Lawrence Photographic

11th August 2023

Joey Dunlop!

William Joseph Dunlop OBE(25 February 1952 – 2 July 2000) was a Northern Irish motorcyclist from Ballymoney, County Antrim, who was noted for his performances at the Isle of Man TT. In 2015, he was voted Northern Ireland's greatest-ever sports star. Dunlop secured a record 26 victories at the Isle of Man TT, including three hat-tricks, and 24 wins at the Ulster Grand Prix. He was awarded the MBE in 1986 for his contributions to the sport and the OBE in 1996 for his humanitarian work in Romanian orphanages.

Joey Dunlop died on 2 July 2000 in Estonia, while leading a 125cc race (he had already won the 750cc and 600cc events) on the Pirita-Kose-Kloostrimetsa Circuit. He appeared to lose control of his bike in the wet conditions and died instantly on impact with trees. As a mark of respect, the Estonian government's official website was replaced with a tribute to Dunlop within hours of his death. Northern Ireland television carried live coverage of his funeral. Fifty thousand mourners, including bikers from all parts of Britain and Ireland and people from all backgrounds in Northern Ireland, attended the funeral procession to Garryduff Presbyterian church and his burial in the adjoining graveyard.

After his death, the Joey Dunlop Foundation was established to provide accommodation for disabled visitors to the Isle of Man. Dunlop's legacy includes the Joey Dunlop Cup, awarded to the most successful rider at the annual TT races, and several memorials and statues in his honour. Dunlop's career was documented in several films.

14th July 2023

Freddie Frith!

Frederick (Freddie) Lee Frith (30 May 1909 – 24 May 1988 Grimsby, Lincolnshire, England) was a British Grand Prix motorcycle road racing world champion. A former stonemason and later a motor cycle retailer in Grimsby,he was a stylish rider and five times winner of the Isle of Man TT. Frith was one of the few to win TT races before and after the Second World War. He won the 1935 Junior Manx Grand Prix and then joined the Norton team for the 1936 TT Races. It was a winning combination as he claimed the Junior TT and finished second in the Senior TT as well as winning the 350cc European Championship.

In 1937 he went one better in the Senior and took a brilliant win and setting the first 90 mph plus lap of the Snaefell Mountain Course. After finishing third in the 1939 Senior, he missed the 1947 TT due to a practice spill on a 500cc Moto Guzzi. Turning to Velocettes in 1948 he won the Junior Race, repeating this success a year later. Freddie was the first ever 350cc World Champion in 1949, winning all five events of the inaugural campaign, using a single-overhead-camshaft engine in the Ulster race.

Frith, alongside other riders from BSA, Ariel and Matchless works teams, served in the army during World War 2 at the Infantry Driving Maintenance School stationed at Keswick, where officers and NCOs learned how to ride cross-country. Sgt. Freddie Frith taught teams of four on Norton 500s over Skiddaw in all weathers. A special treat on the last day was reserved for roadwork, following Frith's track-style fast cornering.

Freddie passed away on the 24th May 1988 at the age of 79 years in Grimsby, Lincolnshire, England.

8th June 2023

John Surtees!

John Norman Surtees, CBE (11 February 1934 – 10 March 2017) was a British Grand Prix motorcycle road racer and Formula One driver. On his way to become a seven-time Grand Prix motorcycle World Champion, he won his first title in 1956, and followed with three consecutive doubles between 1958 and 1960, winning six World Championships in both the 500 and 350cc classes. Surtees then made the move to the pinnacle of Motorsport, the Formula 1 World Championship, and in 1964 made motor racing history by becoming the F1 World Champion. To this day Surtees remains the only person to have won World Championships on both two and four wheels. He founded the Surtees Racing Organisation team that competed as a constructor in Formula One, Formula 2 and Formula 5000 from 1970 to 1978. He was also the ambassador of the Racing Steps Foundation.
 

