{"id":35899,"date":"2014-05-15T15:16:34","date_gmt":"2014-05-15T14:16:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.influx.co.uk\/wordpress\/?p=35899"},"modified":"2022-06-27T15:33:00","modified_gmt":"2022-06-27T14:33:00","slug":"barry-sheene","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.adrianflux.co.uk\/influx\/people\/barry-sheene\/","title":{"rendered":"Barry Sheene Was My Hero"},"content":{"rendered":"

For some reason, Barry Sheene’s cheeky mug popped into my mind some time this morning.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It may have been a Suzuki superbike passing that tweaked my unconscious – or something about the number seven that had the larrikin charm of Barry nudging my mindless noggin.<\/p>\n

Barry was bowling about front and centre in the British mediascape back in the mid-late seventies – a time when I was first coming to carnal consciousness – and by carnal I mean everything to do with cars, girls \u2013 and of course motorbikes, were becoming more and more important to me.<\/p>\n

Around that time the supermarket over the road launched – and there was a Moto Guzzi 850 Le Mans Mk 1 on display as some sort of prize draw. Imagine.<\/p>\n

\"...and<\/a>
…and saucy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Anyway – the great man was a typical hero of the era – a hard riding, hard drinking (and smoking) purveyor of trad manly values – representing the Brut 33 tang of English maleness and winning a World Championship along the way.<\/p>\n

The Kenny Roberts Vs Barry Sheene battles were the stuff of playground debate. A lot of the older kids who already had their provisionals were riding those Roberts style Yamaha fizzies and so were unhealthily attached to the American’s style.<\/p>\n

I didn’t really care who won the races. There was just something endlessly appealing about our Bazzer – he seemed to represent everything a young lad wanted to be.<\/p>\n

Who are the heros now?<\/strong><\/p>\n