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Wooly73

Ivan Mauger

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1 hour ago, Mauger_Magic said:

He was the King here at Newcastle....watched him when we won the Provincial League title and remember he went many many weeks without a defeat at Brough Park until Colin Pratt of Hckney Hawks beat him...then the next week Pete Jarman of Wolverhampton Wolves beat him. He was my hero and it was a joy to see him at Wembley when he won the 1966 European Championship!...RIP Legend.

Beaten also by John Poyser from Oxford, who's daughter Jackie was host to Lubos at Oxford, whilst we were his hosts at Newcastle.

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some people say he would have struggled in the current championship series format ...........  what utter rubbish

in 71 he lost to our other great diamond ole olsen when scoring 14,  in 73 he lost to a pole in a run off and 74 he finished 2nd on a track prepared for Anders Michanek (another diamond....)

I think his sheer consistency would have won him titles between 68-74   ... maybe Olsen would have had a chance in 71

Likewise he could won in 67 and between 75-79 I think his tactical genius would have won at least the 2 titles he won in that era anyway ..... he probably would have 8-10 titles between 67 and 79 under the grand prix system

Individual meetings on the night were always harder to win, even the great Tony Richardsson wouldn't have won 6 individual titles  

Ivan ... was the total professional... a genius..... and total legend

 

 

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1 hour ago, mauger65 said:

some people say he would have struggled in the current championship series format ...........  what utter rubbish

in 71 he lost to our other great diamond ole olsen when scoring 14,  in 73 he lost to a pole in a run off and 74 he finished 2nd on a track prepared for Anders Michanek (another diamond....)

I think his sheer consistency would have won him titles between 68-74   ... maybe Olsen would have had a chance in 71

Likewise he could won in 67 and between 75-79 I think his tactical genius would have won at least the 2 titles he won in that era anyway ..... he probably would have 8-10 titles between 67 and 79 under the grand prix system

Individual meetings on the night were always harder to win, even the great Tony Richardsson wouldn't have won 6 individual titles  

Ivan ... was the total professional... a genius..... and total legend

 

 

Agree 100%...under the Grand Prix System Ivan would have reigned supreme during the seventies as Hans Nielsen would have done during the middle/late eighties.

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Reckon Ivan, and also Ove Fundin, would have won more World Championships under the GP system.  And Ivan a-l-m-o-s-t won 6 in a row !  As we know: he took out 1968-1970, Ole Olsen won in 1971, Ivan won again in 1972, and had he waited another 3/4 of a lap to pass the Pole Jerzy Szczakiel in 1973, it could have 6 on the bounce.   But any rider will say if you see a gap then you really must go for it as you may never get another chance, though there are relativley few 'must win' races under the GP format.   Ivan disproved his 'just a gater' tag in that 1973 Final when he was passing for fun around the outside on his longstroke JAWA, and while he must have been well peeved at the time (to say the least !) and also afterwards at being constantly asked about it, he bore no ill will towards Jerzy "he was a better rider than most people thought plus he deserved to win because I fell off and he didn't", says a lot about the man Ivan Mauger....

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Big obituary in yesterday's Daily Telegraph, presumably by Ben Findon. There was a mention that he lost a million pounds in the insurance crash of the '90's when he was a Lloyds underwriter. He still bounced back and continued his training schools. The last time I spoke to him was about ten years ago when he ran a European junior grasstrack meeting at Tallington near Peterborough. I also remember being taken by him in his Mercedes across the showground to the changing rooms when he raced against PC, and he had the gold bike on the back seat. 

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that gold bike sat in my dads garage at home for a couple of years in bits.

dad & Ivan went up to Donington to the old speedway museum where the bike had been loaned with strict instructions from Ivan not to polish the gold. unfortunately, they kept polishing and it wore the gold plate down so Ivan decided there and then it wasn't staying. the bike was loaded in the car and just unloaded at dads and it stayed until Ivan decided to get it shipped back.

i remember staying at Ivan's when i was about 16 or 17 too and sleeping in the same room as the gold bike, winged wheel, and hundreds of trophies - quite a prvilidge

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1 hour ago, PHILIPRISING said:

IVAN always denied that he lost a million but he did suffer financially from the Lloyds crash.

It was a mark of the man that he didn't bitch about it either, unlike many others. He just took it on the chin and got on with life.

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