Ray Quincey
Talent and tenacity
Being the son of a famous father can be anything but a bed of roses. In the case of Ray Quincey, son of Victoria’s most successful resident rider in the early to mid-fifties Maurice (Maurie), there was no free lunch. When he decided he wanted to follow in the fatherly footsteps on the race track, he had to figure it out for himself.
Maurie himself was the son of pioneer racer and industry figure Percy, and from the time he threw a leg over a racing motorcycle in the late 1940s he was stamped as star quality. Maurie was also astute enough to realise that racing doesn’t last forever, and at an early age set himself up with a motorcycle business in Melbourne. Along with his meticulous approach to racing, he was also dedicated to establishing the business, to the point that he knocked back the coveted nomination to represent Australia in the 1951 Isle of Man TT. He was just 22 years of age and considered there would be ample opportunity later. He was again nominated in 1952 and 1953, declining each time, but finally in 1954 he reckoned the time was right.
Maurie, ever the professional to whom nothing less than perfection would suffice, sailed for Britain in January 1954 with his wife Betty, racing a pair of new Nortons on the Continent and at the Isle of
Man, where he finished tenth in the Senior. The following year he was drafted into the illustrious Norton works team for the TT, finishing a fine fifth ‚
in the Junior. Then in the Senior, while flat out on the mountain section, the con rod broke and locked the engine, hurling him down the road. Fortunately he did not hit any roadside objects, but it was a colossal crash that left him with serious head injuries. At the time of the accident, Maurie and Betty had a four-month old son, named Ray after the great Rhodesian rider Ray Amm. While Maurie did recover from his injuries and even returned to racing in Australia, it was short-lived and after a break of around ten years, he turned to car racing.
Forbidden fruit
As a teenager, young Ray was surrounded by motorcycles through the family business, but initially satisfied his need for speed with a 98cc go-kart that soaked up all his spare cash. It was to have been a stepping stone to a car racing career, but that goal seemed increasingly distant and unattainable.
When the subject of a road motorcycle inevitably arose, he was met with solid opposition from his parents. Even the argument that all his mates had road bikes failed to have any effect. He was 18 before the resistance thawed, although his goal was still to race cars, not bikes. His first real motorcycle was a Honda CB350-4, which soon gave way to a CB500-4. The new-found freedom saw Ray and his mates ride out to a few motorcycle race meetings, and gradually a plan was hatched.
There was still parental opposition, but Ray was legally old enough to control his own destiny and joined Hartwell Motor Cycle Club in order to apply for an A.C.C.A. Competition Licence. The CB500 gave way to something more sporty, a Yamaha RD350, and he entered his first race meeting at Calder in early 1974. It was a dream start with a win in his very first race, followed by two seconds and another win in his remaining rides. The fuse had been lit. Within four months the RD350 had been pensioned off, to be replaced with a pukka racer, a TZ250. This time success was not so instant, but he was a fast learner, and a TZ350 joined the stable in time for the 1975 season. From the beginning, Ray’s style was very much set in the old school. Unlike the modern trend of hanging off and dragging knees on the tarmac, Ray sat straight in the saddle with barely a limb in the breeze. Just like his father.
Despite much-needed sponsorship from the Golden Breed clothing company, organised by Vincent Tesoriero, money was tight, very tight, but Ray decided to contest the 1975 Australian Road Racing Championship in the 250, 350 and 500 classes, which meant hauling his bikes and equipment around the country. The ‘race transporter’ was a battered old VW Beetle towing an equally venerable trailer. His constant companion, organiser, co-driver and sometime mechanic was his then-girlfriend Kathy Leverett. The title-chase began well, with a win in the 250 and second in both the 350 and 500 classes at Symmons Plains, Tasmania. His Bathurst debut at round two did not come up to his expectations, and as the year progressed the results slipped, along with his confidence.
1976 was to be very much a make-or-break year for Ray, and from the outset it proved to be the former. At the infamous Australian TT at
Laverton Air Base outside Melbourne in January,
Ray was a class act in the lower categories, finishing third, as top local rider behind the internationals in the 125 class (on Clem Daniel’s CSD) and in the 250 class, where he was fifth. The 350 could have been even better, because Ray led World Champion Walter Villa for the opening laps, until the damper on the single rear shock unscrewed itself and he was forced to retire. Then came the Australian Road Racing Championships, the first round of which was staged as usual at Symmons Plains. Increased sponsorship from Golden Breed helped bolster his meagre
“1976 was to be very much a make-or-break year for Ray, and from the outset it proved to be the former.”
budget but it was still a struggle. Ray won the 250 and 500 races in Tasmania, then made the trip across to Mount Gambier for round two at McNamara Park. With quite a few of the title contestants in USA for the Daytona 200, Ray needed no second invitation and swept the board to win every solo class except the 125, which he did not contest. This included winning the Unlimited event on his 350, beating Murray Sayle on the Team Kawasaki H2R 750 and Bob Rosenthal’s TZ750.
Although convincingly beaten by Rob Hinton in both 250 and 350 events in Round Three of the series at Bathurst, he then headed ‘home’ for Sandown
Park where he won the 250 and had the 500 race ‚