Commando attack at Mallory Park this weekend....

Anyone going to the Mallory Bike festival this weekend?

I'll be in the race paddock area with the Trident Hunter.

It'd be nice to say hello to any Access Norton members if you're there.

Look for the grumpy bastard spannering this:

What is a 'commando attack', if the bikes in the race are not all air-cooled four-stroke twins ? - Does a win then mean anything ?

acotrel said:

What is a 'commando attack', if the bikes in the race are not all air-cooled four-stroke twins ? - Does a win then mean anything ?

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Hmmmm... what is a win...? What meaning would / could / should be attached to it...? Interesting questions. Which seems to come down to perspective. Perspective, of course, as with values and quality, gets deeper the more you looks at it. Frighteningly so.

Aristotle and Socratise were quite aligned on their take on this. Socratise died for it. Plato developed it further. Eastern views were somewhat diifferent. Robert M Pursig produced his more 'popular' version of an enquiry into this field with his best selling book. His quest for answers cost him his sanity.

Perhaps you could research this over the weekend and report back.

Meanwhile I'm just gonna enjoy a weekend of thrashing an old motorbike senseless around a race track, for no apparent 'value add' to self or society at all.

Johnathon Livingstone Seagull would understand...

Fast Eddie said:

acotrel said:

What is a 'commando attack', if the bikes in the race are not all air-cooled four-stroke twins ? - Does a win then mean anything ?

Click to expand...

Hmmmm... what is a win...? What meaning would / could / should be attached to it...? Interesting questions. Which seems to come down to perspective. Perspective, of course, as with values and quality, gets deeper the more you looks at it. Frighteningly so.

Aristotle and Socratise were quite aligned on their take on this. Socratise died for it. Plato developed it further. Eastern views were somewhat diifferent. Robert M Pursig produced his more 'popular' version of an enquiry into this field with his best selling book. His quest for answers cost him his sanity.

Perhaps you could research this over the weekend and report back.

Meanwhile I'm just gonna enjoy a weekend of thrashing an old motorbike senseless around a race track, for no apparent 'value add' to self or society at all.


Johnathon Livingstone Seagull would understand...

Click to expand...

Nigel , have you been at the mushroom tea again, Socratise is alive and well ,albeit retired from Association Football at a competitive level.

If you mean as I'm sure you do Socrates the Brazilian footballer, sadly he died in 2011.
sam

Fast Eddie said:

acotrel said:

What is a 'commando attack', if the bikes in the race are not all air-cooled four-stroke twins ? - Does a win then mean anything ?

Click to expand...

Hmmmm... what is a win...? What meaning would / could / should be attached to it...? Interesting questions. Which seems to come down to perspective. Perspective, of course, as with values and quality, gets deeper the more you looks at it. Frighteningly so.

Aristotle and Socratise were quite aligned on their take on this. Socratise died for it. Plato developed it further. Eastern views were somewhat diifferent. Robert M Pursig produced his more 'popular' version of an enquiry into this field with his best selling book. His quest for answers cost him his sanity.

Perhaps you could research this over the weekend and report back.

Meanwhile I'm just gonna enjoy a weekend of thrashing an old motorbike senseless around a race track, for no apparent 'value add' to self or society at all.

Johnathon Livingstone Seagull would understand...

Click to expand...

HaHa! Had to log in (rare) to say this is a great answer to a dumb question.

Hope you have a great weekend and good hunting. I was at Spa last weekend for the Bikers Classic, but due to last moment problems with the Notrun, I had to "make do" with the Ducati instead. Life is tough sometimes
Friday was great, Saturday was (bloody) wet, Sunday was good. Even with modern tyres, I don't like Spa in the wet (too damn fast, it's no fun going slowly there) so I left the bike in the pits on Saturday.
I saw two very neat Commandos, a Fastback and a PR, both in the proper yellow. Not in my group though so I have no idea how they went.
/Steve.

I might get chance to get over. Let me know if you need anything.

trident sam said:

If you mean as I'm sure you do Socrates the Brazilian footballer, sadly he died in 2011.
sam

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Your joking , Brasil had a footballer called Socrates. No, I meant Tam Black who took the Killie penalties. I thought they called him that cos he was a thinker and could read the game, now I realise they were just taking the mickey . I'm pretty sure he sells used cars up Forfar way.

