The Isle of Man TT – All about the Course and the Crowd … So I spent all of today learning about both.

I rode the course twice more and, with traffic lights, speed limits, fog, and rain, I just about beat the race winning time – from 1911. The fog on the mountain was so thick the first time this morning before breakfast that the postman overtook me in his little red van. Well he does have windscreen wipers which my Shoei does not. That’s my defense and I’m sticking to it.

My best time was 45 minutes for the 37.7 miles and this evening Bruce Anstey just did it in less than 18 minutes and the more you get to see the details of the TT course, the more respect you have to afford these riders. There is nothing special that has been done to these roads that make you think it’s a track. There are no potholes but there are crazy kerbs, people sitting in their front gardens two feet from your helmet, slippery white lines, intrusive walls, humpbacks, every corner is totally blind between high walls and hedges, and the protection on the lamp posts and walls is laughable. The road surface is generally good but I was totally amazed at the bumpiness of the section from Sulby Bridge to Ramsey – apparently the tree roots are constantly shifting the tarmac – I am riding a BMW K1600GT and it was skittering all over the place even at legal-ish speeds and I cannot imagine what this would be like at race speeds.

Stopping a few times along the way, I met a lot of interesting people; men and their wives (sometimes) from all over the place but generally blue collar British lads just like the blue collar British riders; working blokes who take their bikes seriously but laugh readily about everything else. Meet Jimmy from Glasgow (I kid you not) with an accent that needed sub-titles who is ex-RAF, ex-police, now a builder in Fife who rode his BMW GS Adventure in the GS Trophy in Wales last week, rode home to Glasgow, swapped bikes for his HP4 and took off to the ferry to Douglas and was having a blast. I met Alan from the Lancashire police who are here helping their Manx colleagues stay on top of things and graciously let me sample his bike.

Finally I watched qualifying from Greg Ny Baa then back at the pit wall at the grandstand. I was not close enough to Guy Martin to hear what he was saying to his crew but I understand he had a problem with false neutrals and claimed he lost 30 seconds as a result. They’ll be working hard in the BMW workshop tonight.

Crazy course – lovely people.

Photos: Guy Martin was in the Tyco BMW tent for a long time after he finished qualifying – Alan from the Lancashire police – The profile of the course taken from my GPS track for exactly one lap; it’s called the mountain for a reason – rider at Greg Ny Baa getting a lot of photographer focus – Jimmy from Glasgow.