his throttle hand - check out all the spectators in full rain gear - a typical day at the Scottish Six Day Trial.
I watched an interesting video tape on U Tube about the history of Yamaha - showing the original small 2 cycle bike they made - then later the DT1 that gave them a huge market share, however, the film failed to show or mention any of the other Off Road success they had - first with the 74 TY 250, followed by the World Championship winning YZ 250 monoshock - a design they bought from a Euro guy named Tilkins ( He first offered it to Suzuki but they turned him down!!) - next of course was the hugely successful IT series. - The film was mainly about the Yamaha sports bikes with comments by Wayne Rainy and others - this reminded me of attending a meeting in Japan, when they introduced ( via color slides) the new sports Prototype - they then went around the table asking what we thought - while most of the others gave them the positive answers they were looking for - I replied that putting race bikes on the street in the hands of young riders, might get Yamaha a lot of front page advertising - but all the wrong sort. - Naturally they didn’t listen to me, and sold a ton of them   ( Although I did enjoy riding the RZ two stroke 4 cylinder 500 rocket ship)
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Results of the VMC Trial can now be seen on the VMC Club page. ( You might find this a tad small!!) Thanks to Roger Boothroyd for these.
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Ex army bikes being auctioned off in England 1946. - They were sold in “Bundles”
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Answer to the Wednesday quiz  - Famous Photographer Eric Kitchen - first correct guess was by Bob Clark.
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