Steeling for Speedway

I refer to your May 2020 publication and, in particular, your Key Collection prizewinner article by John Edwards (p29).

In about 1968 I was aged 21-22 years, had become quite a competent anti-clockwise grass track racing sidecar passenger and was looking for a regular ride, both my earlier regular drivers having retired.

Ted Steele drove a very powerful 1000cc Vincent-powered outfit with his passenger Fred Gibbins. They had acquired a very bad habit of ‘looping’ their outfit on the start line – Ted was too throttle-happy and would drop the clutch too quickly for such a powerful machine, while Fred would sit right back over the double-wheeled rear drive.

Their shop and workshop were in a small side road off London Road in Brighton, possibly Gloucester Street? Ted owned the business (Speedway Motorcycle) along with his elder brother, Peter. Peter’s son (also Peter) worked in the business with them and raced his own outfit.

Anyway, I rode passenger for this team for a season and a half, during which we never looped the outfit and had many successes. Fred then came back and took up as Ted’s passenger again. After several start-line loops, Fred injured his back and retired.

I then became regular passenger to a brilliant driver (Peter Delasalle) and provided the bike for him. Upon his retirement I took to driving the outfit myself. I think we won just one race before I decided to switch to road racing – at which I was much more successful, firstly in club racing (BMCRC) and then moved up to international grade. Regrettably I never got as far as competing abroad.

My last meeting was a National event at Cadwell Park, where I led the race for the first 7.5 laps out of eight, before crashing and the bike was totally wrecked.

I’d never been a wealthy man but, by then, in my 40s, I couldn’t afford to buy a competitive machine (for internationals) so I decided that was my time to retire!

Chris Steel