Tourist Trophy trendsetter
Five times winner Alec Bennett – calculated in racing and business – was the first superstar of the Isle of Man races, taking his historically significant victories on four makes of machines in the 1920s. Following on from last month’s feature detailing h
As TT winners go, Alec Bennett isn’t one of the most famous or most revered, and neither does he any longer feature highly on the list of all-time winners. For a long period though, in the late 1920s, he held the record for the most wins in the races. He also scored some landmark wins in TT history, including the last side-valve machine when he rode a Sunbeam to victory in 1922, the first overhead camshaft victory, for Velocette in 1926, and the first TT win for an overhead camshaft Norton, triumphing on the Walter Moore-designed CS1 in 1927. For these feats alone, Bennett warrants a place in the history of the TT.
Alec Bennett was born in what is now Northern Ireland, in 1897, though the Bennett family emigrated to Canada, where he enjoyed his first taste of motorcycling, racing on dirt tracks. He came to Europe during the First World War, initially serving as a despatch rider before gaining a commission and serving in the Royal Flying Corps, piloting Bristol fighters.
After being demobbed and remaining in the UK, he approached motorcycle factories to try and secure a job as a works rider, eventually securing a ‘trial’ with Sunbeam. The story goes that Bennett was sent out on a machine in the company of a factory tester, whose job it was to report on the prospective newcomer’s abilities, or probable lack thereof. So impressed was this anonymous tester that on their return to the Sunbeam works, he prophesised that one day the Irish-Canadian would win a TT, such was Bennett’s natural ability.
Looking back over his career, Bennett’s success ratio was nothing short of remarkable, winning 13 of the competitive races he entered in the period 1921 to 1929 inclusive. His record stood at five TT wins (from 10 races), four French GPs and two Belgian GPs. He also won gold in the International six days trial.
Covering the seven decades that George Greenland has been in the saddle, his collection of over 40 bikes is hugely impressive and includes many of the off-roaders that have carried him to glory on both two and three wheels during that time. We’ve chosen three to examine: the chosen trio are his 1939 Indian 741, 1976 ISDT Jawa and his 1982 Wasp enduro outfit.
Talking of the Indian, George explains: “Shortly after I moved to Wiltshire in 1965, my brother and I were offered four Indian twins, all in ‘large lumps,’ along with an assortment of spares, which cost us a total of £25. My two were missing the exhaust pipes, foot brake and chain guard and the engine was extremely tired, but I managed to fabricate the twin pipes and at that time all of the other spares needed were available through an Indian dealer based in Edinburgh.”
His 1976 ISDT Jawa is a real rarity. Especially interesting and clever was that the entire crankshaft, rod, piston and transmission could be removed without removing the engine from the frame. This design allowed the Czechs to work round the ISDT rule that required the engine to be wire-sealed to the frame. Cheating some might say, but to the Eastern Europeans it was considered ‘just playing the game’.
This particular machine is the one that took George to his fifth British sidecar enduro championship, won the three-day event in Wales and was timed at over 114mph on the 6km main straight across the sand at Le Touquet during the famous French beach race.
George explains: “In total, Wasp made around 50 engines, most of which were used for motocross or enduro, but he also made two five speeders that were housed in road race frames and campaigned in the Battle of The Twins (BoTT) series. At one time, BSA also showed an interest in the twin to power a road bike, but when the man at BSA retired, the project was dropped.”