Stalkie’s Worm

A recent addition to the excellent motorcycle display at the National Motor Racing Museum at Bathurst is this “as raced” outfit once campaigned by the late Brian “Stalkie” Holmes, who passed away in 2013. Best known as a racer of many different sidecars, Stalkie began his racing career on solos and in the early 1970s took the plunge to race in Europe. He found the competition tough, and like most of his countrymen, was perennially short of cash. Back home, he continued to race solos but gradually shifted into the three-wheeled scene. Inevitably, he moved onto a Honda CB750 powered sidecar which he raced with some success at Amaroo Park and Bathurst, where his best result was a third in the 1984 and 1987 Fourstroke Sidecar races with Geoff Rowe as passenger. Brian was a regular competitor in the summer races in New Zealand, and in 1974 took out the prestigious Marlboro Series on the Honda, defeating NZ Champion Gordon Skilton. In the latter stages of his career Brian progressed to a TZ750 Yamaha and finally to a monocoque outfit powered by a Suzuki GSXR1000 engine. After Stalkie passed away, this outfit was rescued from his home in Sydney by Ross Hannan, who sponsored Brian in the early ‘eighties. It represents the era of the ‘worm’ outfits – so called because they ‘wriggled’ through corners due to the extreme length of the wheelbase.