The Finnish Grand Prix
THE FINNISH GRAND PRIX
BENGT BJORKLUND
THE LITTLE FINNISH TOWN of Imatra, near the Russian border, goes “continental” once a year when the Scandinavian round of the world road racing championship takes place. The Fifth Finnish Grand Prix, held for the third consecutive year in the Imatra area on the well-known 6,030-meter-long public road circuit, was a great success. The weather was fine on practice day and most of race day, and 30,000 spectators came out to see giants of the motorcycle world do battle.
The races began with the 125cc machines. The “Big Three” — Honda, Yamaha and Suzuki — were competing in this class, along with the one-machine entries of Kawasaki and MZ.
When the starting light switched from yellow to green, Yamaha’s No. 1 man, Phil Read, who had bettered last year’s lap record in practice, was first away, his machine having started beautifully.
After one lap, Read still led the field. In his slipstream were the two factory Suzukis of Hugh Anderson and Yoshimi Katayama. Luigi Taveri, whose five-cylin(Continued on page 102) der Honda was hesitant leaving the line, had already moved up to fourth place, giving spectators a foretaste of the allstops-pulled racing yet to come.
The two-strokes seemed to go well on the Imatra circuit. Read led lap after lap with his water-cooled twin. Bill Ivy, on the other Yamaha, moved up to third from seventh, passing Taveri. However, Ivy soon dropped out with engine trouble.
Taveri also was finding the Finnish roads to his liking and, on lap eight, took second place from Hugh Anderson, Suzuki. Ralph Bryans, on the other fivecylinder Honda also picked up speed. After a good tussle with Katayama on the Suzuki, he passed the Japanese rider on lap 12.
Two laps later, Bryans had also overtaken Hugh Anderson and was now third, behind Read and Taveri. Taveri pressed even harder and on the 17th lap, with four laps to go, only 100 yards separated him and Read.
Taveri kept whittling the gap down until the last lap, and on the final straight, managed to overtake Read — after the checkered flag. So short was Read’s lead at the finish line that Taveri couldn’t believe his opponent had won. But the timers gave Read a 1/10-second advantage.
In the 350cc race, it was Mike Hailwood’s four-cylinder Honda that started to clear advantage. His fastest rival, Giacomo Agostini, on the three-cylinder MV-Agusta, tried to catch him but couldn’t; the difference in starts was too much to make up. All through the race, about 150 yards separated these two riders, followed by Heinz Rosner on the 252cc MZ watercooled two-stroke twin; Bruce Beale on a 305cc Honda CR77 production racing twin; Czech rider Bocac on a one-cylinder 320cc CZ four-stroke, and, the best private entry, Australian Jack Ahearn, who rode a Norton.
Hailwood’s opposition — as you can see — was not overly impressive. Yet, he bettered both lap and race records.
Sitting beside 1966 World Champion Hailwood in the line-up for the 250cc race was his new Honda teammate, Stuart Graham. Both he and Hailwood had six-cylinder Hondas, and these machines seemed to give the other competitors frazzled nerves before the start had even taken place. Honda pit men had been revving them high and making those eery hound-dog sounds. When they were shut off, a deathly silence settled over Imatra, and then, just as quickly, the riders were away, Hailwood in front, two sets of sixcylinders yowling as he and Graham descended on the town square.
When the sound returned at first lap’s end, a two-stroke came first — Heinz Rosner on the MZ! It seemed as though Hailwood and Graham were working a ploy in which they would let Rosner lead for three laps, then Graham and finally Hailwood again.
Meanwhile, Canadian Mike Duff, who won the Finnish 250 race last year, was defending Yamaha’s international virtue by his lonesome, on the “old” air-cooled twin. It was a hopeless job and he soon retired from the race.
After 12 laps, it began to rain and from there on the race was a Honda team exhibition. Their plan came off without a hitch, with Hailwood first and Graham second. Rosner gave way to Czech rider Franta Stastny, Jawa four-stroke twin.
Then came the big one — the 500cc race. This opposed Hailwood, all steadiness on his factory Honda, and Agostini, who is all “hair” as he leads in points for the 500cc world title on the MV. You will recall that Hailwood won this race last year when he was riding for MV.
While Hailwood bested his foe off the starting grid, Agostini made the Honda camp (who would like to win the championship in all classes) very uncomfortable by perching just behind Mike’s rear wheel for 14 laps. This, indeed, seemed the proper strategy, for Hailwood fumbled his braking for a 90-degree turn and found himself on the escape road watching Agostini shoot by. Mike lost 30 seconds during this little digression and first place now went to the Italian.
As it had started raining (probably the reason for Hailwood’s mistake), things got very spectacular. As the pair passed the S-bend in front of the paddock as fast as they could go, one could see that both men were breaking the front wheels loose in the wet.
However, Hailwood could not keep up with the MV rider and dropped two seconds a lap.
Far behind the two riders at the finish were a group of “privates” who put in a very good show for third place. It finally went to Jack Findlay, Matchless, who was followed by Jack Ahearn, Norton; then a new rider from Australia, Malcolm Stanton, Norton; and Lewis Young, Matchless,
from England.
