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This is the home of automobile road tests in South Africa. We drive South African cars, SUVs and LCVs under South African conditions. It also just happens that most of the vehicles we drive are world cars as well, so what you read here probably applies to the models you can get at home.
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Early Days of Racing in Pietermaritzburg: We chat with a couple of old-time bikers who took on the world’s best and won.

 Pics supplied

This was part of a series of promotional items for Weekend Witness/VSCC Cars in the Park, 2012

Hellfire and anger

Published in The Witness Motoring on Wednesday May 16, 2012

We know of Kork Ballington and Jon Ekerold, home-brewed ex-World Motorcycling Champions, but how about those who never made it that far? Let’s wander back to earlier days when a young man with little more than single minded determination and hellfire in his gut, could get by with very little money but still make dreams come true.

Left: Martin Watson (BSA C15S) high and muddy on grass at Hesketh, 1963

Take shy guy Martin Watson, who had an unfortunate habit of stepping off Nortons. He started off in 1958, at the age of 20, with a second-hand AJS/JAP that cost him a fortune in holed pistons. While persevering with that, he did some grass tracking and scrambles (Moto-X to you youngsters) on a few other bikes he owned, before catching the eye of John Smith, founder of Motorcycle Centre. The pair ventured over to England in 1960 to have a go at some road races and dirt events. Watson recalls some successes and a few failures, with the season ending badly.

During practice for a Non-Experts’ race at Brands Hatch, on the ex-Dickie Dale Norton 500, man and machine parted company at Hawthorne. A compression fracture to his spine put him out of racing for a while. Watson returned home during 1962.

Toward the end of the following year, Doug Aldridge signed him up for Ecurie Umgungunhlovu, starting off with a KTT Norton followed later by Manx Nortons. Practice makes (almost) perfect, they say, and 1964 saw Watson taking second place in the SA Championships. “Should have come first,” he says ruefully, “but coming off seven times in six meetings didn’t help.”

Right: Lining up for the start of a 350cc event at Hesketh in 1964 are (l-r) an unknown rider (Norton), Marriner (Norton), de Kock (AJS) and Watson (Norton)

The following couple of years saw Watson back in Britain racing Aldridge’s bikes – a pair of Bultacos and two Nortons. Of the two years, 1966 was most successful. He finished second in the UK 250 cc Championships with a lap record on the Brands Hatch short circuit aboard the Bultaco, and another 250 cc lap record at Thruxton. This was shortly before the circuit was changed, meaning that Watson holds that particular record forever. The same year saw him tackle the Manx GP aboard the 250 Bultaco and the 500 Norton. Outcomes were almost predictable: “Newcomers’ Award” on the Bul’ and strategic separation from the Norton.

Below: A bike fanatic forever - Martin Watson as he is today
Watson returned home at the end of 1966 – his visa had long since expired, he could not get a work permit and the endless paperwork was a killer. Between business activities, Watson saw out his racing career with Production Bike events until the Roy Hesketh circuit closed in 1981. Now retired, he collects and restores bikes; some even older than he is. His advice to those beginning today: “Do things your own way, not mine – definitely not mine.”

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Mike Grant arrived on the scene a little later, after completing his Army basic training in 1966. A little more flamboyant, he maintained a higher profile than Watson’s and raced with, and against, more of the world’s best. After two years successfully privateering home-built 50 cc bikes, he joined Syd Stacey and Kork Ballington on the Shimwell’s racing team. On the Honda 350 he rode, Grant won 12 times out of 13 appearances.

Below: Mike Grant (Honda) shows Giacomo Agostini (MV) the way up Beacon Hill during the SATT at Hesketh, January1969
September 1968 saw him acquiring one of the then-new Honda 750 Fours directly from importers Midmacor, after giving Roger Mc Cleery a firm undertaking that he would not, repeat not, strip and race it. Yeah, right. Grant and his father duly built themselves that racer between Christmas and New Year, ready in time for the SATT of January 1969. He finished third behind Giacomo Agostini and Gillie Cruse, but ahead of the works Linto 500 twin of Albert Pagani. The remainder of that year and the couple thereafter, were decently successful, he says.

