I had the TV on this morning while getting ready for work and happened to flip past the public access channels. One of them was replaying the 1961 Laconia Classic race as broadcast on CBS. It was actually pretty good coverage of the race, done by CBS with different camera angles. They had footage from around the race track (pre-Loudon, at Gunstock I think?) and in the pit area. They even played some footage from a camera they had mounted on a bike in an earlier race to give viewers “the experience of being on a race bike”. (they didn’t have fancy shake-canceling cameras back then, the footage was very bumpy) The interviews with the racers was a riot. Seeing the mechanics cutting tires with knives in the pits was also pretty funny. The best part was the footage of the riders meeting before the race. “when there’s oil on the track, we’ll have a sidecar with a flag there, understand?” and “no bunching up, OK !”
The commentator was also describing the two racing styles. Some were using the “knee down” style in the corners, although I didn’t see anyone actually dragging a knee. The others were using the “foot out” style. It was funny seeing guys on traditional race bikes riding them like a motard. They also had a little coverage of the drag races, where the winner’s top speed “was an incredible 86.144 mph!”. I kept expecting to see TLRman or JohnnyB but didn’t see anyone that looked like them.
Oh…and the motorcycle race-themed Schlitz Beer commercials were classic.