© Richard Agnew, orginally published in 2003 as "At the Centre for 100 Years: Celebrating a century of Ulster Motorcycle Sport"

Until 1921, hill climbs and sand racing were the only options for the speed loving motor cyclist. That changed from August to October 1921 when the first true road races were held.

It began on Tuesday 16th August with an event at Killough, Co Down. A race, covering three laps of a 12 miles circuit, was held as part of Killough Sports. Four riders started and James Stewart, riding a 4hp Harley-Davidson, won.

Less than three weeks later the Temple Club staged a 25 miles handicap race, on Saturday 3rd September, on a course, starting at the Temple crossroads, and T. G. Lindsay was the winner, riding a 2 3/4hp Imperial-JAP. A week later, it was the Banbridge Club’s turn to hold a 25 miles race on a five miles circuit at Ballynahinch, where Herbert Chambers, from Belfast, won on a 2 3/4hp AJS.

Not content with one race the Banbridge Club staged a second one - The Bann 50, on a 10 miles circuit, near Loughbrickland, on Thursday 29th September. Banbridge man James Finney riding a 3 1/2hp Norton, was the winner, but the event was significant because it saw the road race debut of Stanley Woods.

Woods rode to the event, along with fellow Dubliner Charlie ‘Paddy’ Johnston. Stanley used to race his 7/9 Harley-Davidson machine, both as a solo and with a sidecar, bending the handlebars in to clear the sidecar and out again for solo riding. On the third lap he learnt all about metal fatigue - the bars broke in the middle and Stanley crashed into a bank at Glascar Mills. A spectator, Robert Corbett, cut an inch thick branch from a holly tree and lashed it across the bars as a splint, enabling Stanley not only to complete his third lap, only to find the race was over, but also to get home to Dublin that evening. The stuff of legends!

The South Derry Club held a number of motor cycle competitions on Wednesday 12th October, including a consistent driving test and a hill climb. The winner of a 21 miles race on a 4.2 miles circuit at Desertmartin was J. Forsythe, riding a 2 1/4hp Diamond-JAP. Forsythe also won the hill climb.

The Ulster MCC brought the curtain down on the first road racing with a second event at Ballynahinch, on Saturday 15th October. This 50 miles race was won by James Shaw on a 3 1/2hp Norton.

The roads were not officially closed for these early meetings - indeed they were run without permission being sought from the local authorities. They relied on the co-operation of the local constabulary, who manned road junctions and kept the roads clear of traffic and spectators. In the Irish Cyclist & Motor Cyclist in October 1921, leading Ulster Centre official, Bob Wright, was quoted as saying that, ‘Racing is now completely out of hand. Road races are being held without a permit. The MCUI is abdicating its responsibilities. Races are being held against the law and against the MCUI Constitution. This must stop!’

The ‘road racing question’ was considered at the MCUI Inter Centre Conference in Dundalk on 11th March 1922. Thomas Murphy proposed that, ‘no permits shall be issued by the Union for a speed competition on the road (other than a hill climb) unless the promoting body procure permission from the properly constituted authority to hold the event’. This motion was seconded by Robert McCann and al agreed.

The following year proved to be a momentous one for motor cycling in Northern Ireland with the Road Races Act reaching the statute books in May 1922, thanks mainly to the efforts of Thomas Moles MP, editor of the Belfast Telegraph and a leading member of the Ulster Motor Cycle and Ulster Automobile Clubs. Moles was also President of the Ulster Centre from 1923-’27.

Over the next decade, races came onto and went off the calendar. Only the Temple and Ballynahinch races from 1921 would be held again. The Banbridge Club did not run another road race until the Banbridge 100 from 1928-30. The Temple, of course, ran until 1999, after which the club had difficulties securing a suitable circuit. In 1922 new races were held at Ballydrain, Clandeboye, Cookstown - still running today - Greengraves (Newtownards) and the first Ulster Grand Prix at Clady.

