Classic Festival Pukekohe 5th - 7th February

There were a few problems getting Mike Farrall here but come Friday practice everybody and their bikes were at the track ready to go.

Mike was going to be the big threat in the Pre-war classes on his very quick Rudges and Lee Gourlay on his 500 GP Paton in the Post Classic against SBR’s Commando.

Practice went well on the Empire Star and we quickly got reacquainted as I hadn’t ridden her for a long time.

The Commando was feeling awesome with its new crankcases. It was almost a year ago they broke during my last ride on her. We were quickly up to speed and putting in times close to our lap record of last year.

The Goldstar didn’t go well and we had a timing issue which meant we would have to go back to our standard bore ABSAF motor robbing us of top speed.

The first Pre-war race on the Empire Star I threw away. I had a good lead over Mike going into the last lap and eased off too much, and then I got baulked by back markers at Castrol and the esses. As I headed for the line Mike blasted past to take the win. This was the first time since Paul DeLacy built the bike it had finished in any position other than 1st. Sorry Paul!

In the rest of the races I didn’t back off and managed to win all but the graded scratch race against much faster more modern bikes. I got a tow from 3 Post Classic bikes on the last lap and put in a 1min 14.95sec, the first time a Pre-war bike has ever been that fast.

The Goldy struggled for top speed and although the chassis was working really well and I could make up time on the brakes and in the corners, I was losing too much on the straight to contest the top 3 spots.

The Commando was in the same race as Lee on the Patton, a new copy of a 500 GP bike making more power and lighter than our bike. Steve Bridge had a new motor in his 1000cc Ducati and it was also going very quickly. We were all in different classes with the Commando being a 750cc but we all wanted the outright wins.

I managed to beat Lee in 2 out of 4 races as he struggled to learn Pukekohe’s bumps.
Steve was a different matter. I did manage to get past him a few times and threw everything at him but couldn’t make up for the straight line speed. His bike was also handling much better than last year. Our lap record set at this meeting last year of 1min 5.4sec was smashed. We managed a 1min 4.9sec, Steve did 1min 4.85 and Lee did an amazing 1min 4.35sec.

A great weekend’s racing - many thanks to the CMRR club for making it happen.

Also thanks to SBR, Neville Wooderson and Paul Delacy for letting me ride these amazing bikes and Joy for the lunches.