Worms to Catch Page 15
I worked out that, as an amateur racer, which is what I’ve always been, I can’t do better than I’ve already done. To do it properly would mean me returning from the Tour Divide, racing in all the remaining 2016 British Superbike rounds, then doing all the rounds at the beginning of next year, to give me the best start into the TT. But I can accept that I haven’t won a TT, because I didn’t dedicate my whole existence to it. In the same way, I know that if I want to set a record at the Tour Divide I have to dedicate my life to it, and I don’t want to do that. There’s other stuff I want to do, and I’m happy knowing that I won’t set the Tour Divide record or win a TT.
The only way I’ll go back to the TT is if they let me race something oddball. They allowed Bruce Anstey to race Padgett’s Honda RCV213V-S in 2016, they let the Norton and the Suter 500 two-stroke race as well, all oddball stuff that, I think, makes the race more interesting. If they’ll let me ride something I build in my shed I’ll go back and try to get in the top 20, but if they don’t I’m not bothered.
The 2016 TT was a bad year for deaths, but that didn’t make any difference one way or the other to the way I thought about it. I knew Paul Shoesmith a bit. They reckon his front tyre blew out on Sulby Straight, one of the fastest sections of the track. There’s not a lot you can do to avoid that happening, and there’s nothing you can do to save it if it happens to you.
Another racer I really liked, Billy Redmayne, died after crashing at Scarborough in the 2016 Spring Cup National. I’d met Billy and his mates at Wanganui, the last time I was out in New Zealand, and we’d talked about all sorts of daft conspiracy theories. He was a nice bloke. These deaths don’t affect my choice to continue on the roads, and they’re going to happen, now and then, whether I’m racing or not, but it’s one more thing in the negative column. If I’m not enjoying it, and people are dying, then you really do have to ask yourself, Why am I doing this?
John McGuinness was quoted on the internet as saying he’d rather stick live wasps up his arse than ride 2,745 miles on a pushbike. He said, ‘I just can’t get why anyone would want to do a bicycle race instead of the TT.’ He also reckoned I was getting money for the Tour Divide, which, you’ll know by now, is wrong. It ended up costing me thousands and not earning me anything, and I knew that before I set off. I work hard. I like going to Moody’s on a Saturday morning and thinking, I’m on time and a half here, and I like buying stuff, CNC machines, daft cars, new pushbike bits, but I’m not motivated by money. I’m motivated by job satisfaction. I don’t do stuff that I don’t want to do, no matter how much it’s going to pay. And the Tour Divide was nothing about money at all. It never was.
My dare to the lads at the sharp end of the TT would be: You do what I’ve done, not necessarily a mountain-bike race, but something that would push you in another way, and then come back and tell me I’m mad for missing the TT. They’re operating on autopilot. Every year is the same, the build-up with the North West 200, the TT, then the same run down to the Ulster. At the NEC show they start talking about what they’re going to do next season, then the build-up again beginning in the spring with all the testing in Spain and Ireland, tyre testing at Castle Combe. And they say I’m mad for missing the TT? If they did what I’ve done they might realise there is more to life. As good as the TT was, and what an event, why was I doing it? Why? My dad raced bikes, so I raced bikes. I loved it and it opened a load of doors. I got alright at road racing so the natural thing was to race the TT. Then that’s it, you’re in and the blinkers are on. The only time you get out of that vicious circle is if you get shit and no one wants you any more. Then what do you do? What Steve Parrish, James Whitham and Neil Hodgson do, which is talk about it. Racing hasn’t retired me, I’ve retired from racing. Perhaps they’re all trying to avoid getting a real job, and if that’s what they want, great. But I love my job, and I was looking forward to coming back to work on the trucks. I got on the earliest flight I could from Arizona so I could get back to it.
So, I’ve had it with motorbike racing. I’ve realised that I maybe should have stopped three years earlier. It was only not racing at all in 2016 that made me realise I wasn’t enjoying it and I didn’t miss it.
As soon as I got back from the Tour Divide the Tyco TAS BMW team were already asking if I wanted a ride at Kirkistown. Lovely lads, who I really like spending time with, but what’s the point in riding a bike I know at Kirkistown, somewhere I’ve done hundreds of laps around? What am I going to learn? Sod all.
