Moto memories

The crown prince of MX, the young pretender, the champion in waiting… Dave Thorpe sets his stall for the future.

Lincolnshire’s Cadwell Park is more generally associated with road racing, but the circuit has hosted many a scramble too, and in 1964 the British 250 MX GP was held there. Our photo shows Bryan ‘Badger’ Goss leading fellow Greeves team-mate Malcolm Davis in that epic event. Badger was renowned for a forceful, rising style, tenacious and determined – all qualities which were needed for success in the scrambling world, though without some ability things would be different.

Luckily for the scrambles world, Badger had all of these qualities and more than a bit of ability to back them up.

In 1964, Bryan was certainly among the top 250 class racers in the UK, he was also a motorcycle dealer and as part of the Greeves team is it a surprise that marque featured on his showroom floor? Mixing business and pleasure isn’t always easy but Badger managed to do it and remain a contender for success too. He was a regular in the Trophee d’nations UK squad and in 1966 showed he had what it took to be a champion, by winning both legs of the prestigious event.

Quirks of fate sometimes mean it’s not to be and in the 250 class he was to be the ‘nearly man’, ironically relegated to second place in 1966, even though he won two rounds.

Fate finally dealt the cards his way in 1970, though it wasn’t in the 250 class he had so dominated, but the 500s. By this time he was at the end of his career, no less tenacious and the opposition certainly didn’t give him an easy time, but with age comes experience and that too counts for a lot. The tale of Badger’s championship year is detailed earlier in this issue but it’s nice to end with this colour image of Bryan Winston Goss.