1971 saw him joining Tommy Johns and Errol Cowan, with Grant astride a 250 cc Yamaha TD2. Apart from its first time out at Hesketh, in rain, he remained virtually unbeaten that year. The following season saw Grant cleaning up locally, beating Paul Smart and Barry Sheene at Hesketh and Sheene (again) and Jon Ekerold at Kyalami a week later. He particularly remembers this event – his bike stalled on the line and by the time he got under way, the field was entering the first corner. Grant, thoroughly annoyed, reeled in the field and won. That stalling problem was eventually cured with a simple DIY modification. It had appeared in a factory bulletin, but no one felt it necessary to inform Grant. He got angry often and won many races.

If you can’t beat them, join them – Sheene invited Grant to go over to the UK and race with him. A Suzuki GB ride, alongside Phil Read, saw him piloting a 500 cc two-stroke twin. Before the season was over, he had beaten Read as well. 1972 ended tragically.

Right: Mike Grant (Honda) leads Barry Sheene (Suzuki) through Quarry Corner, 1972.

In his first big international event, at Tubbergen in the Netherlands, Grant had worked up to second on his Yamaha 250 after starting about 13th  (that stalling problem again), when disaster struck. The engine seized solid while rounding an S-bend, coming into a village on the 3rd to last lap. Despite grabbing the clutch, Grant and bike smashed through a barrier and into spectators. The toll was one dead, twelve injured and six months hospitalisation for Grant. He walked again the following June.

Production Class rides on a 750 Suzuki for a Durban team kept him occupied for a couple of years until he took over Jon Ekerold’s old Works Kawasaki in 1976. This made Grant a full-time professional racer, but things were never quite the same. A brief fling with cars followed, but he gave it all up in 1979.

These days, he repairs other people’s 4x4s and V8s, but the bug still niggles. He has built himself a V8 Firenza for Historic or Marque Series racing in the near future. He will also have a Nascar Chevy on display at Weekend Witness/VSCC cars in the Park.

Grant’s words of wisdom? “The faster you go, the slower you age.”


Right: Mike Grant in his workshop today








What We Do

This is a one-man show, which means that road test cars entrusted to me are driven only by me. Some reviewers hand test cars over to their partners to use as day-to-day transport and barely experience them for themselves.

What this means to you is that every car reviewed is given my own personal evaluation and receives my own seat of the pants judgement - no second hand input here.
Every car goes through real world testing; on city streets littered with potholes, speed bumps and rumble strips, on freeways and if its profile demands, dirt roads as well.

My articles appear every Wednesday in the motoring pages of The Witness, South Africa's oldest continuously running newspaper, and occasionally on Saturdays in Weekend Witness as well. I drive eight to ten vehicles most months of the year (press cars are withdrawn over the festive season - wonder why?) so not everything gets published in the paper. Those that are, get a tagline but the rest is virgin, unpublished and unedited by the political-correctness police. Hope you like what you see, because there are no commercial interests at work here. As quite a few readers have found, I answer every serious enquiry from my home email address, with my phone numbers attached, so I do actually exist.

I am based in Pietermaritzburg, KZN, South Africa. This is the central hub of the KZN Midlands farming community; the place farmers go to buy their supplies and equipment, truck their goods to market, send their kids to school and go to kick back and relax.
So occasionally a cow, a goat or a horse may add a little local colour by finding its way into the story or one of the pictures. It's all part of the ambience!

Comments?
Want to ask a question, comment or just tell me you thoroughly disagree with what I say? That's your privilege, because if everybody agreed on everything, the world would be a boring place. All I ask is that you remain calm, so please blow off a little steam before venting too vigorously.