Post by speedyguy on Jan 26, 2016 16:17:32 GMT
VIC RIDGEON was one of the stars when the Provincial League started in the 1960s, doing especially well as a Wolverhampton rider. After the stint at Monmore Green, he was involved briefly with the ill-fated team at Sunderland in 1964, then had a couple of seasons riding in open meetings at Rye House before calling it a day.
Ridgeon has a unique place in international speedway, being the only Southern Area League rider to represent England in a test match. It was in the seventh test of the 1956-57 series at Hoy Park, Durban, on February 23 1957. England beat the South Africans 59-49, with Ridgeon scoring just one point - enough to earn a place in the speedway record books.
Going to South Africa was not the first time that Ridgeon had tasted action abroad. He was in a party of riders led by Ted Gibson that raced in a series of meetings in Spain at the end of the 1953 season. Ridgeon has misgivings on the venture and its organisation. He once summed it up to me, "An unhappy time that saw us return home broke, We had to arrange loans with the British Consulate to pay our fares."
I first met Ridgeon at a car hire office in Forest Gate, East London, in early 1955. It was a business run by Johnnie O'Connor, a colourful character who also acted a mechanic to then West Ham star Jack Young. Besides running the car office - it had a fleet of big Yankee saloons and was known as 'American Hire' - O'Connor was also a novice rider at both the California-in-England and Eastbourne tracks, and was often the announcer at both venues.
Besides Ridgeon, other riders who used to drop in for a chat at O'Connor's cab office included Al Sparrey, Jim Chalkley, Ray Terry, Dave Still, Steve Bole, the Courtnell brothers Terry, Teddy and Maury, Al Holliday and George Cole - not the film star but an aspiring novice of the period who, like O'Connor, sometimes did the mechanic's job for Jack Young at West Ham. And Young was also another frequent visitor who surpringly never wanted to talk about speedway.
O'Connor was a colourful figure of that era. He suddenly vanished from the British scene around 1958 and it was only years later that news filtered back that he had emigrated virtually on the spur of the moment to New Zealand.
Vic Ridgeon passed away in 2009.
Ridgeon has a unique place in international speedway, being the only Southern Area League rider to represent England in a test match. It was in the seventh test of the 1956-57 series at Hoy Park, Durban, on February 23 1957. England beat the South Africans 59-49, with Ridgeon scoring just one point - enough to earn a place in the speedway record books.
Going to South Africa was not the first time that Ridgeon had tasted action abroad. He was in a party of riders led by Ted Gibson that raced in a series of meetings in Spain at the end of the 1953 season. Ridgeon has misgivings on the venture and its organisation. He once summed it up to me, "An unhappy time that saw us return home broke, We had to arrange loans with the British Consulate to pay our fares."
I first met Ridgeon at a car hire office in Forest Gate, East London, in early 1955. It was a business run by Johnnie O'Connor, a colourful character who also acted a mechanic to then West Ham star Jack Young. Besides running the car office - it had a fleet of big Yankee saloons and was known as 'American Hire' - O'Connor was also a novice rider at both the California-in-England and Eastbourne tracks, and was often the announcer at both venues.
Besides Ridgeon, other riders who used to drop in for a chat at O'Connor's cab office included Al Sparrey, Jim Chalkley, Ray Terry, Dave Still, Steve Bole, the Courtnell brothers Terry, Teddy and Maury, Al Holliday and George Cole - not the film star but an aspiring novice of the period who, like O'Connor, sometimes did the mechanic's job for Jack Young at West Ham. And Young was also another frequent visitor who surpringly never wanted to talk about speedway.
O'Connor was a colourful figure of that era. He suddenly vanished from the British scene around 1958 and it was only years later that news filtered back that he had emigrated virtually on the spur of the moment to New Zealand.
Vic Ridgeon passed away in 2009.