CLIVE SMITH

Clive Smith shocked the trials world – or the experts at least – when he battled his JAS Montesa Cota round the 1973 British Experts Trial in Wales and beat the cream of the crop. At the time, 20-year-old Clive hadn’t actually won a national trial but had met the qualifications for an Experts entry.

“I thought I’d thrown it away at the last group when the rear wheel went sideways and I picked up a five,” he admitted to Motorcycle’s Bob Currie who interviewed him after the win.

The Smith family were introduced to trials riding when Clive’s elder brother Raymond swapped a Triumph Speed twin for a Tiger Cub trials bike and, without actually knowing what a trial was, had been persuaded to have a go.

Clive himself soon took up the sport when he turned 16. That he began to do well was quickly obvious and when looking around for a new bike Jim Sandiford offered to back him on an OSSA. The OSSA was delayed, Clive rode a Montesa for a good while then the OSSA turned up; he rode that for a while but by the time the 1973 Experts came along, he was back on a Montesa.

The factory offered Clive a direct contract for a couple of years from 1974 until 1976. A downturn in Spain’s fortunes meant cutbacks, Mr Smith went to a Bultaco through Sandiford and rode this in the inaugural television Kickstart Trial. One of the new White Wonder Montesas became available for him in 1980.

Asked if he’d always stuck to trials he replied: “I had a thought to try motocross at one time but didn’t, I was drafted into the British ISDT team on a KTM for 1974 and that was interesting. I had a bit of an off and ended up having to straighten the back end of the bike with a scaffold pole. Then my hands blistered and I tried to carry on, but Ken Heanes stopped me after a couple of days.”