Not GasGas - Lightweight 50cc road racers.
 

Hi Harry, as requested here's a few photos you might be interested in.

I used to race these bikes when I was much younger and much slimmer!

All the bikes here were owned and built by my late friend, Dave Brearley (except for the Spondon Yamaha AS1 125cc, that belonged to me).

He was a fantastic engineer, building most of his bikes from scratch, making his own frames, exhausts, moulding his own fiberglass tanks, fairings, seats. He also cast a few aluminum parts such as cylinder heads with removable inserts. This was all done just as a hobby, not to make money.



Van Veen Kreidler Replica - Dave made the frame, all the fiberglass, etc. He used a Kreidler road engine crank cases and then fitted Van Veen components. I used to have great fun in the 250cc class on this bike, beating many other, bigger bikes. :) Dave made several of these, improving each one.

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Minarelli 50cc - Again built from scratch. Aircooled, piston ported, simple, reliable. Not as as fast as the Kreidler but adequate. I won the British Classic 50cc Championship 2 years running on this bike.

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Kreidler Tohatsu 50cc Special - This is/was a fast 50cc race bike. This is a Kreidler barrel/crank grafted onto a Tohatsu close ratio gearbox. The Tohatsu was originally a 50cc twin cylinder GP bike that was discontinued when the rules were changed. This bike gave me my first race win in a Classic 125cc race.

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Awesome stuff. The 50cc roadrace class in New Zealand is called F5 hence the handle on several forums . But it also is screen refresh on PCs so I kept it. Both are increasingly irrelevant as I tap at my phone.

Our class is run either on smaller tracks or kart tracks so we favour 125 slicks. For many years I raced an Suzuki RG50 in a Honda RS125 GP frame later changing to Derbi.
Great fun and a lot of mixed races I spent time against hot 150 foulstrokes (our F4 class is 100 2T/150 4T) so corner speed is everything.

Sadly a few stays in hospital have me in retirement while kids still need parenting. Getting a bit heavy to be competitive. Think if I go back as an old man I'll be frustrated.

A few more...

Kreidler Yamaha 50cc Special - I liked the work Dave put into this engine. It's a Yamaha YZ50 aircooled motocross engine, converted to rotary disc valve then a Kreidler top end grafted on to it. :)

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125cc AS1 Spondon Yamaha - This was owned and raced by myself. Air cooled twin. Fantastic chassis, performance was OK but limited by the piston ported intake.

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Aprillia RS50 engine in special frame - Dave wanted to build a modern 50cc racer, some people were using the Honda RS125 GP racer frame, which is a fantastic frame, but he considered it too big/heavy for the small engine, so he designed and built his own frame!

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Very cool. I used to race a Yamaha framed Suzuki T500 back at the turn of the century. Also some RDs and even the odd TZ on occasion. I love two stroke roadracers!

I love two strokes, for me they are the ultimate engine for GP racing, the power to weight ratio is a no brainer.

I feel really disappointed two strokes were phased out of road racing in favour of four stroke engines and doubling the engine size to achieve a similar performance. Of course emissions and marketing forced the move.

Interesting to hear about the racing scene in New Zealand.

What about your kids, are they showing any interest in bikes and/or racing?

All the best, Dave.

Bit young and some learning issues, but we'll see. Kinda selfish but I'd rather be out on my DirtBike or road bike getting time away rather than teaching kids to ride. I had to learn myself. Made me want it.

For sure, we all need time out and what better way than going for a good thrash on the bike. :)

I do miss racing though. 27 years odd. The feeling of winning.

Ahh whatever. Had a nice ride and some venison meatballs and wine. cant be so bad.