Barry Sheene

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Barry Sheene MBE (September 11, 1950 - March 10, 2003) was a legendary British motorcycle racer, winning several British and World Championships.

Related Topics:
MBE - September 11 - 1950 - March 10 - 2003 - British - Motorcycle

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He became the British 125 cc champion aged just 20, and finished second in the World Championships for that class a year later. A spectacular crash at Daytona in 1975 threatened to end his career, breaking his left thigh, right arm, collarbone and two ribs, yet he recovered and was racing again shortly afterwards.

Related Topics:
Cc - Daytona - 1975

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In 1976 he won five Grands Prix, bringing him the World Championship, a feat he repeated the following year.

Related Topics:
1976 - Grands Prix

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In 1979, he moved from the Suzuki works team, believing that he was receiving inferior equipment to his teammates. He shifted to a privateer Yamaha machine, but soon started receiving works equipment. A 1982 crash largely ended Sheene as a title threat, and he retired in 1984.

Related Topics:
1979 - Suzuki - Yamaha - 1982 - 1984

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Sheene was a colourful, exuberant character who used his good looks, grin, and Cockney accent to good effect in self-promotion, and combined with an interest in business was one of the first riders to make large amounts of money from riding.

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He moved to Australia in the late 1980s in the hope of relieving some of the pain of injury-induced arthritis, moving to a property near the Gold Coast. He combined a property development business with a role as a commentator on motor sport, first at the Nine Network with the famously loud Darrell Eastlake, then moving with the TV coverage of the motorcycle grands prix to Network Ten. Sheene's commentary style was idiosyncratic, to say the least. Never letting the audience wonder for a minute exactly what he thought of a rider, bike, or team, his biases were completely transparent. He combined insight into the skills of riding, and the vagaries of the professional circuit, with a penchant for the occasional double entendre delivered with a trademark grin.

Related Topics:
Australia - 1980s - Arthritis - Gold Coast - Nine Network - Darrell Eastlake - Network Ten - Double entendre

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In latter years, Sheene became involved in historic motorcycle racing, usually thrashing the awed amateurs behind him. A little-known piece of trivia is that Sheene invented the motorcycle back protector, with a prototype model he made himself out of foam. The Italian company Dainese purchased the rights off him, and has manufactured (along with numerous other companies) back protectors since then.

Related Topics:
Foam - Dainese

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He died of cancer on March 10 2003, survived by his wife Stephanie and two children.

Related Topics:
March 10 - 2003

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Following reconstruction of the Brands Hatch Circuit in England for safety concerns after requests by the FIM, the Dingle Dell section was changed for safety, and shortly after Sheene's death, the new section was renamed Sheene's Corner in his honour.

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