I’d arranged to
meet Graham & Helen, Keith Anderson and Pat outside CIG in
On reaching the bottom of Pretty Sally two lanes of traffic came to a standstill and remained stopped for some miles. It was bad enough trying to negotiate the gravel on the measly strip of road between the traffic without having to ride around milling pedestrians on the road!!!
Fortunately the rain disappeared and the roads stayed dry for the rest of the night. After petrol at Euroa the traffic cleared a little and we made fair progress. I recall seeing a flashing blue light next to Graham and Helen travelling at 94kmh. That’s a total of $55 in on-the-spots recently, isn’t it, Graham? Tea was eaten at Albury and at 11.45 that night we rode into Wagga, and Don Sexton.
Next morning at
We ploughed our way through the mud, the bikes, the people and the scattered tents on the hillside and selected a fairly isolated spot, which was to become the base for that club with a peculiarly high percentage of 4 cylinder motorcycles. (Weird!) and then we hoisted their flag onto Keith’s tent. The tents were set up, once by the others, twice by me, because some unknown B…. decided it would be fun to scatter my tent pegs over ten acres and leave my tent in a heap. Everyone was pleased to see Tiny and the outfit down from Queensland, especially Ron, who made himself completely at home by scaring us all, especially Kate in the chair, by travelling on either side, full left or full right lock, at 30 or 40 mph between tents, pegs, ropes, bikes and us! By this time, members of the Canberra Touring Club had appeared and their flag was displayed next to the ‘other’.
Every second bike managed to bury itself in its side at some stage during the weekend, as most of the hillside was a complete bog. The bouts of wild cheering signalled another down and those who wanted to battle the mud received plenty of encouragement from on-lookers. It may be worth adding that the inherent stability designed into my own machine resulted in a cleaner bike finally than many others.
That afternoon saw the commencement of “Harry’s Hot-wheels” where any person on any bike was encouraged to display his skill, his stupidity or his bike at will. An outfit slews wildly through the crowd many times as it attempts to gain the most advantageous position to shower mud on another rider from the wildly spinning rear wheel. As the afternoon went on and the night drew near many bikes appeared. A panel-van appeared but made a hasty departure amid a shower of beer cans. Trying to break up the crowd, a police truck drove solemnly through the ring but was also showered with beer cans and abuse. Two cops in the crowd seemed to be as amused as anyone, much to my surprise.
Three gentlemen on a Triumph demonstrated how well it started by letting it fall on them 20, 30 or 40 times while trying to negotiate the impossible mud to the cries of “more revs! more revs!” The Trumpy, on its back, would burp and die and then it would be picked up off these three guys and another attempt at moving. A chopper tried very carefully to ride through the ring without doing “doughnuts” but I suspect only to show off his wheels. And then, ladies and gentlemen, we were privileged to witness the first-ever streak by the rider and passenger of the aforementioned outfit!!! (no…not Ron, stupid!)
Saturday morning greeted us with sunshine, as many of us suddenly realised that we were here to watch the RACING, which was super. After lunch I was enthralled by the sound of the 1962 Honda 250/4 –16 valve being raced (displayed?) in the Historic Machine Exhibition. Although it was not screwed right out it emitted the most distinct sound I have ever heard as the engine note changed through the rev-range. Seeing the Vincent thump down Conrod at 146mph was stirring as well! The God of Rain did his thing and washed the commentators out of their boxes and flooded the track with mud, causing the last two events to be cancelled, the first races ever to be cancelled at Bathurst because a of the weather – it was heavy!!
Preparing for Saturday night saw Malcolm at the pub purchasing the devil’s drink to the tune of $80. Some of us returned to Malcolm’s large tent which he had thoughtfully brought up with him as well as his own and found some strangers there, happily watching TV! I mean, that’s no hassle – we just sat there too … if they want to watch TV!! I don’t seem to remember much of the night after one or two cokes … they sure make strong coke in these old 26oz bottles! I believe that Tiny and Ron had a crack at the ring, but lacked traction. After wrapping rope around the wheel traction was improved until it was finally torn to shreds.
Sunday morning
turned out quite hot and ideal race weather, although some people didn’t feel
in the mood for it. We again witnessed very competitive racing with the number
of serious accidents fortunately very few. A guy spectacularly hit the Armco on
the skyline in Hindle-style in excess of 100mph, and
after flaking on his back for 20 or 30 minutes he finally got to his feet. We
concluded that he was only winded, for want of a better word. In the sidecar Senior Australian G.P., the
duel between Bob Levy’s
That afternoon
saw many people, including myself, pack in preparation to leave. A small group
headed off for Wagga while I started for
After bargaining
with a skin-head at the door to a strip-joint, we were finally admitted for the
fee of $1 with the girls free – can’t think why. The show was a joke as the
owner was trying to put class into the least class joint. We were threatened
with the big boot because we were all laughing uncontrollably! After leaving
and preparing to leave the “Cross” we were confronted by two thugs protected by
the police badge telling us to leave or be booked for angle parking at 3 in the
morning! When I reminded him that we were allowed to stay there as long as we
liked, I was nearly laid out on the footpath. We were followed completely out
of King’s Cross, so with thumbs in the air we headed for
The rest of the
group had to be in
Things that I remember included: the café-owner at Wagga going beserk when I bargained for the ham sandwiches he had brought me in error; the marshal dropping his RE5 in pit straight, Ross blowing the tents over while holding the throttle flat after starting the Kwaka cold; King’s Cross cops; and Chris taking the borrowed helmet all the way to Bathurst, Sydney and back in the hope of finding a female who happened to like teddy bears riding red Honda 4’s with Dunstalls.
See you there in ’76!!!
------ The Phantom ------