Memories of My Cycling Days

(From a hand-written memoir)

1936 Beverley-to-Perth, 5th Place

I decided I would ride in the Beverly to Perth bike race . I was trapping rabbits for a living so did very little training. My dad tried talk to me out of it as he said I wasn't fit enough. A fortnight before the race I stopped trapping so I could do some training. I was 20 years old and fairly fit.

On the Tuesday before the race I decided to ride from Pingelly to Perth to see how I would go.

Between Beverley and York I met a group of riders so I joined them. In that group was Ron Logue who won the year before and the father of a lass that wrote to me recently. Also John Riley who finished second the year before.

We rode to Perth on Tuesday and back to Beverley on Thursday. I rode on to Pingelly, then back to Beverley on Friday, rode the race on Saturday, and back to Pingelly on Monday. Did about 800 kilometres that week.

I had a room in the hotel at Beverley on the Friday night and shared with the chap from Kalgoorlie. He was George Hebbard, which didn't mean much to me until next day. He rode off scratch and punctured in the race, mended the puncture and still got fastest time which gave him title of W.A. Road Champion.

When I finished fifth out of 108 riders , my dad was so pleased. When I got home he was so excited… couldn't stop shaking my hand. And my dad never got very excited about anything.

My first racing bike cost $3, my last one cost $800. Happy days.