Surtees was the son of a south-London motorcycle dealer. His father Jack Surtees was an accomplished grasstrack competitor and in 1948 was the South Eastern Centre Sidecar Champion. He had his first professional outing, which they won, in the sidecar of his father's Vincent at the age of 14. However, when race officials discovered Surtees's age, they were disqualified. He entered his first race at 15 in a grasstrack competition. In 1950, at the age of 16, he went to work for the Vincent factory as an apprentice. He first gained prominence in 1951 when he gave Norton star Geoff Duke a strong challenge in an ACU race at the Thruxton Circuit. In 1955, Norton race chief Joe Craig gave Surtees his first factory sponsored ride aboard the Nortons. He finished the year by beating reigning world champion Duke at Silverstone and then at Brands Hatch. However, with Norton in financial trouble and uncertain about their racing plans, Surtees accepted an offer to race for the MV Agusta factory racing team, where he soon earned the nickname figlio del vento (son of the wind).

In 1960, at the age of 26, Surtees switched from motorcycles to cars full-time, making his Formula 1 debut racing in the 1960 BRDC International Trophy Silverstone Team Lotus. He made an immediate impact with a second-place finish in only his second Formula One World Championship race, at the 1960 British Grand Prix, and a pole position at his third, the 1960 Portuguese Grand Prix. In 1996, Surtees was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame. The FIM honoured him as a Grand Prix "Legend" in 2003. Already a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE), he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2008 Birthday Honours and a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2016 New Year Honours for services to motorsport. In 2013 he was awarded the 2012 Segrave Trophy in recognition of multiple world championships, and being the only person to win world titles on 2 and 4 wheels.

Surtees died of respiratory failure on 10 March 2017 at St George's Hospital in London, at the age of 83. He was buried, next to his son Henry, at St. Peter and St. Paul's Church in Lingfield, Surrey.

5th June 2023

Barry Sheene!

Barry Steven Frank Sheene MBE (11 September 1950 – 10 March 2003) was a British professional motorcycle racer. He competed in Grand Prix motorcycle racing and was a two-time world champion, winning consecutive 500cc titles in 1976 and 1977. Sheene began competitive motorcycle racing in 1968, winning his first races at Brands Hatch riding father Frank's 125cc and 250cc Bultacos. He improved to second behind Chas Mortimer in 1969 in the 125cc class on the Bultaco. By 1970, Sheene had become the British 125cc champion at age 20, riding a former Suzuki factory racing team motorcycle that he purchased for £2,000.

In the 1976 season, he won five 500cc Grands Prix, bringing him the World Championship. He took the Championship again in the 1977 season with six victories. Sheene's 1977 title remained as Britain's last solo motorcycle world championship until Danny Kent in 2015 in the Moto3 category. Finding fame and wealth through racing, Sheene had houses in Putney, in south-west London, and in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, and in 1977 he purchased a 700-year-old manor house in Charlwood, Surrey once owned by the actress Gladys Cooper. He was contracted by Faberge to promote their Brut aftershave lotion.

In 1975 while on crutches, Sheene met fashion-model-turned-glamour-model Stephanie McLean, who was Penthouse Pet of the Month for April 1970 and Pet of the Year in 1971, while they were working together on a photoshoot for Chrysler. She left her first husband for Sheene and after she had divorced, the couple married in 1984, having a son and a daughter. Sheene enjoyed a lavish lifestyle, socialising with friends such as James Hunt, Ringo Starr and George Harrison, drinking and smoking heavily. He even had a hole drilled through the chin-bar on his full-face helmet allowing him to smoke right up to the start of a race.

After a racing career stretching from 1968 to 1984, he retired from competition and relocated to Australia, working as a motorsport commentator and property developer. In July 2002, at the age of 51, Sheene was diagnosed with cancer of the oesophagus and stomach. Refusing conventional treatments involving chemotherapy, Sheene instead opted for a holistic approach involving a strict diet devised by Austrian healer Rudolf Breuss, intended to starve the cancer of nourishment. He died at a hospital on Queensland's Gold Coast in 2003, aged 52, having suffered from the condition for eight months. Sheene and his wife Stephanie had two children, Sidonie and Freddie.

4th June 2023

Mike the Bike!

Stanley Michael Bailey Hailwood (April 1940 – 23 March 1981) was an English professional motorcycle racer and racing driver. He is regarded by many as one of the greatest racers of all time. He competed in the Grand Prix motorcycle world championships from 1958 to 1967 and in Formula One between 1963 and 1974. Hailwood was known as ‘Mike the Bike’ because of his natural riding ability on motorcycles with a range of engine capacities.

