GEOFF TANNER
A talented part-time racer, Geoff Tanner was offered the golden ticket of a dream works Norton ride – but he turned it down. Why?
Geoff turned down a factory contract and balanced racing with working for a London council as a gardener! Read his fascinating story here…
Not many riders would turn down the offer of a factory ride, but that’s precisely what Geoff Tanner did in the autumn of 1955 when offered a seat in the Norton team for the following year. There were reasons, of course…
Geoff Tanner was born in Walthamstow, London, in 1928. During his National Service just after the Second World War, he managed to save a little money, enough eventually to buy a 1930 Scott three-speeder, and after ‘demob’ in 1948 came a 1938 Norton International.
Impromptu Sunday afternoon races from the ‘Wake Arms’ in Epping Forest, and sprints on the disused runway at Fairlop, began to separate out those in the group who had any real aspirations and desire to go racing, and Geoff’s race debut came in 1952 at Ibsley, riding the ‘Inter’ to and from the meeting with makeshift lights and silencer.
The ‘Inter’ was soon replaced by a KTT Velocette, which, being a full race bike, needed to be transported to race meetings, a task accomplished by using a 1928 Royal Enfield V-twin and sidecar ‘float’.
To make Saturdays off work easier to arrange, Geoff took a job as a gardener with Walthamstow Council, and during 1952/3 good results at Blandford, Castle Combe, Thruxton and Scarborough brought him to the attention of Hugh Rae, proprietor of Chiswick dealer G K Rae.
Rae’s previous rider, Bob Keeler, had been drafted into the Norton factory team, so for 1954 they offered to provide Geoff with two new Manx Nortons, both to be prepared by Ray Petty, a mutually satisfactory arrangement that would have a bearing on Geoff’s later decision regarding the team ride with Norton. Wins and places continued, and a 5th place in the Junior Clubman’s TT in June provided valuable experience prior to September’s Manx Grand Prix, where he finished 4th in the Junior. The Senior brought a disappointing retirement with a slipping clutch on the second lap.
The same sponsor/tuner/rider arrangement continued for 1955, and with wins at Castle Combe, Brands Hatch and Crystal Palace, the season was building nicely toward the Manx Grand Prix. Starting the Junior at number 104, Geoff had the benefit of signals as up-to-theminute as possible, with all his rivals in front of him on the road, the downside of course being the ‘traffic’ he would have to pass.
The ride, in his own words, was as easy as these things ever can be: his winning margin nearly four minutes from Alan Holmes and Jackie Wood. The Senior was very different, a starting number 1 meant a clear road ahead, but any signals would be half-a-lap behind and the incentive of having riders in front would be missing. The result, after a hard-fought battle with Alastair King and Jimmy Buchan,
was a historic victory, the ‘Mgp-double’ win.
Hugh Rae was as pleased as Geoff, and so too were Norton, who threw a party and chose the occasion to offer him a place in the team for the following year. Speaking to Bob Shilling of ‘Classic Motorcycling Legends’ in the early 1990s Geoff said: “In Joe Craig’s day I would have jumped at the chance. But for 1956 the team would only have standard production racers so I politely declined and stayed with
G K Rae. I did wonder if I had done the right thing but my predecessor Bob Keeler assured me that I had.” Geoff knew the set-up with Rae’s, with Ray Petty, and with the bikes, so he was confident, comfortable, happy and successful, so why generate ‘factory’ pressure for no advantage in machinery?
Hugh Rae provided two new Nortons for 1956, and after a 2nd place on the 500 in the North West 200, hopes were high for the TT, but both rides ended with retirement. The Golden Jubilee TTS of 1957 were increased in length, Geoff finishing 7th in the seven-lap Junior, and was running 4th on the final circuit of the eightlap Senior when he ran out of fuel at Governor’s Bridge and pushed in to finish in 28th place. He always maintained that bronze replica was the hardest-won trophy of his racing career!
The established pattern of two new Nortons, both prepared by Ray Petty, continued for 1958, and after an early-season ride at Imola, Geoff finished 3rd in the Junior TT behind John Surtees’ MV Agusta and Dave Chadwick’s Norton, but the carburettor needle broke on the second lap of the Senior.
Geoff would go ‘international’ for 1959, so he resigned from the ‘day-job’ and bought a pair of Nortons through Bob Keeler. The successful association with Hugh Rae was amicably brought to a close (he wanted to stick to domestic racing) and Geoff, with new wife Pauline, set off to enjoy life as part of the ‘Continental Circus’.
Although the Grands Prix did not pay much money, a precarious living could be made by carefully selecting international meetings across Europe, and so it proved, the couple returning home at season’s end managing to show a slight, and well-earned profit.
Over the winter Geoff had Ray Petty once more preparing the Nortons, and had every reason to look forward to another enjoyable season in 1960. Things didn’t work out quite that way, with an early-season accident at Mouscron in Belgium leaving him with a spine fracture.
1961 brought a similar season of continental races, plus the TT, but also brought further injuries at Brno and Monza. By now it was clear that some of the determination and desire was no longer quite as it had been. The Nortons were sold and the racing ended with no regrets, maybe just a hint of reflection...
A decent job at a friend’s garage, house purchase and home improvements then took Geoff’s energies, and perhaps surprisingly for one who had been so intimately involved with motorcycles for so long, they no longer figured strongly in his life, at least not until 2009 when he was reintroduced to his 1954 Clubman’s TT Featherbed ‘Inter’, courtesy of owner Bob Chapman.
When this profile was being drafted, Geoff was hurt in a domestic fall, and after a week of intense pain he suffered a stroke and was admitted to hospital for stroke-treatment; an x-ray revealed a fractured knee-cap. Four weeks later he was moved to a different hospital for rehabilitation, and it was there that he tested positive for Covid-19.
On January 8, 2021, a day which saw a record number of deaths attributable to the pandemic, Geoff became one of that tragic number. He would have been 93 later in the month.