The Place

that was one race we had with old belly one year still talked about!!

Start of 1991 race, Number 1 Mick Salmon/Tony Wilde

Can I say thank you (Steve) for allowing me to show you all how much of a great place Gedinne really was for those of us who had the chance to ride this fine road circuit on GP and F2 machines, I was introduced to Gedinne by Jnr Rumble and his old man as they lived local to me and Jnr had an engineering company plus a unit full of chassis built by Derek Snr whos dedication to the sport has never been recognised (IMHO) .

My first venture to Gedinne was in 1989 with Jnr Rumble as Gareth Keep his regular passenger was getting married or summat, his old man Rumble Snr was also going to race and his passenger was Steve Langham who's claim to fame is puking up all over me after a night out at the bar opposite the Welcome hotel which was part of the original Gedinne long circuit (so I am told),,,,,,,,,,(where Jack Muldoon is photographed crossing the train track heading back to Gedinne village on the super long circuit).......

Jnr Rumble was gadget man and had brought a state of the art video camera with him and managed to tie wrap it to the air vents on his LWB TZ700 Rumble Yamaha all was well till we passed the finish line on the first lap of training. Just before the fast kink into the woods the whole thing came loose and I managed to catch it between my legs and then tap Rumble Jnr to get him to stop.
I passed the camera to the marshals who then videoed us squirming up the track to complete the session........I later returned to collect the camera via pit bike but the footage suffered too much interference from the ignition to be of any use..... even so we managed to destroy a brand new motor due to a plug melt down during that first practice, we had to sit out the second practice and spent the rest of the day fitting a spare, finally getting it fired up after dark which annoyed some of the officials including orgainiser (Anton Smit) .

Apart from the racing during the race weekend the town of Gedinne held an all night Lazer disco which even today in the UK would never happen.

Gedinne was always the finale of the Belgian road circuits, before this photo in below , in the same year I was lucky enough to race on the last ever FULL circuit of the fabulous Grand Trophy @ Mettet and win it with Andy Westhead, then on to Chimay in to the town to (a gay bar we found out later) one of many fine places to enjoy and drink the best trappist beers on the planet and I even ended up in a school disco with Andy Peach......

My final race on the Belgian circuits was at Chimay with Franco Martinel in 94 finishing 6th on an overheating 600 Yamaha in a field of F1 LCRs just before we turned out for the 94 TT Races.........

And so to the photo I posted of the 1991 start,,,,,,


It is nice to see Dick had his moment of glory after many attempts , and all you guys who experienced the buzz of the continental roads......



PS ,While we were here in 91 I got to meet the instigator/promoter of the road races at Macau a guy called Rodger Keen who was a racer who turned his hand to engine prep and had a couple of guys working for him to keep the job going when he was away on business.
He was a pal of Barry Sheene /Keith Hewen et al and preped their engines for use in the GP's at that time

I found out he had all ready spotted my bottle of 7* Mataxa on a table in Andy's awning as he passed by on a tour of the pit area . I had always known of Rodger as the guy who fettled Barry Sheene's motors and later he looked after a Manchester lads 350 TZ motors called Dave Shearer in the Marlboro clubman's series who I supported for a couple of years....before doing my own thing with sidecars.....

Rodger was my friend for the weekend due to our connection with Brandy and diet coke with ice.....
we left very early the next morning after the race weekend and I remember passing RODGER KEEN flat out on a camp bed in the open air,pi$$ wet through but dead to the world.

What a way to be,,,,,,,,,

Fritz,,,,,,,,,

,,,,,,,,,,(where Jack Muldoon is photographed crossing the train track heading back to Gedinne village on the super long circuit).......

can we see this photo...pleeeeeeeeeeeeease

Found some more images from that fantastic era,,,,,,

I'm not sure who these guys are on this first machine but they are being chased by Chris Beart on his LCR.



Stuart Hall in Parc Ferme with Clive Price walking up from the rear of the outfit, Tony Darby stood to the right of the picture.



Nev Fisk and Ian Stapleton on his Ireson Yamaha start the up hill section after the wooded section beyond the start and finish.



From the the other side of the same corner.



Nev Returning after a wet practice session.



Jean Cornets LCR ...,,,,,Marc Sadin RIP, http://www.motorsportmemorial.org/focus ... =ms&n=5242" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



Rodger McCall and Pip Hampton glide down the start and finish before entering the woods.



Dick Tapkin in practice....



Dick in the race with a healthy lead over Rodger McCall..



And the reward for all the hard work...In the days when you got a trophy each, you lucky lucky ba*tards we used to get one between us.



Mr Mulldoon and Chris during a dry session.



Stu waits for the start of the session, Jack ( in red shirt) and Chris check tyre pressures before that wet session I mentioned earlier.



And Finally the Van Bergans looking good.



Regards,,,,Enjoy.


Fritz,,,,,,,,

And then there was also the ultra fast road circuit at Chimay ,
my first visit in 91 was short lived and the last time the 9.5km circuit was used was at this event in 1994...



Bob Mills and Allison joined the ranks of the LWB brotherhood on their stunning looking Mac Tools machine.
( I was surprised to here he had become a Mac Tools rep/ hence the name on the bike)



Franco Martinel and me chasing one of the locals out into the fields towards the next village.



And the rear view of the same section....the poor little 600 Yam was soon out of breath chasing the big boys...




Regards,

Fritz,,,,,,,,

PS, The winners of the 94 event were Rodger Body and Andy Peach on the Readymix LCR.

Yet more great pics Fritz thank you!

My first ever continental race meeting on a proper road circuit was the the making of a Boy to a Man and led to many chances to race with some of the best Sidecar racers of that time.

Thank you for giving me that chance to be there at that time.....


Regards


Fritz,,,,,,,

Excellent photos Paul. They bring back great memories of the circuits and the people. I think the bloke on the green no.4 is Hughie Bertrand.