SUBSTANTIAL STYLE

Mike Nicks appraises the career of double world champion Bill Lomas (1928-2007)

Derby lad Bill Lomas was a racing team’s dream – a talented rider and a development engineer. He designed his own 250cc twinoverhead-cam Royal Enfield when he was 22, and soon afterwards rode for two British factories: Velocette, on the 350cc KTT, and AJS for whom he campaigned the three-valve 350cc AJS 7R3 and the 500cc Porcupine twin. Lomas wanted AJS to give the Porcupine a cylinder head with a narrower valve angle and a five-speed gearbox. He wanted to storm up the TT’S Mountain Mile flat in fourth and soar down the other side in fifth. But the factory was unmoved and the bike’s 1949 500cc world championship was its only glory. He also rode the Matchless G45, a pushrod twin based on the factory’s 500cc road bike. It gave good power, but was 45lb too heavy.

Like various frustrated British riders in the ’50s, including Geoff Duke and John Surtees, Lomas’ talents were appreciated by Continental factories, and he worked for NSU, Benelli, MV Agusta and Moto Guzzi. At NSU he contributed ideas that helped the German manufacturer to achieve five world titles.

In the early ’50s MV used Earles-type forks, but Lomas urged them against this as he felt they caused high-speed wobbles. When MV’S Les Graham crashed fatally on the leap after Bray Hill in the 1953 Senior TT, Lomas believed the forks may have contributed to the tragedy. Soon afterwards MV rejected the Earles design and adopted telescopics.

Lomas had his most successful seasons working with Giulio Carcano and the team at Moto Guzzi. The factory’s twin-cam 350cc single was competing against fourcylinder MVS and DKW two-stroke triples, but had the advantage of a horizontallymounted engine, Guzzi’s wind-tunnel tested streamlining and Carcano’s meticulous methodology. For the 1955 TT the economical bike would run straight through the seven-lap Junior race, starting with 32 litres of fuel. Lomas took victory and went on to win the world title. He made it two on the bounce with a second 350cc world title for Moto Guzzi in 1956. On Guzzi’s 500cc V8, Lomas averaged 152mph to break the standing 10km world record in 1957, with the final kilometre timed at 178mph. The attempt took place on a narrow section of the Appian Way, which was bordered by a canal on each side. Safety measures consisted of a police launch in each one, just in case!

Bill Lomas rode 29 different motorcycles in his career. His autobiography was published in 2002 by Redline Books. The photos show Lomas was a great stylist on a bike, and a sharp-looking bloke in a decade famous for drab grey macs and flannel trousers. He was also a talented writer, giving the best picture I’ve ever come across of what the racing life was like in a decade of intense technical progress, at the height of the Continental Circus years.

‘LOMAS WON 350cc WORLD TITLES WITH GUZZI IN ’55 AND ’56’