History of the 6 Hour - 1979 October 21
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Race Report
The Yamaha XS1100 win of 1978 clearly indicated large displacement 4 Cylinder Transverse 'Shaftie Tourers' had a real chance of winning the Six Hour again.
Not surprisingly top Rider pairings including Len Atlee/Gary Coleman (Bike No. 9), Greg Pretty/Jim Budd (Bike No. 12) and Ron Boulden/Steven Gall (Bike No. 14) and many others, were entered on the model.
Left: The Start Right: Blanco, Baillie and Fleming
Honda offered a very different machine, the CB900/4, Dennis Neill (Bike No.2), Ken Blake/Tony Hatton (Bike No.5) and Wes Cooley/Murray Ogilvie (Bike No.11). Kawasaki had a hot pairing on a Z1R, in Graham Crosby/Akihiro Kiyohara (Bike No.4), mind you Croz had the communication problems worked out with his Team Mate, a Japanese Phrase Book on the grid, good grief!! Trust Croz.....
Oh, Suzuki, they were making do with a quiet professional pairing of Alan Hales and Neill Chivas on a Suzuki GS1000 (Bike No.6). Don Wilson's BMW R100S (Bike No.40) and a CBX1000 (Bike No.24) were entered but did not place. In fact the BM had the engine seize during the race, ouch.
The final practice top six were a surprise, only one XS1100 was there, albeit in fourth, that of Greg Pretty. The top three grid positions were taken by Dennis Neill (CB900), Graeme Crosby (Z1R) and Alan Hales (GS1000). The surprise to me was Hilton Steel on a CBX1000 achieving fifth on the grid, just over half a second off the pole time!
The race saw Dennis Neill very well placed, incredibly on the 'last lap' he dropped the Bike coming onto the main straight right in front of 'me' and the Pits! The Bike stayed in the middle of the track for some time, on the racing line! A very dangerous place to loose it, Dennis was OK luckily.
Alan Hales and Neill Chivas on that Suzuki were very consistent and took a well earned win on 360 laps with no tyre change, Alan being a very popular winner. Greg Pretty and Jim Budd brought the first of the XS11's home in second place covering 357 laps and right with them was that man Len Atlee with Garry Coleman on another XS11 credited with the same number of laps. Roger Heyes teamed with Dave Robbins brought another XS11 into fourth place also on the 357 lap count.
So, once again the XS's showed that a reliable shaftie could be there at the end in much the same way as BMW Boxers had over previous years.
Results
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