At the February meeting we had local motorcycling identity Mick Hone give a wonderful talk on all aspects of two-wheeled mayhem, including:

• His racing career- short but lots of fun.
• His shop in Box Hill - partner and school boy friend "Ziggy".
• The Chiodo Mafia- he worked for Peter Stevens Motorcycles for 10 years before starting out on his own.
• His dislike for Honda - stemmed from a Honda Dealer informing him when a 14 year old kid not to waste his time inquiring about the new Honda 4 as he will never be able to afford one.
• Motorcycling Australia – "censored/unprintable"
• Mick Hone Racing - still has most of the championship winning bikes. The riders – Robbie Phillis who could have been the "best in the world"; Troy Corser, Kirk McCarthy, Mat Mladin, Steve Martin, Marty Craggil and Peter Goddard all raced for Mick Hone. On Goddard – he was too exacting. Once during practice, Peter thought the race-bike set-up was "nearly right" but wanted one fork spring pre-load increased by 0.5mm (0.020inch)!
• Scrutineering – how easy it is to rort the system. One competitor, when ordered to remove his camshafts for inspection, degreased the suspect cams for the scrutineers but had two standard cams in the degreasing bath which he handed over for checking.

We thank Mick for his entertaining and candid discussion.