Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126305
, . . With all the recent rain outs and what all going on, no one realized I was missing for a bit, but the truth is I was up on the hill in Community Hosptial for 26 days with a spot of bother with the old ticker. Nothing serious, they said, as long as I behave . . . What brings all this about is that while I was up there resting to get my heart in shape, I didn't know the racing scene had lost Don England to a heart attack , I Donald, Hope and I go back a long way, I feel I should write about him , He was devoted to TT racing, coming out of the -"old schoo l" of racers and was a Gripsters for a long time. TTing . was where it's at with Don, which made us kindred spirits. :~ lt would be hypocritical for me to say that Don England and I were the closest of buddies . We weren't. There were times we didn't even like each :>'t per. But we did manage to get along and there was always communication between us. He was a force to be reckoned with , and I liked him for it . He could be so bloodyminded he could put you up a tree , and I liked him for that too . I happen to be a bit that way myself. Bloodymindedness is • a British Army term quite hard to describe. It has nothing to do with bloodshed but with a person 's complete independence, marching to his own drummer and doing it his way even if everyone else does it some other way. It's stubbornness, devotion to duty and outright cussedness; it's always 'used with respect , albeit a bit grudgingly. Naturally we'd have our words , and his love ly wife Hope could a lways bring about t he peace when her husband got heavyhande d. Watch ing her go through the opening thoes of Huntington Beach while getti ng further along in pregnancy· was watching a superior lady at work . Southern ladies have a certain something about them - which J.>rings up another story about Don . He was Southern too, of another generation, and it brought about one of our squabbles. He made a rule of no . wbmen in the pits , As a working reporter and a scram bles racer at the time I belonged there, No, said Donald, you can write your story just as well from the stands. Don did change' his mind. Hope soothed me with , "Maureen, you must rem em ber Donald is a Southern gentleman, and he always thinks of you as a lady. He has trouble acceptin' ladies fussin' with dirty motorcycles." Dear Hope; all of us who are scrambles people have thought much about you ......nd your family . .It 's not female chauvenism either when I say that the racers all love the "track ladies" like Hope and Dot (Fortune) and Grace (Burton) and very often would rather ta lk to them abo ut problems than they wou ld their husbands. He did mu ch for our sport and gave a lot unt il finally he gave it his life. I'd like to think he was being bloodyminded that day an d would be out there working on that track come hell , highwater or a previous coronary . He 'll be missed. 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