Triumph Motorcycle
My Triumph Motorcycle
Executive Summary By : Michael Chalke
Sometimes memories get lost with time, and I am now going back more than 50 years!
The youth of the country at that time, really only had one chance to take to the road, it was the motorcycle. Walk along the street and not all drives had a car in them. So it was the day of the motorcycle and scooter rider. Getting the first motorbike was a milestone in my life. Albeit, I had an old BSA bike to start with. It was old and very temperamental not always starting on first kick. KICK? Yes the day of the electric starter was a long way off and never happened until after my motorcycling years. The engineering of the engine was after all very basic at that time.
But when it did go, we entered a different world, we were mobile, and at 16 years old we could discover a new world. We screwed the throttle back to max on every gear change, fitted silencers that didn’t silence, and showed everybody how brilliant we were. I don’t think that first BSA could reach 60mph!
There were no safety rules or laws regarding crash helmets, hardly anyone wore one, partly because of the danger of being called a wimp. Many still used the gasmask goggles that were issued during the 2nd world war. But we all suffered the same desire as many do today, we wanted faster, bigger and better machines. England was the choice of the world for a while. with the BSA’s, Matchless, Aerial, HRD Vincent, Norton and of course Triumph.
But back to my Triumph, there it was sitting in the showroom, second hand, but perfect showroom condition. It had to be mine. The total price was £150 .00 a fortune for me, (and my father), but winging prevailed and I was soon wheeling it out of the showroom. It would pass anything on the road, and it would do just 100 mph. I could go from Basing stoke to Salisbury (50miles) in 30 minutes. It was fantastic.
I needed to have sparks come from my footrest, otherwise I knew I had not taken the corner right, and had not impressed anyone. They were such fun days, and looking back I realize I was lucky to survive on that bike. I can tell you that coming off at 60 plus mph, you don’t actually remember leaving the bike and hitting the ground. Once you see all the dangers of riding a motorbike, you have that little bee in your bonnet that says give it up before it’s to late.
Read my other article about goggles motorcycle.