In February 1922, Harry Ferguson proposed to a meeting of the Irish Motor Trade in Belfast that major international motor racing should be promoted to revive interest in the business and pastime of motoring.

Ferguson selected the Clady circuit and intended a race for motor cycles in the morning, followed by one for cars in the afternoon. Ferguson and a small band of suppliers - including Billy Chambers, Robert Condell, Billy Simms and Alex Waddell - contacted Antrim County Council, which agreed to approach the newly formed Northern Ireland Government for permission to close the public roads.

Ferguson had. to go to America, due to business commitments, leaving his small band of enthusiasts to carry out the arrangements - no easy task, given the decision of the motor race committee to abandon plans for a car race and the unsettled political situation of that summer.

One of Ireland’s leading riders of the time, James Shaw, is credited with originating the name Ulster Grand Prix, although he claimed that the credit should have gone to his wife, Ethel. Shaw proposed it at a meeting of the Ulster Motor Cycle Club and it was unanimously approved. Originally planned for 17th June, then 1st July, to avoid clashing with a regatta, the first Ulster Grand Prix was held on Saturday 14th October 1922.

There were 75 entrants, of whom 72 started the seven laps, 143.5 miles handicap race, and less than 20% would finish. The entry included a number of cross channel competitors, and ‘star’ names included Stanley Woods, Wal Handley, Harry Langman, Hubert Hassall, Graham Walker and James Shaw. Hassall, on the works Norton, won the handicap by 45 seconds from Fred Andrews. Langman, riding a Scott, set the fastest lap at 65.70mph, whilst Handley, Andrews, Hassall and Norman Metcalfe won the 250cc, 350cc, 600cc and Over 600cc classes respectively.

Two other competitors in this first race are worthy of note, namely Harrie Palmer and Norman Scott two stalwart of the Ulster Motor Cycle Club.

Palmer first served as race secretary in 1924 - a position which he filled on many occasions, the last being 1973. He was also Clerk of the Course from 1925 to 1930, Ulster Centre Chairman in 1957, and MCUI President in 1960.
Scott was Chairman of the organising committee from 1957 to 1963 and represented Ireland at the FIM. As a competitor, he won the 1922 Ballynahinch 50, the 1924 Temple 50, the 1926 Hurst Cup and took part in the TT in 1925 and 1926, retiring both times. He was a founding member of the TT Riders Association, acting as secretary for over 20 years.

Large crowds attended the race, the spectators encroaching right onto the road, opening up a narrow lane to let each rider through - personal safety seemed low on the list of priorities. At any rate, the first event was judged an unqualified success.
In 1923, a single Coleraine 100 was held; the Dungannon 100 was staged from 1924 to 1927; a North Down 60 was held at Carrowdore in 1925; and when the North Down Club went out of business, the Belfast and District Club stepped in to run the first Carrowdore in 1927 The B&D continued to run the Carrowdore 100 until 2000, apart from when they moved to a circuit near Comber in 1937 and 1938, and again in 1950 and 1951, when the B&D became the first club to hold motor cycle races at the Dundrod circuit.

Road racing was actually banned in 1926, by Down County Council which meant that events such as the Ballydrain, Ballynahinch, North Down and Temple races were cancelled. The ban followed a court action, arising out of a spectator fatality at the North Down Club’s speed trial at Clandeboye on Saturday, 23rd April 1923. The incident saw the demise of the North Down Club, but the ban was rescinded in May 1927 and road racing was back on the agenda.

Two new events were added to the calendar in 1929 - the North West 200 and the Enniskillen 100. The Enniskillen race ran until 1952 on a 6 1/4 miles triangular course from Mossfield to Sydare to Ballinamallard. The event was thought so highly of in the 1930s that some Ulster Centre officials suggested that the Ulster Grand Prix should move to Enniskillen! The 1949 Enniskillen 100 is unique in Irish motor cycle sport in that it is the only time a race has been cancelled because the weather was too good - melting tar forced the meeting to be postponed from June until September.

