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/127748
CI_'~T_ION_' _.1 John Britten .. ',---' :A_:PP,--.RE_ยท By Alan Cathcart g t's just not fair. John Britten's sudden death from cancer at the absurdly early age of 45 has robbed the motorcycle world of a true genius, one of the most innovative constructors and radically minded engineers of the modem era. It is not hyperbole to say that his loss is a tragedy: John had certainly achieved a great deal in his half life, more than most men do in one twice as long, but he had so much more still to accomplish, so many exciting projects his fertile mind was itching to complete. Yet six months ago to the day as he worked on his bikes at Daytona, before watching Andrew Stroud win the first round of the 1995 BEARS World Series on the Britten V1000, the man had been the picture of health; the suddenness of his passing has shocked John's many friends and admirers around the world all the more, even if it was merciful that so vigorous a guy, with such a fertile mind should not have had to suffer the frustration of inactivity for too long. But at least before he left us, John Britten had the satisfaction of knowing that the motorcycles bearing his name conceived, designed, constructed, developed and raced all by himself with the aid of a handful of friends, had succeeded in defeating the products of bigger, more established manufacturers from all over the world, to place 12th in the debut six-round BEARS World Series, thus becoming the true World O1ampions they deserved to be. I first met John Britten almost 10 years ago on a grass bank overlooking the Manfeild race circuit in New Zealand. We were both in our racing leathers, having strolled out from the paddock to watch practice and check on track conditions. John was already well established as one of New Zealand's demon Vintage bike racers, aboard a self-brewed Triumph Tiger special that owed more to his engineering skills than the efforts of the Meriden factory. But John's interests weren't pigeon-holed, and he was already collaborating with another local engineer, Bob Denson, in the manufacture of a fearsome, methanol-burning 1000cc engine for sidecar speedway - the Denco. And John had already taken the DOHC 60-degree V-twin design to an appointment with its next logical step, powering the first in the series of Britten road racers, all of which utilized a similar engine format, though water-cooled in future rather than air-cooled like the eight-valve Denco. But it was the chassis formal~t:~::~::~j:~~~~~~~~j~ of the'~ew BEARS racer that made it truly attention-grabbing: the Kevlar / carbon monocoque, the modular design which allowed the WP upside-down fork and fuel cell to be unbolted from the stressed engine and rear wheel/swingarm, the horizontally underslung rear shock, or the weirdHarold aerofoil bodywork which tested John's theories about two-wheeled downforce (perhaps acquired during the building of his own 24-foot wingspan glider a decade previously - a design so efficient it needed only a la-mph wind to carry him ~oft, and which worked so well it once took off by itself when not pegged down while its creator was having a cup of tea). I'd seen the Denco-Britten in magazine photos and was eager to ride it, even if John hadn't built the Winged Wonder as an attention-grabber, but with the aim of winning races to demonstrate the effectiveness of his ideas. By then he had already started to recruit th.e nucleus of the band of helpers and admirers who would allow him to create such a remarkable line of Futurebikes on the most slender of resources, among them Kenny Roberts' 500cc Grand Prix team's chief engineer Mike Sinclair, like John a resident of Oiristchurch, the capital of New Zealand's South Island and .arguably the most remote outpost of mainstream motorcycling. The fact that such avant-garde, innovative machines came to be constructed so far from the Japanese or European epicenters of two-wheeled development speaks volumes for John Britten's determination, fueled by a healthy dose of traditional Kiwi self-reliance. If you were a New Zealander who raced a Manx Norton in the olden days and you blew the engine, you fixed it yourself with locally made parts that often worked better than the originals. What Britten did was to go the extra mile and make the whole bike from scratch in the first place, using radical techniques and advanced materials and' all without a single formal motorcycle qualification to his credit, only his hard-eamed experience in the school of life. That self-tuition had begun back at