Another thing I thought was that I’d never want to see a pushbike again, but by the end of the Tour Divide I was thinking, I’ve got all this fitness, I don’t want to waste it. So I got home and tried to enter the Salzkammergut Trophy, a mountain-bike race in Austria, but the entries had closed. It was just as well because I need to concentrate on getting my turbo bike ready instead.
I won’t ride the Tour Divide bike again. I retired it and it’s sat in Louth Cycle Centre. I bought almost all the bits for the bike, £2,400 worth – hubs, bags, charging gear – and Hope gave me brakes and crankset. I might take some bits out of it and build another bike. If I was going to do something like the Tour Divide again I’d start with a proper mountain bike. There was a lot more mountain biking than I’d thought there’d be, and it would be lighter than the Salsa.
A few days after getting back from America I was in at work, and Belty was snorting up phlegm, making a horrible noise that was getting right on my nerves. I asked him to stop, but he kept doing it. Then I warned him not to do it, but he kept at it. The next thing I know, I’ve got him by the throat. I couldn’t understand why at first. All I can think is that being on my own, with no one asking me anything, no one relying on me and no one to deal with, gave me a very short fuse. And that short fuse was there when I had to go back and deal with people. Maybe I need another big ride.
I want to cycle to Magadan, on the far side of Russia. That would be something to aim for, wouldn’t it?
CHAPTER 14
Gina and Nicky’s netball lasses and free butties from the wagon
THE MAJESTIC ROCKIES, the Teton mountain range, the Gila Wilderness, the Chihuahuan Desert … the contrasts in the scenery I saw on the Tour Divide were amazing. Not Radio 1 ‘amazing’, but properly amazing. I rode on fire roads through woods and forests, concentrating on not getting my eye poked out by a low branch, then there would be a clearing in the trees, and in the distance I could see snow-capped mountains. I’d look down at my Garmin and realise, This is taking me dead south, those mountains are south: I’m going over them. I wasn’t worried or apprehensive, it was just a case of, Right, I’m going over those buggers. Very matter of fact.
After the Tour Divide, I flew back with Sharon and we landed at Heathrow. I cycled into work the next day to prove to myself that I could get back on the bike straight after all that. Then I had a few days off the bike to let my body recover. The following Monday, I’d been back just short of a week and it was a beautiful morning. I shouldn’t really have biked to work, because I was still a bit sore, but I couldn’t resist it. I was a good two-thirds of the way there, just over Riby Top, and riding down Riby Drag, so called because it’s a bit of a struggle for a truck to get up it. I looked up and out and saw the view of Grimsby, Immingham Dock, the Humber Estuary and Spurn Point on the Yorkshire side of the Humber, all spread out in front of me under the morning sun. I reckoned it was as beautiful as anything I’d seen in America.
My mate Benny and his family emigrated to New Zealand – I visited them a couple of times when I raced at Wanganui over Christmas – but they moved back to Lincolnshire while I was on the Tour Divide. Benny explained that he couldn’t have the same standard of living over there as he could here without doing daft amounts of overtime at work. They’d been out there just short of three years when they moved back. Benny and his wife, Jaquina, are happy to be back. He returned to a job earning more than he did when he left, and he says nowt’s changed, but he likes that. I like that about the place too.
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When Sacha Baron Cohen’s comedy Grimsby was being filmed, a local politician came round to Moody’s to have a word with us. He was worried that it was going to portray Grimsby in a negative way. I described the visit in When You Dead, You Dead, but that was before I, or anyone, had seen the film.
I was on a two-day filming job down in Bedford, getting the hang of the pedal-powered hot-air balloon I’m hoping to fly over the English Channel (that’s not a sentence you write every day), when Grimsby was released. Unusually for me, I didn’t drive home to try to get something done in the shed between the two days of filming, then have to drive back to the TV location at stupid o’clock the next morning. Instead, I stayed in a hotel with the North One lot, and someone had the idea of going to the pictures to see Grimsby.
