I’ve been photographing since I was about 11 years old and I’ve never regarded myself as a great lensman. Indeed, the only area where I have always felt in which I excelled was racing photography. I fell into that purely by accident after purchasing an SLR camera in early 1976 in preparation for going to Laverton, in Victoria, for the Australian TT in February of that year.
The meeting had been widely publicised with many overseas riders booked to attend, most importantly, the the Italian ace, Giacomo Agostini, reunited with his beloved MV Agusta for one last tilt at the world championships before his upcoming retirement. Most people knew that Ago was on a hiding to nothing, he had, after all, been poached back from Yamaha where the 500cc Grand Price two stroke machine had shown itself to be clearly superior to the aging 4 cylinder 4 stroke Italian machine It was rumoured that copious amounts of money had changed hands to lure Ago back to his beloved MV and that he wouldn’t really be competitive against a horde of brand new RG500 two stroke Suzukis.
The pundits were, this time, correct and, despite putting in a good showing, Ago had to settle for 2nd with Australia’s Kenny Blake, winning easily on the Jack Walters entered RG. Nobody really cared, though as the glorious sounds of the MV on the wide open spaces of the air force base was more than enough compensation for seeing him beaten (yet again, in Australia).
Indeed, the pundits were more than correct as Ago didn’t even last a whole season in the 500 class in 1976, leaving MV part way through the season clearly signalling that the days of the 4 strokes were over (at least for the present time.)
I was more than happy with my Laverton photos despite having to shoot from the spectator stands, a considerable distance from the track.
Thus began 6 years of chasing the races and documenting their efforts. Blessed with the gift of the gab it didn’t take hardly any time for me to ingratiate myself with race organisers and score myself press passes that enabled me to get into the pits and out onto the track where the spectators couldn’t go. Being able o get close up with the bikes meant that the quality of my photos improved.
..an early photo of Wayne Gardner, still sponsored by the late Kevin Cass.
Photographing meant travelling and the above shot, taken at Hume Weir, long since closed for racing, illustrates the lengths I used to go to. My brother and I were absent every second weekend at least and we got to know the tracks and, more importantly, the riders and crews. And we went further. While there were paid journalists who covered the racing, usually working for the motorcycle press, we found that, through personal contact, we could sell enough photos to the competitors to cover our costs and sometimes a little more than that.
And we covered the “C” Grade races and the Club Days, events that the “pros” did not. This widened the scope of potential customers as well as giving us more chances to make sales. More importantly, it provided us with the opportunity to see young riders at the very beginning of their careers which didn’t seem that important back then but has proven to be extremely important with the passage of years. The above Gardner shot, for example is from 1977 when he was just a C Grader and years before he became well known as a potential world champion.
An interesting side-effect was that we became au fait with riders and their riding numbers and my encyclopedic knowledge of racing numbers, developed back then, has lasted to the present day.
However, my expertise in taking photos of other bikes and riders never developed into expertise in taking photos of my OWN bikes. Somehow my own photos are stilted and static (perhaps the bikes needed to be MOVING for my skills to be exhibited)? Others have taken good photos of me and my bikes, most notably John Keogh, from Sydney, who used to be a regular at Macquarie Pass and on the Putty Road and he never disappointed.
TWK is now gone to the gods and I have only a few shots but I am happy that the photo at the head of this article is one of my better efforts. Taken very early one morning at Kurrajong Heights, I am pretty proud of this one, being totally unaware that it would only be shortly after this that the bike would be trashed down near Batemans Bay.
So, my advice? Take LOTS of photos of your bikes, and get other people to take lots of photos as well. There is no trip that you’re on that can’t be interrupted for just a moment or two to record the day for posterity.
