I started biking at the tender age of 14, I used to hang around with a bike club in my hometown of Maidstone in Kent & that’s where I got my nickname from. At the time there used to be a bike paper called Motorcycle Weekly which had a cartoon strip in it called Ace & Grubby. Ace was a motorcycle racer & Grubby was his mechanic. As I was only 14 at the time I couldn’t own a bike so what I used to do was during the week I’d help out members of the bike club fix their bikes & in return I’d get a pillion on the weekend runs out to the coast or wherever we’d go. The upshot of this was that some bright spark, I forget who gave me the nickname of Grubby!
When I joined the RAF I thought I’d lost the nickname until a mate on the training course I was on came back to Maidstone with me & when we walked into my old local & I was greeted with my nickname he turned to me & said, that name suits you & it stuck again….so much so that 28 years on I’ve still got it.
I rode motorcycles solely until my 30th year when I finally gave in & took my car test, simply because my girlfriend at the time had a sprog & she wasn’t happy about her being in the sidecar, if anyone remembers me riding my old sidecar outfit they’d understand, it used to spend most of it’s time on two wheels! Up until the I’d had a succession of bikes including five Yamaha RD250’s…must have liked them I guess!
I’ve had all sorts of machinery ranging from a Honda CB125 S (stop laughing at the back!) to the bike I own now, a Suzuki GSX1300R Hayabusa.
I still own a MkII Moto Guzzi Le Mans, which I hope to have back on the road again next year. It’s my bike, built by me for me. I’ve carried out all the work on it apart from the tuning parts for the engine, which was carried out by Amadeo Castellani of Raceco, who used to do all of 3 cross’s racing bikes. The engine was built entirely by myself as was the rest of the bike. The thing about my Guzzi is that it is capable of a genuine 145 MPH, friggin scary on an old pushrod V twin as you’re half expecting the pushrods to pop out at any minute!
The Busa isn’t quite stock either, it now puts out a very healthy 175 BHP at the back wheel, as standard they used to put out 175 BHP at the crank (for a good 2000 model) I’m not going to say what I’ve done to it, you’ll have to ask me over a pint.
I’ve been a member of the 3B’s since blahdy blah yakkity schmackity….or there abouts. (I’ve been so drunk since I joined that I can’t remember the year. Suffice it to say that it was a very long time ago!)
Since I joined though I’ve seen a lot of changes to the club, the size of it for one thing & also the size of the events that we now host. When I first met the 3B’s it was at their first rally (Stuff & Puff Rally) which if my memory serves me well had about 150 people there. I had such a good time that I thought that I’d see what they were about. As I’d had such a hard time with clubs over the years, both MC & MCC I wasn’t too keen on joining any more clubs, but as you can see I succumbed to their charms, must have been Billy’s smooth talking at his reception that did it, that or D’s alternative medicine!
I hope that the next time I see whoever it is that’s reading this they but me a pint…….mine’s a Guinness, cheers!