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 The MEC recently organised "An Evening with Michael Roe" with Robin Rhodes as MC and Stephen and Michael Doyle hosting the event in the Glen of The Downs Golf Club. Predictably, Robin was superb, his rapier wit having lost none of its edge since I last met him when he visited us in the Phoenix Park commentary box in 2009! The audience was almost like a "Who's Who" of Irish Motorsport with ex racers such as Des Cullen, Larry Mooney, Peter Lynch and Mike Armstrong rubbing shoulders with club officials and a plethora of current racers. Even young Ginetta Junior race winner Sean Doyle was there, ensuring that we had all generations of the sport represented.
Robin kicked off with Michael discussing his dominant 1984 title winning Can-Am season, eloquently explaining tech specs and even the complexities of running one of the cars.
This was followed with a film show of Michael's Can-Am season complete with a wonderfully enthusiastic Paul Phelan lookalike presenter! This showed the extent of Michael's dominance of the series, with his VDS-Chevy often qualifying almost two seconds clear of the pursuing pack. In fact such was the Irishman's pace, that he qualified on pole for each of the ten championship races and won seven, with Jim Crawford picking up the pieces in the remaining three, only when Roe hit trouble. An interesting part of this story was that when the Can Am series shared the Dallas track with the F1 championship, Roe's fastest lap was over a second quicker than the best of the F1s, Nikki Lauda. Also, that weekend, Michael recalled, Martin Brundle crashed his Tyrrell and broke his ankle. Ken Tyrrell offered the Irishman the drive for the following Australian Grand Prix. Initially he accepted, rang Wilfie Fitzsimmons in the RIAC (nowadays Motorsport Ireland), who organised the necessary superlicence, and began organising his trip. Team owner Don Walker was against this however and told Michael to stay put, and they would launch an Indycar team the following year. "I have no doubt that had we done so, we would have won plenty of Indycar races because we had a super team", he says wistfully, but unfortunately Walker ended up in prison for various reasons and the dream came to naught!
When the film was over, Robin and Michael returned to the microphone for some chat about Michael's racing in Ireland in the early days. Robin's initial question being "Did you learn much at Mondello or more when you went to the UK?" Michael immediately answered "I learnt everything in Mondello" He paid tribute to John Murphy, who he said had incredible knowledge when Michael began racing FF1600 (John is retired and lives near Mondello now and his two sons race Formula Vee!) and then Ralph Firman when he moved to the UK. He said the Irish drivers were successful because they often lived with team owners during the season even and bartered expected prize money against entry fees on occasion. He also said there was always someone back home who would offer you "the odd hundred quid" to keep you going! (Don Kissane receiving an honourable mention at this point!) One of the best stories of the night was when discussing his Formula Ford campaign in 1978. The works Van Diemen was not handling 100% and after a lot of work, Michael and the (works) team came to the con that the chassis was stressing the engine block unduly. They took the car back to the workshop and cut off the engine mounts and welded in new ones. after a few laps, Michael says the car was perfect so he came in. He was back home in Naas the next week and his father asked him how he was going to do in the next big race,( this being the Formula Ford Festival.) "I'm going to win it" replied Michael. Michael's father then suggested that his son should buy a suit for the prizegiving, so off he went down the main street in Naas to a shop "that sold pitchforks and wellies" and bought a new suit for the princely sum of £17.50! The suit was duly packed into the bag, Michael flew through the heats, semis and quarters and won the final, and wore the suit to the prizegiving! The infamous story of Michael driving back from Dun Laoighaire ferry port to Naas..... in his Formula Ford.... when his lift didn't arrive, did not come out as unfortunately time ran out but I have no doubt that we only saw the tip of the iceberg in terms of Michael's stories!
Well done to the MEC for putting together such an enjoyable evening (free of charge by the way!) and to the Doyles for their usual superb hospitality. A quick chat with MEC President Robin Taylor during the night revealed that they intend to run some more of these events, possibly even going bi-monthly. When the word spreads about the first one, I have a feeling they will be inundated with enquiries about the next! They are also looking for new members, specifically younger ones, to ensure the future of their historic club. Further information can be found on www.mec.ie
that's all for this time,
Leo
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