German Grand Prix

GERMAN Grand Prix

SLONIGER

Honda and Suzuki continue their march to victory.

IF nothing else, the German Grand Prix proved that it takes a Honda to beat a Honda — at least in the 125 and 250cc classes. These two middle events on a four-race Solitude card were chiefly interesting for the private duels staged by the Honda team riders. We wouldn’t want to insist that they were staying together to please the crowd, since nobody else was able to keep them company, but at least none of their top men seemed prone to stray very far from his mates.

On the other hand, the new 50cc class proved less successful for the world’s largest builder of two-wheeled vehicles. That was the opening race at Solitude race track near Stuttgart, so let’s begin there.

Training occupied portions of Friday and Saturday with Suzuki’s recent acquisition from East Germany, Ernst Degner, setting the early pace. Now, Stuttgart is home ground for the German Kreidler factory and they couldn’t allow that. Their number one man, Hans Georg Anscheidt, went out Saturday to set matters right and landed the pole position for the twelvespeed Kreidler at better than 77 mph. Degner, his greatest rival for the 50cc crown, was nearly two seconds slower over the seven-mile course and the best Honda, ridden by no less than Luigi Taveri, was almost eight seconds in arrears. The Germans began to hope. Degner went into the Solitude race with three straight wins and Kreidler felt it was time for a change.

Solitude was not to be the new dawn. When the flag dropped at the unholy hour of nine AM, Degner disappeared into the middle distance and spent his six laps getting further and further out in front, until he finished 22 seconds to the good. For first place it was a parade but the second spot was a dice all the way.

Anscheidt had a slippery grip on second in lap one but Taveri ousted him by about two lengths for the next two and the German had to contend with Suzuki’s second man, Mitsuo Itoh, as well. This gentleman put them all to shame for one round, getting into second before Hans-Georg got the “schnell” signal and poured it on to pull out a safe second, with Itoh third and a waning Honda leaving Taveri fourth. Part of the race was run in rain showers and the oil flag was out at the first turn, a very quick sweeping left-hander, for the entire race after a lesser light dumped his bike on the start.

Taveri’s two-stroke problems didn’t dampen his spirits however. The Swiss exchampion with the Italian name popped up again at ten o’clock with another fourstroke Honda, this time in the 125cc class. Solitude is a rider’s circuit, with everything from that rapid sweep to a climbing right-hand hairpin that reminds one of a spiral staircase at speed. They even have esses — about a half-dozen of them in a descending row. Even the straight has a bend in it.

For Taveri, who definitely likes the light bikes better than the heavy stuff, this sort of course is made to order. He has a particularly delicate touch with small tires — and the second race was visited by damp spots and oil flags as well.

Once again Luigi had to work for his marbles, after posting best laps in both training sessions — followed in both by a pair of Hondas. The closest competition in training came from Dr. Josef Ehrlich’s EMC singles from England. The exAustrian two cycle specialist has a quick bike there but he doesn’t have the Honda organization, for one thing. He does have Mike Hailwood and Paddy Driver though, and that helps.

Getting back to the front-runners, the only man close to Taveri in the early going was teammate Jim Redman and he led five of the laps, until trailing in to wait at the finish line at the end of round seven. Even assuming Taveri was supposed to win it after the full nine, Redman kept things interesting before suffering one of the rare Honda retirements. Life wasn’t too black for the Japanese, of course. They still had Tommy Robb safely in third (then second) for the entire race and Bob McIntyre eventually finished fourth, after Redman dropped out. Only Hailwood on the EMC could break the phalanx, with a third.

Just for the record, with six races run and four to go (assuming Argentina), Degner has a thin but growing lead on points in the 50cc class over Anscheidt — 32 to 27, and only the six best of ten are counted. .Taveri is third with 21, but enjoys a virtually unassailable 39 to 24 point margin over Redman in the 125cc division with Robb third, again for Honda. Redman retaliates in the 250cc class where 42 points (and four wins in six) almost assures his championship over McIntyre with 32.

One of those wins — and over McIntyre at that — came at Solitude in the closest finish of the day, planned from the pits or not. After chasing Taveri around in the previous race Redman was loaded for bear — spelled McIntyre, as above. This class didn’t even figure to be a contest outside the Honda stall with their quarter-liter fours producing some 46 hp and the likes of Redman and McIntyre aboard. It wasn’t.

Mac got the early jump and managed to book six of the eleven laps but Redman led the one that counted, at the end. Before that halcyon moment they had shadowed each other like Siamese twins, leaning into the first turn as one man. The official distance separating them at the flag was one-tenth of a second but that was for convenience of marking. They weren’t that far apart. Behind this pair the third team Honda, ridden by Tanaka, screamed along a minute and a half off the pace followed by German Guenther Beer on another Honda, no less.

The Japanese factory carries this spare works bike around Europe loaning it to the most promising local rider in each country. Beer was tapped for Solitude and looked generally as if he could have passed into third but was too polite. Maybe he just wanted another crack at the product. A private Guzzi from England came fifth before the horde of NSU’s — all of which are beginning to show their age. Degner appeared to enliven this race but the Suzuki was never in competition. He concluded his day by dropping it going into that first bend. Ernst came off clean and skidded some thirty feet on the seat of his leathers, with the bike making better sledding of it ahead of him. Neither were seriously damaged.

The motorcycle festivities closed after lunch with the 500cc sidecar run (a meagerly-entered F.I. car race was held even later) that settled the world’s championship for the class. None of the Grands Prix to come have sidecar divisions so Max Deubel and Emil Hoerner own the trophy free and clear, for the second season, but they had to hustle a bit to get it.

The defending titlists had a ten-second training edge over their closest rivals, Camathias and Winter from Switzerland and England respectively. Camathias could pull out the title only by winning — provided Germany’s own Deubel didn’t do better than sixth. In practical terms this meant the local BMW boys had to drop out. To add to the Swiss driver’s problems he was using a new co-driver after his regular, Burkhardt, was injured at the Isle of Man.

Nonetheless, Camathias was game for the good try. He got the starting jump from the middle of row one and held off the white and blue German three-wheeler for four full rounds. Once Deubel got by, however, it was strictly no contest. The old and new world champion even tacked up a fresh class record at 89.5 mph to prove he meant business, and he won by some 48 seconds. The first ten bikes were all BMWs, but the quickest were the new “kneelers” where the driver rests on his knee pads — no seat. They are low.

For true fans the Solitude meet had plenty of good dicing and some wonderful Honda noise. It even had a leatherclad pinup, one Catherine Tickle, who rides the chair for her bearded brother in the sidecar class.