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RWYB
Shakespeare County Raceway
17 April 2016

The sun shone on Shakey  on Sunday the 17th of April and a great field of two, three, four and even six-wheeled vehicles assembled for what promised to be a great day's action.  Undoubtedly the headline class was the Supercharged Outlaws who were holding their first of seven rounds for the 2016 season.

However, what really made my day was the appearance of one man and two rather small bikes which did not even put in a single pass.  That man was Brian Chapman who back in the day was the scourge of Top Bike with his world beating Vincent-powered bikes.


Brian Chapman with the two fastest Vincents of all time

There was a bewildering choice of engines used in Top Bike competition back in the 1970s before the almost universal adoption of the Japanese multi-cylinder lumps.  The favourite was the Triumph twin of either 500 or 650cc capacity.  It was quite common to see twin-engined machines and even three engines was not unheard of.  However, Brian was a die-hard fan of the Vincent marque so, bucking the trend completely, he selected the single cylinder 500cc engine from the Vincent Comet, a bike very few people had even heard of.  The frame was artfully crafted to take advantage of the diminutive size of the engine and indeed Brian's own rather compact stature.  The result was a light and very low machine which looked totally dissimilar to virtually every other bike.  Over the years he experimented, tuned and refined the machine until in 1979 he had run a staggering best of 8.81 seconds and 157 mph.  The bike was called Mighty Mouse and it certainly was mighty, but mouse-like - not really.  It roared like a tiger with the tooth ache and went like you know what off a shovel.  The mind boggles as to what it must have been like travelling so quickly yet so close to the ground.


Mighty Mouse

Mighty Mouse had been  developed to its maximum potential so in 1981 Brian debuted a new machine with a 1000cc Vincent V-twin featuring two superchargers.  Super Mouse as it was known was soon down into the 8.2 second zone with speeds approaching 170 mph.  Unfortunately Brian's career ended prematurely when he took a spill in 1982 and, although only bruised, decided to retire from racing.  There was undoubtedly much more to come from Super Mouse but, sadly for the world of drag racing, this further potential was never to be realised.


Super Mouse

Here are some other pictures I took of Brian and his simply extraordinary machines.

 

And here are some pictures of the supporting cast

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(First posted on 21 April 2016)