Club News

Stevenage and District Motorcycle Club

Club News

This Section is for Club related news and reports from members about motorcycle and club related matters.

If you decide to do a seaside run again pop down to Weymouth.

Be nice to see a few old faces all the best

Barry Edwards

This was recently received from an old club member:

I came across your club site by accident and it brought the memories flooding back. I was a member of the club for a few years in the 60s before I moved away from the area and it was one of the happiest periods of my life.

I still clearly remember pals such as Arnold, Brian the Geordie, Ted Merrick, Michael Bayles, Les and Chris Ward , Pat and Hazel Barrett were particularly good to me, often feeding me and once providing a floor to sleep on in an emergency.

In those days I had Vincents – a Series C Rapide and a Comet – but now retired and lost in the middle of rural France, the fastest thing I own is a donkey.

I’ve wonderful recollections of club runs, sprint meetings at Duxford, rubbing shoulders with gods like George Brown – the beer wasn’t bad, either – but best of all I remember our annual trips to the Isle of Man for the TT Races.

I’ve written a nostalgic article about one such voyage and if you think members would be interested in following me down memory lane I’d be pleased to send it on to you, though I’m not a club member (I suppose if you twisted my arm I could rejoin; do I get a discount for returning like the prodigal son?)

Meanwhile, here’s a photo from way back featuring a couple of young veterans which might amuse your members.

Best Regards

Tony Davis

This e-mail was received by the Club:

WE ARE STARTING A BIKE MEET AT THE GOAT P.H. ON TUESDAY EVENINGS FROM 1ST APRIL 2008.

THE GOAT IS IN CODICOTE, HERTS. SG4 8XE ON THE B656.

THERE IS A BURGER/KEBAB VAN ON SITE AND WE ARE HOPING TO RAISE MONEY FOR THE HERTS AIR AMBULANCE APPEAL.

THANKING YOU

GRAHAM DOVEY

01438 820475

To present a balanced view I submit these e-mails from members who went to the above meet.

Dave,

Went to the "New" bike club that is starting up at The Goat PH Codicote.

Only 3 bikes turned up which I suppose is to be expected for a new start club. Spoke to the organiser who happened to be the owner of the pub!!

He then got changed and went to his investment meeting at the pub??

Seems to me that all he is interested in is raising money for his own pocket as there was no mention at all about the fund.

The bar staff were more interested in serving the locals as I waited 10 mins to get served. The toilets were rank as well. Disgusting.............I wont be going back.

Thought you should know as it is advertised on the web site

Thanks

Ian Larman

Dear Dave,

Strange how things are seen differently.

I also went to the goat and Ian was sat outside talking to another motorcyclist who turned out to be Graham the owner of the pub. He seemed a pleasant enough bloke.

He did go and get changed to attend an investment club who meets at the pub. I could see nothing wrong with that especially if he was a joint investor. Of course he is interested in lining his own pockets, he does run a pub after all and it is a very competitive business these days.

Liverpool was playing Chelsea that night and I must admit the bar staff was very interested in the game but I didn’t seem to have much trouble getting served although Ian did seem to be away for a while.

I used the toilets and can’t say I noticed anything bad, in fact I don’t remember much about them and I’m sure I would have remembered if they were rank.

There were three bikes other than the publican’s the other belonged to a couple who sat at our table but kept themselves to themselves.

All in all I had a pleasant evening talking to Ian and thought the pub had potential especially being at the end of a good riding road.

Regards

Ron

This was received from a local Photographer:

Hi,

My name’s Chris I'm a professional photographer in Hertfordshire. Recently I have taken a great set of images for a Motorcycle club in Pinner and thought you might be interested in my services.

I covered their Track day and I have attached one of the images. On the day I took photographs of all of the bikes individually and while screaming around the track each member paid an extra £10 and received a CD of print quality images which included each them and their bikes. An inexpensive way of each rider getting some great photos.

From this day we have had a number of members who have had a photographic book made up of their bike. We find a location, take some great pictures of the bike and produce a book to keep. You heard of portrait sittings for families and kids this one’s for your bike ( your pride and joy!)

If you would like to find out more please give us a call.

