Whatever happened to?
This issue Chris Pereira delves into the archive to remember and tell the story of Michael O’rourke.
Michael was born on April 11,1931 in Plumstead London and the family later moved to Camberwell. His father Bill was a butcher by trade, but he was also a grasstrack rider so as a boy, Mike inevitably spent most of his weekends at grass meetings. He eventually made his racing debut at Leatherhead grasstrack in August 1947 on a KSS Velocette. By 1949 he had inherited his dad’s JAP special, which he modified and renamed the OM Special. With the OM fitted with racing tyres he started racing at the Haddenham circuit, where he recorded several second and third places. This led to the offer from Tom Arter of a 7R for the September 1949 meeting at Scarborough, where he finished a respectable eighth. In 1950 his uncle Jim Oliver bought him an ex-syd Lawton 1948 7R, on which he recorded his first win at the 1951 Boreham Championship meeting. He was sixth in the 1952 Ulster GP and was given a works 7R for the October International at Thruxton,
where he was second to John Surtees also on a works 7R. In 1953 his uncle Jim and Wilf Beckett, who was president of the Bermondsey club, worked out a deal in which Wilf bought a new 7R and Jim bought one of the new G45s for Mike. He finish 15th in the Junior TT but the G45 broke a fuel pipe in the Senior. The G45 yielded only three wins, two in the Coronation Cup at Brands in June 1953 and one at Brands in September, after which it was replaced by a 500 Norton. Mike bought the 7R from Jim and Wilf came up with the offer of a 500 Norton. Mike decided to go racing full time and over the next two seasons, most weekends saw the family travelling from one circuit to another. The 1954-55 seasons were the period of John Surtees’ domination. Although he had only three wins, Mike was second to Surtees no less than 20 times. During 1956 and 57 he rode for Ron Harris’ MV Concessionaires on 125 and 203 MVS, recording several wins and places and winning the 1956 125cc British Championship. In 1958 he joined the illfated Slazenger team of Alan Trow and Jack Brett, but by 1959 he was back working for Harold Daniel assisting Herman Meier with the Ariel Arrow project. In the 1960 TT the Ariel finished a remarkable seventh at 80.18mph, beaten only by the Japanese and Italian works teams. In 1962 he rode Frank Sheene’s Bultaco, winning the Brands Hatch 125cc Championship before retiring from racing at the age of 31. He made a brief comeback in 1962 riding Bob Rowe’s CR93 and 250 Ducati. He finally worked for Castrol as a development engineer at the Pangborne research centre until redundancy. Using Mike’s racing photographs I compiled a chronological racing photo album, which I presented to Mike and Jean. In October 1996 I received a call from Jim to say that Mike had succumbed to a sudden heart attack at the age of 66.