The first North West took place on Saturday April 20th 1929 and in keeping with other Irish road races of the time, the inaugural event was primarily a handicap event, with the riders starting at intervals. The Rudge and Norton factories were quick to seize the opportunity for a pre-TT try out - the 36 strong entry included Stanley Woods and Percy ‘Tim’ Hunt from Norton and Ernie Nott and Tyrell Smith from Rudge.

The event took a heavy mechanical toll of the 31 starters - only eight finished! Belfast’s Billy McCracken (348 Velocette) took the handicap win by over seven minutes from Coleraine’s Malcolm McQuigg (246 Zenith). McQuigg won the 250cc class, Harry Meageen (346 JAP) won the 350cc class and Ernie Nott (499 Rudge) took the first of four consecutive 500cc class wins. The fastest lap of the race was set by ‘Tim’ Hunt (490 Norton) at 70.56mph.

The organisation of the race fell short of the standards required today. For instance, the organisers only learned, while the race was in progress, that Antrim County Council should have been asked permission to close the part of the circuit under that Councils jurisdiction! Motor cycle sport went into decline, along with the rest of the world, in the ‘great depression’ of the early 1930s, reaching its lowest point in 1932 when there were just 40 entries for the Ulster Grand Prix, over all three classes. The race was beginning to recover when it was boosted in 1935 by being awarded the title ‘Grand Prix d’ Europe’. This title was awarded to one race each year, by the world governing body, which meant the race concerned was considered the most important of the season and each class winner was awarded the title of European Champion.

The entry of 79 was the highest for 10 years, of which 15 represented countries such as Belgium, Germany, France, Italy and Sweden. The foreigners had a successful day, with Arthur Geiss (Germany) winning the 250cc class on a supercharged DKW and Belgian Rene Milhoux (FN) finishing second to Jimmy Guthrie in the 500cc class.

Another crisis hit all motorsport in 1937, following an insurance price hike as a consequence of the spectator tragedy at the RAC Tourist Trophy car races in Newtownards in 1936. Another insurance hike was to ensue in 1988, with several road races in the south of Ireland being cancelled.

The first road race after World War Two was held by the Ulster MCC on a five miles circuit, using parts of the main Lisburn-Dundrod and Lisburn-Glenavy roads. On Saturday 22nd September 1945, the winners of this Ulster 100 were Harry Jackson (handicap), Walter George (250cc), Wally Humphrey (350cc) and Artie Bell (500cc) The following year the Ulster Club were able to return to Clady, but the original circuit could not be used because of runway extensions at RAF Aldergrove. A revised 16 1/2 miles circuit was inaugurated on Saturday 17th August 1946 with the Ulster Road Race. This was not an Ulster Grand Prix as such, as international racing had not yet resumed after the war, but it was a try out for the future Prior to the start, Race Secretary, Billy McMaster, wheeled a flag-draped machine onto the grid in silent tribute to those who had died since the last Ulster Grand Prix, including leading Grand Prix competitors Wal Handley, Walter Rusk and Ted Mellors. The winners were Les Martin (250 Excelsior), Vic Willoughby (350 Velocette) who was the fastest finisher, and Bruce Graham (500 Norton).

The Mid-Antrim Club, which had only been formed in 1945, staged the first Mid-Antrim 100 (later 150) on Wednesday 24th July 1946 on the Ballygarvey circuit, outside Ballymena - George Dummigan (249 Rudge) was the handicap winner.
The 1948 Ulster Grand Prix carried the title Grand Prix d’ Europe for the second time, but race day was one of the worst on record. In the early morning it was drizzling, by 11am it was raining heavily and by starting time it was lashing and blowing a hurricane. The storm lasted for four hours and covered the entire period of the race. At one point there were fears the scoreboard would be blown over, and the idea of posting times on it was abandoned.

The Ulster Grand Prix was included in the first road racing world championship in 1949 and continued to be a counting round until 1971, when rising costs, civil unrest, and the trend away from public roads courses saw the promoters lose their championship status. The event regained World Championship status in 1979, as a round of the TT Formula World Championships, which continued until 1990.

