The Special One

Our Down Under correspondent has a touching story that shows dreams can come true and memories can be kept alive.

- Jeff Ware

Okay, stick with me here, this is along story so let me grab a beer from my fridge as I’m in the shed and it’s bloody hot.

As I write, it was this exact day 25 years ago – Australia Day, January 26, 1993. I was 17 years and eight months old and working as a first year apprentice motorcycle mechanic at Willing Motorcycles (of the brothers Len, Warren and Glen Willing fame). Warren, a multiple Grand Prix champion here, was the Marlboro Roberts 500cc GP Yamaha engineer at the time, Len was my boss and was Australian 500cc champion and a super bike legend and Glen was a production racing and tuning guru.

The head mechanic, Dudley Lister, was the ex Mick Doohan mechanic.

In short, I was in heaven. I’d been skipping school and hanging around the shop for years, scabbing brochures and stickers, rummaging through the bins, and as soon as I turned 17, Len Willing said to me one day: “Oi, I suppose you want a job you little f***er?”

Working there and dreaming about 500cc GP bikes day in day out, while servicing RG500s and RZ500s along the way, had me well hooked on two-strokes. I owned a rough 1987 TZR250 and Australia Day, being a public holiday, was race day up the local hills for us dreamers.

With fresh rubber fitted, a new pair of jeans bought after pay day, and no idea what ‘scrubbing in’ was, I headed north to the Old Road, my local famous bike stretch of 30 miles of tight and challenging corners. I had no mates that rode bikes yet, so when I saw a bunch of riders at a café, I kinda parked up and hung back in the shade (it’s bloody hot in January!) I remember hoping they would notice the extra effort I went to that day cleaning my TZR250, including the chain of course!