I like Sacha Baron Cohen’s characters. Borat is a big favourite, and even though I think it was filmed in Essex, I reckon he got Grimsby spot on. His accent is pure Grimsby, just like Moody’s. The film, and the actor, have been criticised for the way the working classes are portrayed, but it’s a comedy – it’s supposed to be a funny caricature, not a documentary. I reckon only those who recognise some of themselves in it – and wish they didn’t – would be offended by it.
Sacha Baron Cohen plays Nobby, a waster and football hooligan who deep down is a good bloke. He hasn’t seen his brother for years, and when they meet he finds out that his brother is a top secret agent. I don’t know if I was just in the mood for summat daft, but I found it funny, especially the elephant orgy.
I was born in Grimsby and work in Grimsby, but I’ve never lived in the town that is home to about 90,000 people. I’m happy to be associated with it, though. I can call it a shithole, because I grew up around there, but you can’t if you don’t live there. It’s my shithole. There are nice bits and rough bits, like everywhere. The rough bits are in the top three most deprived areas in the country, according to government reports from a few years back. But Grimsby, or Great Grimsby, to give the place its proper name, has everything I need. It’s a handy place for me, and I’m never stuck for much. There’s always someone around who can help you out of a fix. There are 500 food-related companies in the area. When I looked into it I read that there are more pizzas made in Grimsby than anywhere else in Europe.
All those food companies are supplied and served by thousands of trucks, which is why there’s such a strong haulage industry, with all the suppliers and specialists that support the road haulage game in the area.
The downsides of Grimsby? I can’t think of any. I don’t think the people are any different in Grimsby – you get arseholes wherever you go. I just try to steer clear of them. I’m not worried about there not being a lot of culture. I’m not much of a night-out man. I like going to see live bands when one takes my fancy, but I don’t mind travelling to see them and, anyway, the Picturebooks came to Grimsby and played Yardbirds, the local biker bar. They were brilliant.
When I decided I was going to write another book, I wanted the cover to be something a bit gritty. I went exploring down by the fish docks for somewhere that could be an interesting backdrop. Fifty or sixty years ago, Grimsby was said to be home to the biggest fishing fleet in the world, but, because of the Cod Wars with Iceland, there are hardly any trawlers fishing out of Grimsby any more. The dock area I found was like a self-contained, run-down, half-deserted town, overlooked by the 300-foot-tall Dock Tower that was built in 1852. It’s a dead clever relic of the Industrial Revolution that could hold 30,000 gallons of water which was pumped into it. The pressure of the water, sat at 200 feet above the ground, was then used to provide hydraulic power for the machinery on the docks.
The name of the town comes from the Norse for Fisherman’s Village, and Danish Vikings settled here in AD 9. Most of the fish are from Iceland, but some are still processed in works down on Grimsby, whether it’s filleting or smoking. The docks are fascinating, like the land that time forgot. You could film a zombie apocalypse film down there and not have to change a thing or even tell anyone. You’d just have to stop the odd truck or Transit van until you’d finished your shot. And you’d only know about the place if you lived round here. I don’t know what will happen to it. Parts of it are falling to bits. If it was in London it would have all been converted to fancy flats, but it’s Grimsby, and no one wants to live by the docks or invest in doing them up.
When I was on the Tour Divide I found a cycle shop in Whitefish, Montana, where I stopped to buy some new pedals after one of mine had broke. The couple who owned it had been touring about on bicycles, looking for a new place to live, when they rode into Whitefish and decided, This is the place, and stayed. That was back in 1980. No place I’ve visited has ever grabbed me like that. I’ve been to a few countries around the world, and there’s nowhere that I’d rather be than round here. Only New Zealand has come close, and it’s still not here.
I like that I can do deals with the local folk. Take Gina and Nicky, who run the butty van near work. They’re rum as hell, but I like them. A few years ago they said, ‘Come and hand out the trophies for the end-of-season Grimsby and District Senior Netball League awards, and we’ll give you free butties for the year.’ You’d do the same, wouldn’t you? When Top Gear come knocking, ‘Sorry, I’m busy,’ but Gina and Nicky’s netball lasses and free butties from the wagon? I’m there!
