THE OTHER LAVERDA TT2

I had been racing my good friends, Cleve and Pete Brightman’s Aermacchi for a number of years, with a fair bit of success. We had three top seven finishes in TT Formula 3 in the Isle of Man, including a podium in 1979, but much like Maurice Ogier, Cleve fancied another challenge. Never one afraid of a challenge, Cleve asked if he bought a Laverda Montjuic would I race it, with the aim of building a Formula 2 bike for 1982. Obviously I said yes and I raced it in standard trim at a few meetings in 1981, and to be honest didn’t like it that much.

“IN THE SAME SEASON WE WERE RUNNING A GOOD FOURTH IN THE FORMULA 2 RACE IN THE ULSTER GRAND PRIX WHEN THE IGNITION FAILED.”

Over the winter Cleve commissioned Harris to build a chassis and set to work on the engine; again like Maurice, Cleve is a skilled engine builder. Things were late coming together and prior to going to the Island we only had a few shakedown sessions. The Harris chassis was superb, the fuel tank crafted by another mate, Rob Drury, was exactly right, and TZ fairing and seat made for quite a pretty little bike. Forks and wheels remained standard Laverda as the budget was at its limit. As Alan has mentioned, the Laverda factory showed no interest (they still don’t seem impressed or interested in what we achieved) but British importer, Slater Brothers, helped as much as they could with a discount sale or return spares kit, which we used heavily. On the Island the Laverda was quick, with the handling only let down by the forks, put pretty fragile. Come the four lap race it ran like a dream and we ended up with fourth, ahead of many much bigger budget efforts. For 1983 Cleve pulled out all the stops, with more engine work, proper racing forks and brakes and the best racing wheels in the business, Astralite. I fitted RG500 bodywork and the end result looked like a full-on factory racebike. Practice at the TT was a nightmare, with only one full lap completed, and that involved holding one carb on from Signpost. Come the race the Brightman Laverda never missed a beat, handled like a dream and brought us home fifth, with a lap just short of 105mph, a respectable lap then and still the fastest ever lap of the TT Mountain Circuit by a Laverda of any capacity. I rode a lot of different machines in 17 years racing in the Isle of Man, but that Brightman Laverda was the sweetest handling of them all, and those results the most emotional. In the same season we were running a good fourth in the Formula 2 race at the Ulster Grand Prix when the ignition failed and holding seventh in Formula 2 World Championship round at Assen when an oil leak forced me into the pits. For 1984 I took up the offer of a brand new Moto Cinelli Ducati TT2, which didn’t deliver what it promised, but that’s another story. Later Cleve, generous man that he is, loaned the chassis to a Yugoslavian rider and while in his ‘care’ it was ‘stolen’, a sad end to a fabulous motorcycle. Malc Wheeler