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"WSRA BULPHAN LUNCH by BERT HARKINS"
"Our WSRA regional lunches, which
take place throughout the country from Bournemouth in the South to Glasgow
in the North, are well known throughout the Speedway world for their good
food, good company and a good day out, but we hadn't realized just how far
that word had spread.
At the South Eastern Lunch at Bulphan
in Essex in July, we had a visit from a long distance
traveller,.....former Wimbledon & Cradley favourite, Bob Andrews who had
travelled over from New Zealand with his wife, Lynda to join us. All I can
say is that it is a helluva long way to come for a free lunch, Bob must
have Scottish ancestry!
Bob is the "Vic White" of the New
Zealand Veteran Speedway Riders' Association, taking care of all the NZ
activities and their magazine plus keeping in touch with all his friends
around the world by sending rude Emails to them all! Bobby is half a World Champion, having won the World Best Pairs Championship along with his "Other Half", Ivan Mauger, so his name is in the record books along with those other Kiwi World Champions such as Briggo, Ronnie Moore and "Ivan Who?"
Although born in London, (Bob has never forgiven my German wife, Edith as he always tells her that,......."Your lot bombed our chip shop!"), he now lives in Auckland, New Zealand and has some WSRA members as near neighbours,...Wolverhampton's, Tommy Sweetman and Cradley's, Roy Trigg whilst former Glasgow Tigers, Joe Hicks and Bruce Ovenden along with that legendary promoter, Ian Hoskins are over in New Plymouth, so he has plenty of Speedway company down there in "The Land of the Long White Cloud"..
Our new WSRA President, Terry Stone, (or as my dear old Mum used to call him in his Glasgow Tigers days,..."CHERRY" Stone), was respendant in his Chain of Office (Reynolds Chain??) and introduced Bobby to the 80-odd (and some were VERY odd!) guests. In his short speech, Bobby mentioned that former World Finalist and Wembley Lion, Eric Williams, who now lives in Queensland, Australia, was not very well, so everyone sent their Best Wishes to "The Little Welshman", as Eric calls himself and our hopes went with him. Unfortunately, a week or so later, Eric lost his long battle and headed for that big pits area in the sky, so our condolences go to his family and all of his many friends,.
One former rider who made had a welcome surprise at the lunch was former Wembley, Oxford and England star, Jimmy Gooch. There had been a story in the Speedway press recently, that, over the years, Jimmy had lost his World Final and British Final medals. By co-incidence, two riders who also rode in that British Final were at the lunch, Bob Andrews and Trevor Hedge, but they had managed to keep their medals safe.
President Stone then invited Jimmy Gooch up onto the stage and presented him with,...............Jimmy's missing British Final medal! It seems that the medal had been amongst Terry's memorabilia collection for some years and had even been taken around to various shows and events when there has been a WSRA display so, when Terry read the sad story about Jimmy's lost medals, he made this surprise presentation to the delighted former World Finalist. The WSRA to the rescue!
Once again, the sun shone on the Bulphan lunch as it seems to do every year and after lunch, members could check out the Terry Stone photo albums. sit in the sunshine with a cool drink in the gardens of Ye Olde Plough House and listen to the lovely sound of an unsilenced JAP being warmed up! Paradise! The Jap was an all-chrome model belonging to Danny Dunton and there was a queue of people waiting to be photographed sitting astride that iconic machine. Perhaps we should have charged for the photographs and raised some money for the WSRA funds!
Check out the website for the next lunch date and try to come along to meet up with old friends. Who knows? Someone may have an old photograph of YOU in their collection!
The Scottish Reunion takes place at Ashfield Speedway on Sunday 6th September and you don't need to be Scottish to be able to attend, so why not head north for some good old Highland Hospitality. New WSRA President, Terry Stone will be making his first official appearance in Scotland since taking over that hallowed position and who knows,...he may even buy you a drink to celebrate!... ..........Details from Jim Henry on 0131-664-7185..
See You at the next WSRA Get-Together!
Bert Harkins
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Photos by Maggie Radcliffe |
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