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PORTLAND’S sidecar speedsters, Tim Campbell and Brian Fitzgerald, added two more titles to their growing list in recent weeks, returning from Tasmania with both the Tasmanian and the Australian titles in the 2011 Australian Historic Motorcycle Championships.
The Australian titles were held first and the pair got away to a rough start, having to replace an engine during the practice sessions.
A very strong field had travelled South to Symmons Plains Raceway for the event but once they had their mechanical issues out of the way the duo took the challenge right up to them, winning the first two races to put themselves in a commanding position leading into the third and final race, needing only to finish the race to claim the national title.
That almost did not happen, however, after Fitzgerald missed his grip in a change over and found himself being dragged along behind the bike.
Fitzgerald said he had had his legs out dragging behind the bike before and been able to recover, but when he saw Campbell starting to accelerate again he realised his rider did not know he’d slipped and it was time to bail out.
“It was in the quick change over and I just missed my hand, held on and got dragged along for a bit,” Fitzgerald said.
“I just had the one hand on the outside just hanging on and bouncing along, and I was thinking look around, look around, because he usually checks just to make sure my hand is there, but then he started gassing it again and I thought, nah, I can’t hold on, and just let go and rolled along a couple of times.
“The fella behind us just missed me by about 10mm they reckon, he almost cleaned me up.
“Having seen the video now I pretty much rolled, jumped back on my feet, turned around and kept running, jumped back on and got into it.
“I was only actually off the bike for eight seconds.”
Those eight seconds took their toll, however, with Fitzgerald destroying his helmet, leathers and gloves, yet despite the added risk of racing with damaged safety gear the pair managed to fight their way back through the field to get back up to second position to claim the Australian title comfortably.
Campbell said while the pair had been in good form leading into the event you never go to events of that standard expecting to win because there were always things that could go wrong.
“It was a big achievement, when you have travelled all that way to do it,” Campbell said.
“Brian has done the job really on this one, because he jumped back on after falling off.
“If he didn’t jump back on we would have got third.”
Following their Nationals success the pair stuck around in Tasmania to tackle the Tasmanian Titles at Baskerville and despite having to nurse their bike through the last two races were a dominant force, winning all four to clearly take the title.
The pair now holds the Victorian, South Australian, Tasmanian and Australian titles to clearly be the number one combination in the country.
The pair will attempt to defend their SA Title over the Christmas break.