Two new road races were introduced during the 1950s. On 30th June 1956, the Killinchy Club, formed to support riders from that area of Co. Down, most notably Jimmy Hayes, held the Killinchy 150 at Dundrod.

Sammy Miller (250cc), Ralph Rensen (350cc) and Wilf Herron (500cc) were the winners. The Killinchy Club continued to run the event until 1991. In 1992 they ran it as a short circuit fixture at Bishopscourt after which they withdrew from promoting road races. Dundrod and District Club took over in 1993 and have been running the Dundrod 150 ever since.

The first Tandragee 100 was held on 19th April 1958, using the same circuit that is in use today, although the start/finish area was on the Cobra straight. Noel Orr (500 Matchless) won the overall handicap, while the class winners were Brian Cartwright (200cc handicap), Sammy Hodgkin’s (250cc), Ralph Rensen (350cc) and Robert Ferguson (500cc). The following year witnessed Ralph Bryans making his race debut, winning the 200cc handicap on a 197 Ambassador.

The main speed championship in Ireland was the 100 miles championship, held as a one-off sand race at Magilligan until 1930. With sand racing dying out, the championships were held at the Dublin 100 road race in Phoenix Park from 1934 to 1940. After the war it was the turn of the Munster 100, from 1950 to 1955. From 1957 to 1965 the championships returned to Ulster and were held in conjunction with the Carrowdore 100. The championships ceased after 1965 because, like many other races of that time, the format of the Carrowdore 100 changed. Since the beginning in 1921, most races had been a single race of 50, 100, 150 or even 200 miles distance. All the classes started separately, but raced concurrently. Entries were now increasing to a point that each class needed its own separate race, hence there were more races at each meeting, but each had to be of shorter duration. The days of the 100 milers were over.

Tommy Robb was one of the finest Irish road racers of the 1960s. He won 200cc Ulster titles on grass and sand in 1955 and won his first road race in 1956 - the 200cc handicap race at the Cookstown 100. Tommy won many Irish road races over the next few seasons, including five wins at the North West 200 from 1959 to 1965. In fact Tommy was the first rider to win two races in one day at the North West - the 125cc and 250cc classes in 1959.

In 1962 Tommy rode for the factory team Honda, managed by fellow Irishman, Reg Armstrong. Tommy won the 250cc Ulster Grand Prix and the 350cc Finnish TT, as well as non-championship races at the Japanese Grand Prix and the Saar Grand Prix in Germany. At the end of the year he finished runner-up in the 250cc World Championship and third in the 125cc class. Tommy finished fourth in the 250cc World Championship in 1963, but was dropped by Honda in mid-season during 1964. He was immediately signed to ride factory Yamahas and later would also ride for Bultaco.

As a privateer he claimed fourth place in the 1970 500cc World Championship on a Hurst Seeley G50. In the twilight of his career, Tommy won the 1972 500cc Ulster Short Circuit title and on Danny Keany’s Danfay Yamaha he scored an elusive TT win in the 125cc class of 1973. Tommy made a one-off comeback at the 1979 TT, retiring from the Junior 250cc race and taking fifth place in the Formula Three event.

The North West 200 and Ulster Grand Prix suffered a severe blow in 1963, with the withdrawal of financial support from the Northern Ireland Tourist Board. The North West was cancelled and the Ulster Grand Prix only survived, thanks to the formation of a supporters’ club and the intervention of the Ulster Centre stepping in as promoters. The Ulster Grand Prix and the North West 200 Supporters’ Clubs have become essential mainstays of the two international events ever since.

In 1964 and 1965, Dick Creith, from Bushmills, was virtually unbeatable on Irish roads, riding the Nortons of famed Irish tuner Joe Ryan. In the 1964 500cc Ulster Grand Prix, with the circuit awash in torrential rain, it was Phil Read on a Reg Dearden Norton who quickly established a commanding lead in the 500cc class.