I’ve got a good mixture of stuff round here, racing pushbikes, building motorbikes and cars, work, a good few routes to cycle home, friends I’ve known for years, family, a decent house and mates with local farms where I can ride my dirt tracker. I like it so much that I haven’t bought a summer getaway in Monaco or Spain. I’ve bought one on the beach south of Cleethorpes.
I keep wondering, What’s the next thing? But it’s not through wanting to escape Lincolnshire – it’s all about the challenge. And once it’s over I always think, I can’t wait to get back.
CHAPTER 15
I could show them a front wheel and they knew what was coming
BECAUSE I AVOIDED being eaten by a Montana grizzly, it meant I could race at my favourite motorcycle event of the year. By the middle of July 2016 it had been over 11 months since I’d crashed at the Ulster, and I realised I was looking forward to a motorbike race for the first time in years. I’m not saying I hadn’t enjoyed racing motorcycles for years – I loved racing, but I’d been going from one meeting to the next to the next with my head up my arse. I wasn’t really looking forward to them, not even the Southern 100, which I loved once I was there, because I was flat out to get done at work and then rush to the boat.
The run-up to the 2016 Dirt Quake was different. I was just going from there to there to there, and I found myself thinking, Oh, a bit of racing. That’ll be alright. And on something stupid an’ all.
Dirt Quake was the idea of Sideburn magazine. Before Dirt Quake, there was an event called Rollerburn, held at Newark Showground at the end of 2011. It was also organised by Sideburn, the coolest motorbike magazine ever. Rollerburn was a mixture of a motorbike custom show, an art show and a roller derby match, with bands playing at one end of the hall and a skateboard ramp in the middle. The whole roller derby thing was mega, and at the end of the night I took part in an indoor drag race against Gary Inman, the editor of Sideburn, and Charlie Chuck, the mad-haired comedian who was Uncle Peter in Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer’s The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer TV show in the mid-nineties.
We raced down the middle of the exhibition hall on matching dirt-track race bikes, each of us towing a roller-derby lass on her rollerskates. It was like the 1975 film Rollerball. We were even wearing helmets painted to exactly match the teams from the film. Charlie Chuck was only taught how to ride a bike a week before the Rollerburn show, just so he could take part in this race. Next thing, he’s lining up between me and Gary, and we’ve all got tattooed lasses from the Lincolnshire Bombers Roller Girls team in short shorts, fishnets and long socks, crouching down and hanging on to special handles on the back of three Co-Built Rotax race bik
es.
The race was supposed to be a bit of fun and a spectacle, and it was, but Gary got off the line quicker than me, and I wasn’t having that, so I gave the 600 cc dirt tracker a bit of a handful and overtook him, with Charlie Chuck not that far behind, cackling like a madman. He was mental, and now that I think back, he wasn’t even wearing a helmet. Unsurprisingly, I hadn’t practised racing with a roller-girl on the back, so I think I went a bit quick for the lass. Her racing name was Catfight Candy, and she got into a bit of a speed wobble over 45 mph, fell and ended up with a bit of friction burn from the polished concrete floor. Some of those roller-derby women are as hard as nails, and she was still smiling, happy that we’d won.
Rollerburn was a proper good do. It’s where I first met Paul from Krazy Horse. They had a display of bikes and their Airstream caravan, and it was the first time I met the Racefit lot too, who would end up making the exhaust for the Martek and the wall of death bike. They had a really nicely done Kawasaki Zed and a Suzuki Katana on show there. There was a lot of cool stuff, and I don’t know why Sideburn never did another Rollerburn, but the next idea they came up with was Dirt Quake.
Gary at Sideburn had been racing dirt track for a few years. He’d noticed that people were nervous of getting involved, and he wanted to show that it was easy to get into. He came up with the idea of putting on a dirt track race on a proper track, with all the insurance and medical cover of a regular race but open to people who’d never raced before. He also made sure they could enter on just about whatever bike they had. He didn’t want the kind of bikes that could easily compete in other races, because there was nothing stopping those folk from competing week in, week out somewhere in the country if they put their mind to it. So at Dirt Quake they have race classes like Inappropriate Road Bike and Street Tracker (for bikes that look a bit like proper race bikes but are road legal). There is also a class for women and a chopper class.