TOUGH TIMES
Even with Pop providing the transport and fuel, without additional sponsorship it became pretty obvious that self-funding a four cylinder twostroke racer was virtually impossible, even based on their entire joint income. So for the 1979 season, Sandra persuaded local Yamaha dealer, Yamachine, to let them have any spares at cost and a retainer for fairing and personal advertising. His new sponsor supplied a set of Dymag wheels which was the first time they’d had that luxury. Previous to that, if it rained, you’d see Roy and Pop frantically ripping out the wheels and bringing their tyre levers into play and changing to a set of wets. When I quizzed Roy about the big Yam’s running costs, I was surprised at just how reasonable costs can be if the bike’s wellprepared and ridden with mechanical sympathy. They always ran standard engine parts bought from either Bill Smith or Derek Chatterton who had Chris Mayhew spannering for him. He was a first class engineer who steered Roy in the right direction on more than one occasion. Roy could make a crankshaft last a season before handing to a ship’s engineer called Mark Stevens who certainly knew what he was doing and was reasonably priced into the bargain. After every meeting, the top end would come off and be inspected for the bugbear Yamaha detonation problems. The rings were replaced every four meetings with barrels being replaced as and when necessary – hopefully not too often. Tyres were a major part of the very limited budget even though they bought ex-dunlop part-used tyres wherever possible. Although still gaining top-10 finishes and never having broken a single bone in the whole of his 12 year career, a combination of things led to Roy hanging up his leathers in 1982. A lengthy steel strike had severely affected Yamachine’s fortunes and it was looking to cut back on his sponsorship, if not stop it altogether. The writing was on the wall for two-strokes as big four-strokes such as Honda’s RC30 were taking over the heavyweight class. He had taken a nasty tumble on the last lap while in the lead, at Barn Corner at a Cadwell National which really shook him up. Work schedules and financial constraints were sapping the team’s morale and Roy felt that Pop’s enthusiasm was beginning to wane – the show was over, although the team’s love of bikes and racing has never diminished. The Yamaha was sold to Chris Woolnaugh and Pop was reimbursed, while I purchased the Metisse which was later sold on to Martyn Orgy and later it had the odd outing in the hands of the late Charlie Sanby. Sad to say that the ever-popular paddock character, Pop Toyne, passed away during 2004 – RIP friend. However, that’s not the end of the story... Roy was invited to ride at the massive reunion of Cadwell past masters on August 2-3, on a Volksworld of Louth supplied Honda SP1. This invite was a fitting accolade to the Toynes, who not only loved Cadwell Park, but raced professionally, on a shoestring budget. Just as an aside, one of the apprentices who worked on trucks alongside fitter Roy Toyne, was none other than Guy ‘let’s have a tea break’ Martin – it’s a small world ain’t it!