Dick, from sixth place on lap five, fought his way up to second place on lap eight. On lap ten the gap had been reduced from 45 to 31 seconds, and with four laps to go it was 20 seconds and at the flag, after 17 laps, Creith failed by just eight seconds to catch Read.

A repeat performance was on the cards in 1965, when news came through that rain was falling at Cochranstown and Wheeler’s, just four laps into the 500cc race. Paddy Driver, Chris Conn, and John Cooper were the early leaders. When the rain came they all slowed but Creith repeated his 1964 feat, this time winning by eight seconds from Driver.

Creith is one of only four Irishmen who have won a 500cc World Championship Grand Prix: Cromie McCandless was offered a works Gilera on the eve of the Ulster Grand Prix in 1952 and won the final race on the Clady circuit; Reg Armstrong won four races between 1952 and 1956; and the last is Tom Herron, who won the 1976 Senior TT.

In 1965, Ralph Bryans achieved a feat that no other Irishman has managed, when he won the 50cc Grand Prix World Championship. He was runner-up in 1964 and 1966 and took third place in the 1966 125cc championship and third again in the 1967 350cc title chase. Honda pulled out of world championship racing after 1967 and Ralph raced only sporadically after that.
The first Ulster Road Race Championships were held in 1966 and for the first time all the local races were connected by a common theme.

These championships would continue until 1988 - in 1989 they were replaced with a tarmac championship, incorporating short circuit fixtures as well, and were disbanded altogether from 1990, because it was felt there were too many championships and that an Irish title was more significant than an Ulster version. The first champions in 1966 were Billy McCosh (500cc), Len Ireland (350cc) and Ray McCullough (250cc).

McCullough, from the townland of Carnew, near Dromara, has an amazing record in these championships, with 14 titles in just 15 years, including 11 250cc championships. Ray worked as a technician in the mechanical engineering department at Queen’s University of Belfast. QUB have been involved in motor cycle racing since the late 1960s, firstly with mechanical engineering student Brian Steenson, from Killyleagh.

Steenson gave the QUB 250cc twin-cylinder two stroke its debut at the 1969 Mid-Antrim 150 and then rode the QUB single cylinder 500cc two stroke for the first time in practice for the 1970 North West 200.

Following Steenson’s untimely death at the 1970 TT, McCullough was an obvious successor, and gave the 500cc machine its first win at Bishopscourt on 27th June 1970, with a new lap record.

McCullough and the 500cc machine enjoyed more wins over the next few years, and together with Dr Gordon Blair developing the machines, Irish Racing Motorcycles sponsor Mick Mooney and Hubert Gibson, from Dromore as race day mechanic, he dominated 250cc and 350cc racing in Ulster on the QUB Yamsels as no other competitor has managed before or since.
Ray won 13 assorted Irish road race titles and in total won 99 national Irish road races, his first win coming in the 200cc handicap race at the 1960 Temple 100. He has the most wins at the Temple - 20 in total up until 1979.

Ray’s finest achievement came in the 1971 250cc Ulster Grand Prix. In heavy rain, he beat Finnish ace Jarno Saarinen and Germany’s Dieter Braun into second and third places. Phil Read had been the early leader and when passed by McCullough he waved at the Ulsterman in the hope of slowing the pace in the appalling conditions, before retiring on the penultimate lap.
Ray went on to win seven ‘Ulsters’, what at that time equalled the record of Stanley Woods and Mike Hailwood. He wasn’t quite as successful at the North West 200, but still managed three victories at the ‘triangle’.

He didn’t travel overseas much to race, but between 1970 and 1978 Ray took nine wins at the Southern 100, including the Solo Championship in 1975. A foray to England in 1971 produced a 250cc British Championship race win at Oulton Park, ahead of Barry Sheene. One wonders what McCullough could have achieved if he had hit the Grand Prix trail! Ray also raced on the short circuits with some success, winning the Embassy championship in 1975 and 1976.