A nine-time world champion, Hailwood won 76 Grand Prix races during his motorcycle racing career, including 14 Isle of Man TT victories and four consecutive 500cc world championships. After his motorcycle racing career concluded, he went on to compete in Formula One and other classes of car racing, becoming one of the few men to compete at Grand Prix level in both motorcycle and car racing. He returned to motorcycle racing at the age of 38, taking victory at the 1978 Isle of Man TT.

During his car racing career, Hailwood raced in Formula One and World Sports Cars, but never achieved the same level of success that he had found on motorcycles. He participated in 50 Formula One Grands Prix, starting with an early phase between 1963 and 1965, debuting in the British Grand Prix on 20 July 1963, achieving two podium finishes and scoring a total of 29 championship points. He was in contention for a victory at his first Formula One race in six years, the 1971 Italian Grand Prix. The first five finishers were covered by only 0.61 seconds, and Hailwood was fourth, 0.18s behind the winner Peter Gethin. He won the 1972 Formula Two European title and earned a podium finish at the 1969 24 Hours of Le Mans. Hailwood ran three full seasons in the European Shellsport F5000 series 1969-71 and was 2nd in the 1972 Tasman F5000 series in which he drove a 5000 engined F1 chassis. Following his retirement from motor sport, in late 1979 Hailwood established a Honda-based retail motorcycle dealership in Birmingham named 'Hailwood and Gould' in partnership with former motorcycle racer Rodney Gould.

On Saturday 21 March 1981, Hailwood set off in his Rover SD1 with his children Michelle and David to collect some fish and chips. As they returned along the A435 Alcester Road through Portway, Warwickshire, near their home in Tanworth-in-Arden, a lorry made an illegal turn through the barriers onto the central reservation, and their car collided with it. Michelle, aged nine, was killed instantly. Mike and David were taken to hospital, where Mike died two days later from severe internal injuries. He was 40 years old. David survived with minor injuries. The lorry driver was fined £100.

28th May 2023

Steve McQueen!

Terrence Stephen McQueen (March 24, 1930 – November 7, 1980) was an American actor. His antihero persona, emphasised during the height of the counterculture of the 1960s, made him a top box-office draw for his films of the 1960s and 1970s. He was nicknamed the "King of Cool" and used the alias Harvey Mushman in motor races. McQueen received an Academy Award nomination for his role in The Sand Pebbles 1966). His other popular films include The Cincinnati Kid (1965), Nevada Smith (1966), The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), Bullitt (1968), The Getaway (1972), and Papillon (1973). In addition, he starred in the all-star ensemble films The Magnificent Seven (1960), The Great Escape (1963), and The Towering Inferno (1974). In 1974, McQueen became the highest-paid movie star in the world, although he did not act in film for another four years. He was combative with directors and producers, but his popularity placed him in high demand and enabled him to command the largest salaries.

McQueen was an avid motorcycle and race car enthusiast. When he had the opportunity to drive in a movie, he performed many of his own stunts, including some of the car chases in Bullitt and the motorcycle chase in The Great Escape. Although the jump over the fence in The Great Escape was done by Bud Ekins for insurance purposes, McQueen did have considerable screen time riding his 650 Triumph TR6 Trophy motorcycle. It was difficult to find riders as skilled as McQueen. At one point, using editing, McQueen is seen in a German uniform chasing himself on another bike.

McQueen developed a persistent cough in 1978. He gave up cigarettes and underwent antibiotic treatments without improvement. His shortness of breath grew more pronounced, and on December 22, 1979, after filming a biopsy revealed pleural mesothelioma cancer associated with asbestos exposure for which there is no known cure. On November 7, 1980, McQueen died of a heart attack at 3:45 a.m. at a Juárez hospital, 12 hours after surgery to remove or reduce numerous metastatic tumors in his neck and abdomen. He was 50 years old. According to the El Paso Times, McQueen died in his sleep. Leonard DeWitt of the Ventura Missionary Church presided over McQueen's memorial service. McQueen was cremated, and his ashes were spread in the Pacific Ocean.

• Steve McQueen - 15 Things about Steve McQueen

• Steve McQueen - Man on the Edge

• Steve McQueen - On Any Sunday (Clip)