The V4 Jawa – Not a killer
I was there the day that Bill Ivy was killed at the East German Grand Prix at Sachsenring in 1969. It was wet with a slight drizzle on the circuit. The crash happened on the first lap of practice. About 800 metres from he start there was a left cobblestone curve which could be taken at about 100 km/h. There were no spectators in the area, nor were there any barriers on the outside of the curve, but Bill lost it on the slippery cobblestones and was killed. The management from Jawa denied that the bike had seized, and it was not stripped to confirm whether it had seized. Nevertheless the English motorcycle magazines demonized the V4 Jawa. I was at Brno for the 1970 Czech Grand Prix. My H1R Kawasaki had seized the crank in the previous GP and already my spare crank was away getting repaired. In the morning of the first practice, a Czech person introduced himself to me as the manager of the Jawa V4 350 and asked if I would race this bike. I said yes, thinking there was a possibility I could race it full time. He went on to say he was very disappointed with (their rider) Silvio Grasseti as every time he didn’t get a good place he complained about the engine. The race mechanics would strip the engine but could find nothing wrong. I took the bike out in practice and as I was going out Chas Mortimer said to me, “You’re not going out on that thing are you?” I just smiled. I found that the power came on at 10,500 and was red-lined at 13,500. It felt faster than my H1R and with the 7 speed gearbox, it was great to ride. About 9/10 of the way around the lap, I was racing down towards a right hander where you start to climb back towards the finish. I put the front brake on hard and the steering locked, so I went straight through the corner and onto the road – the mudguard had bottomed out on the fairing. I rode back to the pits where I asked the team manager to remove the guard. Then it started raining and the manager wouldn’t let me out again until the last practice. It took about ten minutes for a lap. I revel in the wet conditions, especially on the cobblestones, I didn’t slow up as much as other racers, and managed the whole of the practice
session. The practice result showed I was a split second behind Agostini on the MV Agusta, and one second faster than Renzo Pasolini on the Benelli, and 20 seconds faster than Silvio Grasseti on the other V4 Jawa. I felt satisfied as I wasn’t scratching and had plenty in reserve. For the race, I went out to the start and waited on the line, my Jawa having been warmed up already. Silvio Grasseti did a massive wheelie on the way up to the start and flipped his Jawa – it took some time to clean up the mess. When the flag dropped, my Jawa was flat, I thought it must have oiled the plus, so I carried on, completed the lap, then pulled into the pits where the mechanics changed the plugs. It was still the same so I carried on and completed the race. Afterwards I asked the team manager what the problem was. He told me he knew I was a very good rider, but that Grasseti did not want me to race any more, and as he paid the race team money to race in the west, he had instructed the mechanics to make my V4 slow. Ginger Molloy Hamilton, NZ