As the undisputed king of Irish racing in the mid-seventies he was involved in one of the most interesting periods. Ray - along with Ian McGregor, Trevor Steele and Brian Reid - were known as the Dromara Destroyers. Their counterparts were the Armoy Armada - Joey and Jim Dunlop, Mervyn Robinson and Frank Kennedy. It boiled down to a contest between ‘the king’, McCullough, and the young pretender, Joey. Many and mighty were the contests between the two and throughout it all there was never any animosity between the riders or their respective supporters.

Ray retired at the end of the 1983 season. There had been no major wins or championships - the king had finally been dethroned. He did, however, make a one-off comeback at the Ulster Grand Prix in 1984, qualifying in pole position for the 350cc class, but retired from the race with engine trouble.

The TT Formula World Championships, first held in 1977, brought another golden age of Irish success on a world stage.
From 1980 to 1990, Joey Dunlop won the Formula One World Championship five years in succession (1982 to 1986), finished second three times, and third twice. In the process he won 18 world championship races.

His younger brother, Robert, took third places in the same championship in 1989 and 1990, while Brian Reid won the Formula Two World Championship in both 1985 and 1986, winning five world rounds between 1984 and 1986.

The most recent new race in the Ulster Centre was held for the first time on 25th August 1996 - the North Monaghan Club ran on a circuit at Glaslough. Derek Young, from Dunmurry, claimed a hat-trick of wins.

Hat-tricks have become something of a regular feature at Irish road races in recent years, as the number of races at each meeting has increased. One rider, Phillip McCallen from Tandragee, has quite a remarkable record in this regard. In 1992 he won five out of six races at the North West 200; in 1994 he took four wins at the Ulster Grand Prix as well as the first 125mph lap of Dundrod; in 1998 he became the first and, so far, only rider to win four races in a week at the TT; then rounded off the year with five out of five at the Ulster Grand Prix.

In Irish national road races, James Courtney won every round of the 1995 250cc championship (11 races in total). This feat was equalled by Robert Dunlop in the 125cc class of 2001, although only over a six rounds championship, curtailed by foot and mouth disease. Ray McCullough and Adrian Archibald are also worthy of note. McCullough won all the rounds that he contested (seven out of a total of eight) in the 250cc championships of 1977 and 1978, whilst Archibald did the same (five out of a total of six) in the 2001 1000cc class.

Lap speeds at road races have risen to levels that could not have been foreseen in 1921. Walter Rusk lapped Clady at exactly 100mph in 1939; North West circuit took until 1957 when Jack Brett achieved the ton; Mike Hailwood broke the 100mph barrier at Dundrod in 1966. Speeds rose even higher. Mick Grant went round at over 120mph at the 1975 North West 200 and just three years later, at the same meeting, Tom Herron set a mark of 127.63mph. Circuit changes at the triangle have restricted speeds since then, but in 2002 Ian Lougher surpassed Herron’s record with a lap of 127.820mph at the Ulster Grand Prix - a British Isles lap record.

Road racing has faced many problems over the years. As well as being banned in County Down during 1926, civil unrest in 1972 saw the first half of the road racing season cancelled as the authorities discouraged large congregations of operators - the Temple 100 was the first Ulster race of the year at the end of July Foot and mouth disease during the spring and early summer of 2001 meant that the first Ulster road race of the year was the Mid-Antrim 150 in August.

Several fatalities at road races in 1999 and 2000 brought about a searching review of this branch of the sport, firstly by the MCUI itself in the winter of 1999/00, and then a Government inspired Task Force in the winter of 2000/01. The Task Force consisted of Jim Cray and Harris Healey from the Ulster Centre, Sean Bissett and George Rogers from the Southern Centre, and representatives of both the Northern Ireland and Irish Sports Councils. The Task Force came up with 67 recommendations to improve the safety record of road racing. These recommendations are now being implemented, but in the face of high profile criticism it remains to be seen how successful this exercise has been in securing the future of an 80 years old tradition.

Copyright © by Motorcycle Union of Ireland (Ulster Centre) Limited All Right Reserved.

Published on: 2007-01-15 (6232 reads)