Many Thanks

Chris Wells, v-Images.

m: 07736 938628

t: 01923 662716

w: www.v-images.co.uk

Biking Research Questionnaire

I am writing to your club to ask if they can help with some research.

Bikers are often ignored at local government level, but imagine how this could change if they knew how much is biking and bikers are worth to their economy? This piece of research is building upon a much smaller project carried out a couple of years ago and intends to give an indication of what biking brings to the economy. This research is not being funded and is being carried out at our own expenses, because as bikers we care about biking.

Owl Research is carrying out some research to find out what riders spend on biking and related activities. All answers are anonymous and should take no more than 5 minutes to complete. Please can you forward this on to all your members and ask them to complete a very brief questionnaire on their spending. This can be found at:

www.owlresearch.co.uk/eco/index.php?c=325

Thank you for your help, please feel free to email me if you have any questions.

Regards

Dr Paul Broughton M.Phil.
Owl Research Ltd
12 Lower Mains
Dollar
Clackmannanshire
FK14 7LN

01259 743885
07850 697769

Mark and Jason of the KTM Centre in Hemel Hempstead have once again kindly agreed to sponsor our barbeque at the Long and Short Arm PH on 11th August this year.

Thanks to them in anticipation, and do try to make this evening the success it usually is

Two New Club Vice Presidents

The Committee was moved to approach two longstanding and worthy members of the club and offer them the honorary post of Vice President.

I am delighted to report that they have both accepted.

They are:

Les Ward

And

Arnold Hoiles

Both Les and Arnold Have served the club with distinction over the years, Les you may recall was the Club Treasurer for many years, and Arnold is one of the founder members of the club.

They have both written to the Club Secretary, I append the letters below.

Please make an effort to chat to both these members, you will learn a lot about the Club and Motorcycling in general.

Photographic Competition

21st January 2008

Below is a picture of the winner; its Mark Blundell

And a copy of the winning photograph.

This article appeared in the Stevenage Comet Newspaper on Thursday 13th December 2007.

This E-Mail was received following the recent BMF show; its nice to know we get things right sometimes!!

Hi all

Just a quick thank you, to all those at last weeks tail ender. The Gov and I were greeted at the gate by ‘Squeaky’ with some very welcome tickets, this enabled us free entry to the show. So we made a bee – line to our stand, only to be greeted by a bunch of friendly welcoming faces. Murray and his partner ( sorry girl, don’t know your name other than you are pretty, and have a tattoo in a place that I should not be looking! ) offered us a chair and pleasantries. I Can’t make many club functions but it nice to know that the club is still full of like minded folks. It is easy to why you are experiencing the success that you deserve.

Take care

Big D

P.S. Had a repair at Bikersrealm 01707 321 666, 07729232591 recently, and had excellent service.

Its From Dave Hubbard

Les Ward sent me this:

Attached is a snap of the latest in Irish Sat Nav for motor cycles!!!

These can be purchased at WH Smiths or your local geography shop.

Les Ward

Mike Austin sent me this:

I have attached a letter which I sent to the Women's Refuge Address with a cheque of £100 form our firm Smiths Detection - Watford

Please could you add this to the website and maybe more members could get their companies to donate as well to other charities we do.

Here is the letter:

Ref:- Donation to Stevenage & North Herts Womens Refuge

Stevenage and North Herts Women's Refuge

PO Box 110

SG1 3EP

On behalf of The Forum Committee and the Company, we would like to donate the sum of £100.00 to the Women's Refuge.

We contributed this money to your charity because an employee belongs to The Stevenage and District Motorcycle Club and thought it was a good gesture by us.

The cheque is enclosed and we hope this will help towards the fund raising for the good causes.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Mike Austin

Chairman of the Forum Committee.

As Mike said why not lobby your own companies to donate to our charities.

Roger sent me these pictures of our illustrious president, Pat.

Roger said that: the tankard was presented for 50 TT's. Model of Laxey wheel made to scale by pat. Laxey is where club used to stay on island. Trophy in photo is original TT trophy taken at pat's presentation at centenary year.

Here are some of the Club During the very wet Donnington Race meeting .

