The Queensland Championship for historic motorcycle road racing machines was another eventful meeting for the SuperCool team. We competed in three classes (Ultralightweight 125, Lightweight 250 and Junior 350). Two machines, the 125 and 350, didn’t last the distance over the four required races for each class, both had mechanical issues, but our 250 was strong and fast. Coupled with some brilliant riding from Daniel, we won the 250 championship in a close finish in the last race.
The team members for this meeting were Jim Mott, Mark and Jon Mitchell, and Daniel “Max” Marshall. On day two, the SuperCool engineering team came to give a hand with Rene Le Miere, Marc Van Beest, Daniel Brown and Khoi Truong.
The post-race report issued by the club (QEMSC) described the three days of competition and fun:
“The Motorcycles R US 2026 Historic Motorcycle Road Race Championships attracted more than 110 riders to Warwick’s Morgan Park Raceway. Competitors came from as far afield as Tasmania and Western Australia and included 16 sidecar teams.
Back in 1991, QEMSC staged the inaugural championships at Lakeside Raceway, north of Brisbane. Strong support both then and today has seen the event grow to 40 races over three days despite being held mid-week. It is now recognised as one of the country’s premier classic road race meetings. As well as the 170 competition bikes, the championships presented a lineup of superb Ducatis to mark 100 years of Ducati manufacture. The display featured classic and modern street machines plus a restored Epicycle Ducati 720 parallel twin built and raced in the eighties by the late Pete Smith of Sydney.
Elsewhere in the pits, spectators had plenty of Ducati race bikes and other marques to admire – like David Woolsey’s 1971 Norton Ken Redfern / Dunstall 810 and Brendan O’Neill’s Matchless G50 500.
Japanese bikes dominated the pits, however Velocette, BSA, Harley-Davidson, Bultaco and Triumph were all represented. The P3 sidecar class included two Vincent Rapides and a Norton Atlas.
This year, the event welcomed a new major sponsor, MRU (Motorcycles ‘R’ Us) a Brisbane Ducati Dealer. To celebrate Ducati’s milestone year and the event’s new corporate partnership, MRU gifted Ducati key rings to all riders and officials – a much appreciated gesture from owner of MRU and former Superbike champion, Tony Armstrong. Other event supporters were Wynnum Marine, MotoAX Dyno, Rose City FM 89.3, JB Photography, Mick’s Fix Leather Repairs and Old Bike Australasia.
We we’re blessed with weather that only South East QLD can produce during Tuesday’s qualifying and also on Wednesday which saw the commencement of racing. Whilst the weather remained quite mild for Thursday, the wind which came through Morgan Park during the morning period kept everyone on their toes, particularly the Ultra Lightweights going through turn #8 at full throttle. Those that camped at the track were kept busy on tarp / awning patrol during the Wednesday night and early Thursday morning with the camp sites being put to the test.”
Our Supercool Competitions Department team for this important meeting comprised of Mark Mitchell, Jim Mott and Jon Mitchell.
The gearing setup was left as it was at the Condamine Classic in April and The Big Chill in July – 16 tooth front sprocket and 36 on the rear. We also kept the main jet size #220 in each carburettor in anticipation of having higher relative air density, which turned out to be in the range of 93-95% over the three days.
We went into this meeting confident of defending our Qld title from last year, but unfortunately, it was not to be.
In the first qualifying session, the gearbox developed a ‘sticking between gears’ symptom which wouldn’t allow Daniel to change gears as smoothly as normal. Despite this, he still achieved a best lap time of 01:48.819 which is almost three seconds better than our last qualifying time, and only 00.377 second slower than pole sitter Lee Williams.
After this session , we tested the gearbox in the pits and concluded the sticking symptom was too risky to send Daniel out in the race, so we retired the bike for this event.
Our TD3 was left with the same set up as The Big Chill in July. Gearing was 15/36, and carburettor with main jet #340, needle #3 on position 3. Our EGT temperatures range from 1149-1266°F over the three days
Qualifying went well, the first session our best lap was 01:46:169 and the second session at 01:44:852 which put us grid position 2 behind Terry Morris who was also riding another very fast TD3.
The first race went well, ran second with a gap of 0.637 seconds and a best lap of 01:41.643. The EGT levels were at 1230-1266ºF. At these levels we were a bit concerned about the high temperatures, so we put our camera scope into the cylinder and could see the positions were still a nice brown colour, so we made no changes to the carburetors.
The second race was a faster result, wining with a margin of 1.001 second, and a best lap of 01:39.878 which was our best lap yet at Morgan Park. EGT was similar with 1236-1206F.
In race three, we ran second with a gap 2.657 seconds after Daniel missed a gear coming onto the straight on lap 4. The best lap time of 1:40.285.
The fourth and final race was low on final finishers, but we were still up against the most consistent and fastest rider over the weekend Terry Morris, but Daniel managed to slip stream Terry over the finish line to win by a margin of 0.531 of a second.
This gave us the overall championship win in the Period 4 Lightweight class with 90 points.
The final assembly of our TR3 was completed four weeks prior to this race meeting, and we were conscious that the old Hitachi CDI ignition system might not be up to the task, despite giving the bike a street test of a few laps around our industrial estate in Ormeau.
True to our suspicions, we encountered oiling of the plugs during practice, which caused the expected misfiring and lack of power, which was compounded by a possible ignition system failure on one channel.
The engine had been reassembled as is with the original pistons and barrels that we knew had marginal ring gaps, but we had no other choice due to the lack of new components being available from Yamaha. The result was marginal compression in both cylinders which also contributed to the lack of power.
The best time in the first qualifying session was 01:55:084 and in the second session 01:51:154 which placed us 8th on the grid. During the races we soldered on with the plug and ignition issues, we even tried running fresh hot plugs before entering the grid, but without success. We didn’t finish any of the races and our best time was in race 3, 01:51:308.
The gearing setup was – 16 tooth front sprocket and 36 on the rear. The main jet size was #340 in each carburettor.
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