SPEEDWAY RIDERS TURN TO MOTOR-CYCLE ROAD RACING

Wanganui Chronicle, 3 June 1950, Page 6

SPEEDWAY RIDERS TURN TO MOTOR-CYCLE ROAD RACING

Several well-know speedway riders have foresaken speedway riding during their off-season to tackle longdistance road-racing on the Whenuakura circuit, Patea, on June 10. They include Kevin Beck, once captain of the New Zealand speedway team and a consistent performer in all motorcycle sport, Kevin Hayden, New Zealand quarter-mile grasstrack champion, Richard Tunbridge, North Island beach-racing champion and Don Boyle, a star of Taita speedway, Lower Hutt. None of these riders will be appearing on their speedway machines, which are built for short distances only and which can be ridden only in an anti-clockwise direction. At Patea they will be riding more conventional mac! Ines. Tunbridge led last year’s Wanganui Grand Prix for nine laps, eventually finishing second, while Bock led for the first lap until his motor failed. He has been unlucky in road-races to date.

Among the best favoured riders in the Patea motor-cycle road-races on June 10 is G. J. Hitchman, of Feilding, who led the senior race for. the first three laps of the events run at Whenuakuia on February 18. Hitchman has met bad luck in this season’s road-races. In the New Zealand Tourist Trophy he retired on the first lap. He again retired when leading the Hamilton Grand Prix, and crashed just after he had been overhauled in the last Patea races. He made second fastest lap in the Cust Grand Prix, Christchurch, and retired with a flat tyre while lying second. Another competitor is R. McKinnie, of Napier, who holds the New Zealand road hiilchmb championship. T. G. Lamberton, of Hamilton, although mounted on an old machine, made one of the fastest laps in the last Patea “senior” race, and was second in the senior event at Hamilton.

Wellington speedway rider R. Tunbridge was second in the senior Wanganui Grand Prix, and fourth in the Patea T.T. junici. Other well-favoured riders are W. G. Taylor, second in the Patea junior, second in the senior grand prix at Cust, second in the junior Wanganui Grand Prix and a leading competitor in most other events, J. Green and D. Hollier, of Palmerston North, G. Wils. n of Waverley, R. E. Laurent, of Paeroa, V. Wilkinson, of Wellington, B. Coleman, of Wanganui, K. Bock, of Wellington, and R. Barnes, of Palmerston North. Highly favoured are Rod Coleman, of Wanganui, and L. V. Perry, of Auckland.