It would be a good wee junket at Mallory, and a hoot watching GB Nigel flogging the blue bomber, but judging by the photo size these days it looks like a minichamp model!

Hi it is 1100 km for me so unfortunately i will not be ther. However if you could get a little video i would love to see that.
Good fun & good luck,

Martin

I will try to get over the weekend ..have a great time . Al 8)

Nice to catch up with you Nigel, I hope nothing fell off today.... :shock:
Did you get to hunt any Triples down?

Well, as long as we're going to get all philosophical and such, life is all about the journey, not the destination. Same applies to vintage motorcycle racing. Sure, we're all trying to win (I think I only won once in my racing career), and it's fun when we do, but it's the challenge of riding well (and maybe passing the occasional Trident) that brings us pleasure. If the rules allow faster bikes than our Commandos, so what? This isn't motogp. Itt's a bunch of nut cases who like to flog old bikes around the track.

Just my humble opinion, of course :lol:

Ken

Dommie Nator said:

Nice to catch up with you Nigel, I hope nothing fell off today.... :shock:
Did you get to hunt any Triples down?

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Yes, great to see you Cab, and a couple of other Access Nortoners too.

Well, I suffered a transmission failure on the day... the gear pedal fell off !!

Once that was remedied we resumed the Trident hunting quite successfully. Even glimpsed the rear wheel of the odd Rob North...!!

I rode at an Old Fart's meeting at Mount Gambier in 2003 and won a couple of races with my Seeley 850, however I did not really have to beat anyone to win them. There was only one guy who had a 750cc Honda who was out-braking me at the end of the front straight who posed any sort of a problem. I simply out-rode him. In that same year I was involved in running the Australian Historic Championships at Winton. We combined bikes from three 'periods' into capacity classes and sorted out the championship details later. It turned out that one of the fast guys with a Period 4 Norvin ended up in a race with another fast guy on a Period 5 Ducati. They were both at the front of their race and arrived at a corner together. The guy on the Norvin was in front but had the drum front brake, so he gave way to the guy on the Ducati. To me that was much more interesting than seeing those two bikes racing in their 'correct' periods. It is the sort of racing I would dearly like to indulge in. If you can finish in front of those guys, you have really achieved something. Defeating somebody who is riding a four cylinder Honda by outriding them, really means nothing. The Period 5 Ducati was Brook Henry's Vee-Two machine from Western Australia, had Wally Campbell on board - the Norvin was Ken Lucas's with Peter Guest on board. - Probably doesn't mean much to you guys ? It showed what can be done with a fast Norvin. Both bikes were air-cooled two-valve twins - the competition sort of made more sense.

I like having fun with motorcycles as much as anyone. But racing all costs money, so we might as well make it worthwhile. I get more out of making my bike competitive, than I do out of winning races with it. But a win against the good guys is good value.

I came back in after one long track session, the bike was really quite hot as it was a very hot day (by UK standards).

I got off the bike and looked at it ticking over like a metronome, just listening for any abnormal noises. This guy comes up and says "I was watching you in the warm up area with the bike ticking over like a Honda" he said "I thought it would cut out or spit back any time soon but it didn't, and it's still doing it now"!

He wanted to know my 'secret' so I just pointed to the carbs! It's true, the FCR / Tri spark ignition combo really is the bollocks. A track is a good place to take plug readings and the Trident Hunters plugs are text book good.

Apart from the gear pedal, all I had to do all weekend was put fuel in it. No oil leaks, perfect tick over, started first kick every time, and went like the clappers. Can't really complain about that from a 43 year old Brit bike eh?!

It was also interesting to just how many people there were familiar with JS / Comnoz / cNw. Plus there were many who didn't know, but do now.

Looks like you and the bike enjoyed yourselves , and that's what it's all about !
Now, when are you going to build another Rob North, you know it makes sense :wink:
sam
Are you going to Beezumph next weekend ?

Well I'd be lying if I pretended I didn't have the occasional Rob North related thought or idea. But I'm trying hard to follow the therapists orders and abstain ...!!

Won't be at Beezumph unfortunately, but I hope y'all have a great one.

Yes mate, I'm familiar with your abstentions Ha,
You might aswell just phone Les Whiston today, you could sell that Teutonic thing and put the money into a nice 930.
Looking forward to BZ, hopefully it won't rain (too much anyway)
sam