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Riding the Matchless/Ajay trials bike through the woods. My expression suggests this is not among my natural skills |
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An MC reader wrote in about pillion riders adopting a sidesaddle position. Looks dangerous to me. Never mind, it gave the lovely Kay a chance to show off her legs. I may even have worn a tie as tribute |
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I'm riding this Velocette on a friend's Scottish estate, hence no crash helmet. The pillion passenger is his son |
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Some vehicles have four wheels. Here's my Beemer near the top of Mount Ventoux, a famously severe stage in the TdF |
Unlike T S Eliot’s Prufrock, Blogger Avus has not measured out his life in teacups but in vehicles. He’s had dozens and it’s hard to say whether he prefers acquiring them to going places with them. Hardly any have turned out to be duds, which I find remarkable. Based on an accumulated fleet a tenth the size of Avus's half of mine were disappointments. Maybe I’m not discriminating enough. Maybe I just wanted to go to places and do other things.
However I am not without experience. The first three photos here were all taken when I worked on a weekly magazine called Motor Cycling, a grave career mistake on my part. I had a passing interest in motorised two-wheelers but I’m predominantly a writer, It’s my view that one doesn’t write one’s best when the subject is confined to a hobby. Abstractions open up the world, material matters quickly reveal their limited potential. Logistics is what I’m best at
Avus has commented on my blog since the year Dot, and I’ve returned the favour. Recently I mentioned I’d once ridden a works bike prepared for a long-distance endurance event (not in fact a race) over rough terrain. Avus said he’d like to see the photo taken and here it is among other oddities. Avus’s first reaction would be to say I’d got the make wrong, it’s a Matchless not an AJS. I’d reply in two words: badge engineering. One reason why neither of these makes is extant.
Kay? Who the heck is Kay?
ReplyDeleteMikeM. Always wanting me to dot the is and cross the ts. Kay was a secretary at Motor Cycling. I have another photo of her riding the pillion conventionally and looking less comfortable. Filled space on the Letters Page, my responsibility. It's not all overhead-camshafts, you know.
DeleteA less comfortable Kay? Please!
DeleteGreat old motorcycle photos. I used to ride an electric bike to work, a long ride from the coast up into the redwoods at UC Santa Cruz. Nothing like a motorcycle, but still a little bit of that Vrooom vrooom fun.
ReplyDeleteNewRobjn13. Old? Seems just like yesterday. Enjoying myself, fulfilling a decision I arrived at aged 11. And, of course, writing luminescent prose and wondering what the USA would be like. Found out three years later.
DeleteThank you, Robbie, for the dedicated posting and the bike images.
ReplyDeleteYes the Matchless and AJS were similar bikes with just a different finish, and had been since the early 1930s when A. J. Stevens Ltd. were taken over by the makers of the Matchless bike. Why the resulting takeover maintained for many years the differing magneto/dynamo positions on their single cylinder bikes (one to the front of the cylinder the other to the rear) I don't know. However, as you say, the Associated Motorcycles (AMC) conglomerate sunk into the 1960s mire which submersed most of the British motorcycle industry whose management seemed to put their heads in the sand and ignore the gathering onslaught of Japanese motorcycles - better built and what the public wanted.
I like your intial "trials" image on the Matchless - standing up for maximum control with left hand firmly gripping the bars away from the clutch lever. I agree that to think a small wheel scooter would be any good on the rough was ridiculous and like your choice of pillion passenger with the long legged Kay.
I had a 1953 single cylinder 500cc Matchless, rigid rear end,which I adapted for green lane riding. It was an earlier iteration of the one you are seen on. Maybe i will do a post on it soon .
Your blog is an inspiration and example to me and always has been since we "met" earlier this century. Keep it up. There're not many left of us these days.
Avus: Glad you found this entertaining. And whereas there's nothing intrinsically wrong in our sharing info in public about our respective illnesses we should, if possible, concentrate on the more upbeat aspects of our lives.
ReplyDeleteAs to the rapid decline of the British motorbike industry I remember a BBC TV discussion programme in the early sixties when a fairly prominent US journalist, Murray Kempton, asked for explanations from a trio of British journalists one of whom was Peregrine Worsthorne (the name says it all) who at the time wrote exclusively Tory ideology stuff for The Daily Bellylaugh and who - on appearance alone (beaky, tweedy, aristocratic) - looked as far from motorcycling as it would have been possible to get.
Kempton listened politely to the rubbish that was spoken and then summarised the situation thus: "Might British motorcycles have died away simply for lack of a button?" Referring, of course, to starter motors which Brits had always condemned in bikes on the grounds that they were "too fancy". Wilfully supporting engineering primitivism.
I apppreciate your summary of my stance as a trials rider. But if I had any skills of this sort they are better represented by the thrashing figure trying to control the Lambo. Both photos were taken by a professional photographer attached to the mag. With the Matchless pic, I knew what I needed to look like and for a split second I had all the details as they should be and must have yelled "Now!" to the cameraman as I trundled at about 2 mph in the lowest gear across the woodland. I was accompanied by another MC journalist who did trials and raced in scrambles. He immediately identified my failings as a trialist: "Don't rev, let it plonk." Wise words.
yes indeed, the plonk. Om my old 500cc Matchless one could set the ignition lever for almost maximum retard leve the throttle alone and it would perambulate through any mud at about 4 mph. Steam engine tactics.
DeleteLovely old two wheelers! Those were the days!
ReplyDeleteMy dad was a motorcyclist, a builder of motorcycles, renovator of old ones and designer of racing gear boxes, and when I was a kid that was the only transport we had. In fact I spent a large proportion of my childhood in a sidecar, travelling the length and breadth of the country with Dad and Mum, she on pillion although definitely not side saddle.
Jean. Designer of racing gearboxes. Now there's a specialist. A job taken to its extreme with 50 cc racing bikes, some of which were equipped with as many as 18 gears, if not all within the same box. These days bikes tend to be ridden by enthusiasts who also have cars for warmth. In my youth. I rode a bike because I couldn't afford a car.
DeleteAs to riding pillion sidesaddle, the subject arose via a letter to the mag. The suggestion seemed insane, but we decided to pursue it for a week, hence my brief role as a male model. As I mention, Kay looked more comfortable sidesaddle than otherwise mainly because she was wearing a miniskirt. I assume your Mum wore something more suitable.
My father had a motorcycle before he crashed it at age 40. He never wore a helmet. There are a couple of stories there, but there always are with men who own motorcycles. I like the photos.
ReplyDeleteColette. Plenty of stories. Mostly about crashes. I once hit a car amidships going down a steep hill and flew clean over the car's roof. Tucked into my raincoat was a box containing my complete collection of LPs. Guess what the car driver said: what they always say: "I never saw you." My LPs survived but my bike had a much shorter wheelbase.
DeleteI always hoped that riding a motorbike would make me look more manly. Photos seem to suggest the reverse.