Make
Haste, Slowly is a 330 page saga set on the Continental Circus of
European racing from 1960 to 1967. It is a race by race chronicle of
Canada's foremost Grand Prix rider, Mike Duff. Mike came from humble
beginning learning his craft on abandoned airport curcuits near his
home in Toronto. Coming to England in 1960, he rose through the ranks
as a struggling private rider on British short circuit racing, riding
privately owned 350 AJS 7R and 500 G50 Matchless machines to compete
as a factory contracted Team Yamaha rider. He never won a world
championship, nor an Isle of Man TT, but he rode some of the most
exotic racing machinery ever built on glamorous race courses that are
but names in a book to most. He mixed it with the best of the time
and often emerged victorious. Share these experiences in detail from
the perspective of his seat aboard a "works" Yamaha RD56 or
RA97, a Matchless G50 or 7R AJS, or the legendary AJS Porcupine.
The
original text of Make Haste, Slowly was published in 1996; it sold
out in January of 2011. A new edition has been available since March
of that year with many noteable changes. Michelle added over 8,000
words to the text to bring her story up to a more current date. She
also added over 25 new black and white photographs for a total of 72
photographs, stratigically placed by relevant text adding visual
perspective to scenes being described. By reducing print size from 12
pt to 11 pt and increasing the page margins she was able to reduce
the number of pages without sacrificing any of the story and helping
to keep shipping costs and production costs down. All the colour
photographs in the first edition have been removed again to keep cost
increases to a minimum. |
Make
Haste, Slowly contains 72 photographs from the Golden Age of GP
racing, many previously unpublished.
A
MUST READ FOR ALL MOTORCYCLE RACING FANS
Scotsman,
Bob McIntyre was the first rider to lap the Isle of Man at over 100
mph riding a four-cylinder 500 Gilera. Bob was Mike's hero when Mike
first became aware of international motorcycle racing. On a chance
meeting on the boat going to the Isle of Man in 1960 Bob sat down
beside Mike on a bench and began a conversation. During that
conversation Bob asked, "Is this your first time in the
Island?" to which Mike answered yes.
"Ah!"
came Bob's response. "Make Haste, Slowly, Laddie." Good
advice then; good advice now. And so it was, in 1960, Bob McIntyre
unwittingly set the stage for,
Make Haste, Slowly, The Mike Duff Story.
My
RD56 that I ran privately in 1966. Note the homemade front disk brake. |
Riding
the 250 RD56 Yamaha twin at Ramsey Hairpin in the 1965 Isle of Man
TT. I finished in second place.
At
Kate's Cottage, riding a 500 G50 Matchless in the 1962 Isle of Man
Senior TT, I retired on the 4th lap with a broken crankshaft while
lying in second place. |
