2011 Isle of Man TT News
Many of the riders and machines have already been confirmed for the 2011 Isle of Man TT "Milestones of the Mountain" Parade Lap, which will celebrate the Centenary of motorcycle racing around the iconic Mountain Course.
The IOMTT parade, which takes place on Senior Race Day, June 10, will feature 26 of the most important events, riders and moments in a 100 years of TT racing.
Appropriately, a replica of the American-built Indian machine that Oliver Godfrey rode in the first Isle of Man Senior TT across the Mountain has been sourced and will be the first motorcycle away.
It will be ridden by Dave Roper, who was the only American to win a TT until Mark Miller emulated his feat in the 2010 TT Zero clean emissions bike race.
One of the all time Isle of Man TT greats Stanley Woods will be represented by former Manx Grand Prix rider Ivan Rhodes, who will be riding a genuine 350cc works Velocette, which he owns. Woods originally rode the bike in the 1948 Junior TT and 1949 World Championship.
Geoff Duke, the six-time TT Winner and six-time World Champion will be represented by his son Peter, who will be riding a Manx Norton, the marque that Geoff rode to five TT victories in the 1950s.
One of the greatest names in IOMTT history, Honda, which was the first Japanese manufacturer to contest the event and has gone on to win 155 times, will be represented by former World Champion and TT winner Luigi Taveri, who will be riding a 1964 Honda RC161.
Eight-times IOMTT winner and eight-times World Champion Phil Read, one of Yamaha’s most successful riders, will be riding the factory 4 cylinder two-stroke 250cc Yamaha that he raced successfully in the 1968 TT and World Championship.
Sidecar legend Jock Taylor, a four-times IOMTT winner who achieved a podium on his debut, will be represented by Steve Webster, MBE, the 10-time FIM World Champion. Steve will be riding one of Jock’s TT-winning machines.
The Isle of Man Senior TT-winning Honda RC30 from 1988 will be ridden by Gary Dunlop, representing his father, five-time World Champion Joey. The Northern Ireland racer first competed in the Isle of Man in 1976 and his record of 26 victories leaves him as the most successful TT rider of all time.
Scotsman Steve Hislop, the first Isle of Man TT rider to lap at over 120mph and who took part in what is widely acknowledged as one of the all time great races – the 1992 Senior TT against Carl Fogarty – will be represented in the parade by close friends Steve Plater and Stuart Easton.
Steve, who has two IOMTT victories to his name and is the Senior TT Race record holder, will be riding a replica RC30 to represent Hizzy’s achievement as the first rider to lap at more than 120mph in 1989, while current British Superbike star and IOMTT hopeful Stuart Easton will ride the ABUS 588cc rotary Norton from the epic 1992 Senior Race.
Northern Ireland’s Phillip McCallen, the first rider to win four races in one week, will be riding a Honda RC45.
McCallen, who won 11 IOMTTs in a career that ran from 1989 to 1999, will be on the starting grid with the man that broke his record, Ian Hutchinson, who will be riding his history-making Padgett’s Honda Superbike.
David Jefferies, the ever-popular nine-times TT winner, will be represented by his uncle Nick, who will be riding the V&M Racing Yamaha R1 that DJ raced in his 1999 campaign. His great friend and rival John McGuinness, who has dominated the IOMTT leader board with 15 victories since his first victory in 1999, will be bringing his 2007 Honda Superbike, on which he became the first man to break the 130mph lap for the 37 ¾ mile course.
