CCM ARCHIVES: Riding the Phillip Island Classic - Michael Neeves
Riding the Phillip Island Classic - Michael Neeves
Typical. You don’t have a racing crash for years and two humdingers come along on consecutive days, at the same corner and both caused by Yamaha TZ750s, living up to their reputation as one of the venomous racers ever created.
It was all going so well. I got a pole and carried on with a win and a couple of thirds behind Craig Ditchburn and former Aussie superbike champ Marty Craggill on their TZ750s. After that it all went a bit squiffy.
The first get-off happened on the Saturday when Ditchburn highsided a couple of bikes ahead of me, halfway round the third gear Southern Loop (Turn 2). His Yamaha hit the Aussie tarmac, burst into flames and everyone behind scattered. I took to the grass and down I went, hard enough to set off my airbag. It doesn’t seem a particularly quick corner when you’re riding it, especially compared to the bum-clenchers of Stoner, The Hayshed and the Melandri-tyre-smoking Turn 12, but the world speeds up when you’re out of control.
Fast forward 24 hours and after a race-long battle with Craggill, I’m punted out of the lead on the last lap, this time on the entry to the Southern loop, just after seeing the yellow nose of his Yamaha enter stage left out of the corner of my eye. The collision flicks me up into the blue summer sky and slam-dunks me on the tarmac on to my back, setting off my airbag’s second charge and destroying my lid. It’s such a whack that I can taste the impact and see stars for the rest of the day, but once again my riding kit saves me from serious injury.
But despite the dramas, racing Down Under has been a great way to start 2020. It’s my fifth year at the Island Classic riding for the Carl Cox Motorsport squad, with teammates David Johnson (Katana), Dean Oughtred (EXUP and Honda CR750) and brother Ben (GSX-R1100), who all put in sterling rides over the weekend. Competing at one of the world’s evocative circuits in the sunshine, while everyone else the other side of the world is looking longingly at their bikes, waiting for the spring to arrive is, as the Aussies say, ‘like being kissed on the dick by an angel’.
My weekend is actually a story of two halves, racing in the Unlimited Open, where I have the pace to run at the front and the International Challenge where a top 10 is do-able, if all the planets align, which I managed to do in ‘19. Both run to Aussie ‘Period 5’ rules, so that means grids packed with big, brash early 80s superbikes and gnarly two-strokes, like the TZ750 – bloody things. Some of the top bikes are rumoured to kick out as much as 195bhp…
The International Challenge is a match race between 2019 winners Australia, America and the UK with the winning team decided over four races during the event. For the Aussies and US, it’s a clanger of big names: Alex Phillis, Jed Metcher, Steve Martin, Cameron Donald, Beau Beaton, Aaron Morris, Shawn Giles, Josh Hayes, Larry Pegram, Michael Gilbert…the list goes on.
Team UK no longer has the likes of McWilliams, Hickman and McGuiness in its ranks. Instead it’s a merry band of hardy club racers on more modest machinery. My ex-Jeremy McWilliams Harris Suzuki is a work of art, but it’s always a shock to ride these big old things compared to modern stuff. The throttle is hellishly stiff, twin pot AP calipers are no match for the rapid approach to the walking pace Honda Corner and it shakes its hips like Travolta at high speed, if you don’t sit right forward.
Billet ali forks, an Ohlins rear shock, Ktech fork internals, Dymag wheels and Pirelli Diablo Superbike slicks lets the Harris steer, grip and corner like a modern racer. It does around 160mph at the end of the Gardner Straight, around 10mph shy of the quickest bikes, but the 148bhp, 1230cc GSX1100 motor still gets your attention.
The Aussies win the 2020 International Challenge, just ahead of the Americans with the plucky Team UK-ers bringing up the rear. I’ll be back again for 2021…but staying the hell away from those stinking Yamahas.