Denny McCormack
Two lives
Denis Trevor ‘Denny’ McCormack was anything but the archetypal motorcycle racer. When it was the norm for top riders to enjoy a drink or three and be comfortable up to their elbows in grease and grime, young Denis was the clean-living opposite.
Born in Adelaide on 31st December, 1940, Denis, now Denny, took on an apprenticeship as a carpenter, and kept supremely fit with a combination of a strict vegetarian diet and plenty of exercise. That included weight lifting and cycling, both of which he excelled at, and there was always surfing in the challenging waters of the South Australian coast not far from his home at Reynella. A born extrovert, Denny loved music, dancing and was a keen singer. Before he was out of his teens, motorcycles entered his life; big British motorcycles like a Triumph Tiger 110, a Bonneville and a BSA A10. He joined the Velocette Motor Cycle Club, home to some of the state’s biggest names in all forms of the sport. From there it was a small step to the track, although South Australia was short on road racing venues with only McNamara Park at Mount Gambier and occasional meetings at Mallala, following the demise of the small circuit at Port Wakefield. In between road racing there were grass tracks and beach racing on a speedway-style special powered by a BSA B33 engine. But two strokes were taking over and Denny moved to a Suzuki Hustler, on which he elevated himself to B Grade in 1967 with some fine performances at Mallala. By mid 1968 he had joined the Juventus club and was into A Grade, and attracted the attention of SA Suzuki distributor David Cornell who supplied 125, 250 and later 500cc Suzukis, tuned by Dean Harrison. It was enough to convince Denny that his future lay not in carpentry, but road racing, and he took the decision to embark on this risky profession at a time when it was merely a hobby to virtually everyone else in Australia. Instantly recognisable in all-white leathers, with fashionable flowing locks and aviator sunglasses, Denny positioned himself as a promoter’s dream. In 1969 he cleaned up at Mount Gambier winning the 125cc and 250cc South Australian titles and began to contemplate the peripatetic existence of a pro racer in such a vast country, carefully ‚
balancing his expenses with projected prize money and trade bonuses. For this reason he stayed relatively close to home, but made regular trips to Victoria, and to Sydney to compete at Amaroo Park, where promoter Vincent Tesoriero supplied ‘a few bob’ to help with expenses. In early 1972 at the new 1.5 mile Adelaide International Raceway, Denny defeated classy opposition to win the 125cc race on the Suzuki. With Mallala lost to motorcycles from 1972 to 1980, coupled with the rapidly growing popularity of Production Racing, he made the trip to Sydney for the 1972 Castrol Six Hour Race. He shared a Suzuki Cornell T20 with Ron Ferrier and finished a creditable third in the 250cc class on 323 laps – just one behind the class-winning Yamaha DS7 ridden by local aces the Sayle brothers and Warren Willing. From 1972 to 1974, Denny racked up tens of thousands of kilometres between Adelaide and Sydney, hardly missing a meeting at Oran Park and Amaroo Park. He was consistent and fast, didn’t crash too often, but found the eastern states stars like Toombs, Hindle, Atlee, Blake and company to be formidable opposition, especially with his road-based Suzukis. He made only two appearances at Bathurst, in 1972 and 1976, but did not figure in the results. By 1973, the Yamaha TZ350 was required equipment and provided rides in the 350cc, 500cc and Unlimited classes. With the ageing Suzukis becoming uncompetitive, Denny joined the Yamaha ranks and quickly adapted. “Denny McCormack was the fastest push starter I ever saw. It was like the bike was running the moment he moved it,” recalls rival Bob Rosenthal. His race pace and flamboyant off-track presence soon caught the eye of South Australian Yamaha distributors Pitmans, who stepped in for the 1974 season with a 350cc Yamaha as well as one of the new 700cc TZ750s. This gave Denny the chance to compete in the multi-round Australian Road Racing Championship series which had been instigated in 1973. It was a long trek to compete from coast to coast, but he finished off the year with victories in the 350, 500 and Unlimited races at the final round in Western Australia. This gave him second place overall in the 350 title, and third in both the 500 and Unlimited classes – which transpired to be the closest he came to winning an Australian championship. Earlier in the year, he walked away from the field to win the 350cc South Australian Grand Prix at A.I.R. A few months later in September, he starred in the South Australian TT at A.I.R., defeating Ken Blake and Ross Barelli to win the Unlimited Championship, and took out the 350 as well. He also added the prestigious Harvey Wiltshire Trophy to his collection when he sensationally defeated Ron Toombs’ Kawasaki H2R in a 30-lap, fairing-bashing contest at Calder.
It had been Denny’s best-ever year, but then came the season-ending final round of the Pan Pacific Series at A.I.R. The series had kicked off in 1972 as an attempt to lure overseas stars during the European off-season, but the experiment was not repeated the following year. Revived for 1974, it came down to a showdown between Toombs and American Pat ‚
Hennen, both Kawasaki mounted. Although he did not contest the opening two rounds, Denny reckoned his chances on his home track. True to form, the green machines ran away at the front in the opening heat, while Denny battled with Trevor Woods, John Boote, and Rob Hinton. As Australian Motorcycle News reported, “It was obvious that all were making a do or die effort and on the fourth lap McCormack did just that. Just after entering the ‘bowl’ he went wide and slammed the (concrete) wall bodily, not once but twice, as he slid down.”
As McCormack lay motionless on the track, the race was stopped. Crucially, St Jones Ambulance officer Cliff Wright, a veteran at motorcycle race meetings as well as other sporting events, leapt into action. Mr Wright later received an Order of Australia Medal for service to the community and said at his inauguration, “In 1974, I was in charge of the first aid at the Adelaide International Raceway. Denny McCormack, who was a top Australian rider at the time, came off his bike and hit the wall. I checked his pulse and there was nothing there so we started working on him and we finally got him going,” said Cliff later. Denny had been clinically dead for several minutes and had suffered six fractured ribs, a broken pelvis and other injuries.
Amazingly, Denny made a comeback to racing, and even contested a number of Asian events in 1975, where he rode a 350 Yamaha in the supporting classes to the main Formula 750 class. At the Indonesian Grand Prix at Jakarta he won the 350 race and took a 250/350 double at the Selangor Grand Prix in Kuala Lumpur. He also won the 250 class at the Malaysian GP and at Penang. But more strife lay ahead, when he crashed at McNamara Park he was struck by a following rider. He suffered severe head injuries and this time, the effects were much more permanent. Physically and emotionally shattered, it was time for Denny to hang up his helmet. Almost. A return to competition cycling helped restore his fitness and confidence, and in 1981, he again took up motorcycle racing. His mount was a Yamaha RD350LC, supplied by South Yamaha in Adelaide and fettled by his old mechanic and mentor Dean Harrison. Alas, the trauma of the head injury had not abated and the comeback was short-lived.
In fact, the aborted comeback was the least of his troubles. With his health deteriorating, his private life collapsed. Unemployed and homeless, he ended up sleeping rough in parks in Adelaide. It was in one such location that he was recognised by former AFL Football legend Graham Cornes, who had become a respected sports journalist after his retirement from playing. In December 1999, Cornes wrote of this experience in the Adelaide Advertiser newspaper. ‚