Here is the Club Crowd During the TT Races.

The recent Caption Competition has been Judged; the winner is........

"Ere Bruv, found a neat way on saving the rear tyre from wearing out"

From Mike Austin

Well done to him, if he seeks out a committee member at the next meeting he can claim his fantastic grand prize.

"That Daring Young Man In His Flying Machine"

Stuart took part in a sponsored parachute jump for the Keech Cottage raising almost £1,000; well done to him.

In fact he enjoyed it so much ( what a fool ) he had a second go later in the afternoon.

Don't forget if you sponsored him, or even if you didn't, pay up soon.

Damien sent me this:

Hello Dave,

Now Jo & I are online here are some random pics for the club's website gallery.

I don't get to meetings as much as I used to, with working shifts, but it's as nice to see everybody when I come out, & Jo always has a good time when we come out.

See you soon.

PS - check out www.motorcyclenews.com Bottom of the homepage is my little write-up on my trip to Scotland - I didn't expect that!

Do check this web site its very interesting

Here are some of his pictures.

SERV provides, on a voluntary basis, an "out of hours" service to NHS hospitals delivering emergency supplies of blood.

It is up and running in Kent, Surrey and Sussex, and last year made over 1000 runs that in the normal course of events would have cost the hospital service a great deal of money in mini cab and courier fees.

We have just started offering the service in Oxon, Berks and Bucks, and have made our first runs.

We are now trying to start up in Hertfordshire (and surrounding counties) and we do have a number of committed volunteer riders, but to make it workable we do need to increase our numbers so that we can give adequate cover without it becoming too onerous.

I am wondering if any of your members might be interested in helping us get off the ground.

We have a web site at www.serv.org.uk which will give you and any one interested a good idea of what we do and how we do it.

If anyone is interested and would like to make contact, my telephone number is 01462 435 213, or by email at motoduncan@yahoo.co.uk

I hope this may be of interest and look forward to any replies.

Duncan Neill.

(I have already sent my name forward, any more Club Members?)

Our club president, Pat Barrett, plans to attend his 50th consecutive Isle of ManTT this centenary year

( yes - half a century in centenary year ).

He remembers his 1st TT ( 1957 ) as though it were yesterday ( v8 moto-guzzi- Dickie Dale, mv-John Surtees, 1st 100mph lap Bob Mac Gilera, 8 lap senior with pannier fuel tanks non-stop ). He sprinted a Vincent outfit at the Ramsey sprint in 1961/2.

with Phil Chambers 1960

Brighton speed trials sprint 60/61

I

with Ian Ashwell ( killed at Brighton 14 sep 68 on solo Vincent ).

on right with wife Hazel in Laxey at 2006.

Well done to Pat for such a unique record and good luck to him on his forthcoming trip.

Here is an Article from the Comet Newspaper of Thursday May 31st 2007

Dinner Dance 2008

The Committee has decided, after a good deal of consideration, visits and discussions with both venues, and much sole searching to move the location of next years Dinner Dance to the Cromwell Hotel, High Street, Stevenage Old Town.

Both venues offered the same in the way of facilities, menus and entertainment but as many members had voiced the opinion that they felt a change would be good the committee has decided to do so, the more central location was also a factor in the decision making.

Long standing members will recall that we did hold the Dinner Dance at the Cromwell up to about ten or twelve years ago, but moved for various reasons, with new management and facilities at the venue we felt it was a good time to retry this once popular setting.

All aspects of the Dinner Dance will be retained i.e. The speech making, prize giving, the popular raffle and the disco dancing. Rooms at reduced rates will still be available.

I bet you’ve all seen these? Apparently, whenever you see these signs on the road then you should be aware that you are riding near a crash hotspot for motorcyclists!

Didn’t know that? And never knew there were so MANY bike accidents? Notice the web address at the bottom of the posters?

www.shinysideup/co.uk

The website is pretty basic at the moment, in fact you can order yourself a sticker and that’s about it!! Wow, I hear you say, but give them chance it may well develop into an interesting and informative web site, a list of Hot spots for motorcycle accidents is promised for the future.

Tony has given me this interesting newspaper article, and even better picture from 1982.