Old Hat Editorial
Less than three weeks separated the passing of two of Australasia’s most famous competitors, both who had dominated their sport in the 1950s, and who had reached their nineties. The similarities to Maurice “Maurie” Quincey, who died on July 16 aged 90 and Rod Coleman, aged 93 when he died on 6th August, do not end there. Quincey was part of a Melbourne motorcycling dynasty, his father Percy was 1922 Victorian Grass Track champion, raced on dirt circuits prior to WW2 and was a prominent member of the motorcycling community post-war. Coleman, New Zealand born and bred, rode in the wheel tracks of his father, also called Percy who carried the sobriquet ‘Cannonball’. Percy began racing at the age of 14 and became a hero pre WW1 on the NZ Grass Tracks before joining the booming scene in USA as a factory Indian rider and in 1930 represented his country at the Isle of Man TT.
Percy Quincey’s son Maurice (Maurie) and Percy Coleman’s son Rodney were chips off the old block. Maurie was winning races in Victoria from the moment he straddled a Triumph 3T and within a very short period, after receiving a new KTT KTT Velocette from his father, shot to the very top of the Australian scene. Rod Coleman, living in the family’s apartment above his father’s motorcycle business in Wanganui was racing from the age of 15. By 1949 at the tender age of 22, he was racing in the Isle of Man on a brand new 7R AJS. Five years later, as a member of the works AJS team, he became the first New Zealand TT winner with victory in the Junior TT.
Maurie had been nominated for the Australian team for the 1951 TT, but turned down the offer to concentrate on his own new motorcycle business, where his father, an electrician engineer, also worked for over 20 years. Three years later Maurie took the plunge, and after a promising start at the TT where he gained valuable experience, he was given a works Norton for the following year’s Senior TT. In what could have been a tragic ending to the tale, Maurie crashed heavily when the con rod of his 500 broke, the injuries curtailing his international career.
Both Rod and Maurie conquered Australia’s biggest race – the Bathurst Easter TT – when it was the almost exclusive domain of New South Wales riders. Both continued racing after their European adventures and both built up successful motorcycle businesses. Rod finally hung up his helmet in 1963 while Maurie swapped two wheels for four, becoming a top notch car racer before retiring in the ‘sixties.
With their almost simultaneous passing, a chapter in Australasian motorcycle sport has closed. The road to the World Championships is no longer a serendipitous escapade as it was seventy years ago – Rod Coleman left NZ to sail to the TT on a cargo steamer with just ten shillings in his pocket.
These days money talks, sometimes, unfortunately, above talent.