The subject of this week’s flashback is well known to those who followed racing in the 1970s. It is, of course, the likeable German racer, Helmut Dahne. Helmut who, throughout his career, used the same pattern leathers (and still does, he’s still riding and doing track days at the young age of 77 years) came to Australia twice to race in the prestigious Castrol Six Hour production race. Teamed with “gun” riders both time (Bryan Hindle in 1976 and Tony Hatton in 1977 – this photo from that race) he finished 5th both times against the best production bike racers that Australia had to offer, one of the best results for an overseas rider who, in the history of the race, featured poorly in the results.
Helmut was, at first, daunted by the tiny 1.9km Amaroo Park layout, his liking for the wide-open European tracks was clear. After all, he had two Isle of Man podiums to his credit. But he was even more daunted by the speed shown by the local riders riding, as everybody had to, strictly stock standard motorcycles. He couldn’t believe that the likes of Blake, Eastmure, Budd, Heyes, Hansford, Willing etc could be so fast around such a tight, constrained layout. Touring car legend, Dick Johnson, once said of the Six Hour that running a production bike around Amaroo for six hours was somewhat like running a marathon around your clothesline.
The added complication was that Helmut was riding a BMW, whose cylinder heads poked out each side of the bike and would easily be scraped while rounding the tight corners. As you can see from the picture, Helmut is at maximum lean angle in the r/h corner and the cylinder head must be just touching the raised kerb on the inside of the corner. Similar damage to the l/h cylinder head can be seen.
The BMW pilots were thus limited as to lean angle and therefore lap times. They certainly devised the best means possible of minimising the damage and, in the worst case scenario, the R100S did allow the rocker covers to be loosened, by undoing the bolt in the centre, and rotated and then screwed back into place. It COULD be done, but it took time and it was messy and the riders preferred, as top riders do, to ride around the problem rather than sacrifice time spent in the pits.
Note also in the photo the distinctly “blued” header pipes. Since the Six Hour was also an economy run in terms of trying to limit the number of pit stops you had to do, the bikes were tuned to run extremely lean and thus also extremely hot. The Beemers only needed three pit stops in 1977 whereas the top Kawasaki runners all had to do four.
A well-credentialled production racer of the day, summed up sharing the track with Helmut like this..
“He passed me into stop corner in the 6hr -at the rate he was going at I thought he was going to dig the head in – he just wound the throttle on to wind it up on the suspension, leant off the side and just touched the cover. bloody frightening how fast he could hustle that BMW around a tight track.”
In 1977 the other Beemer in the team won the race and it remained their only SIx Hour win, still cherished by the BMW fraternity.
Since last entry my wife and I have enjoyed a short break at Port Stephens, very refreshing. Catch you next time.
