A little more info - it was of course the first Sidecar TT since the 1920s, and Watsonians had promised Hans a good, competitive outfit to take on the BMWs.

Perhaps cynical (aren't we all!) he left Luigi Taveri on the Continent and pitched up in Douglas.

The "good, competitive outfit" he had been promised turned out to be a tired long-stroke Norton that apparently steered and handled like a bowl of soup.

With a scratch passenger, who unfortunately was not immortalised by the then media and thus remains anonymous, he completed only two laps rather than the three necessary to qualify, and confirmed his first impression that the outfit would do nothing for his bank balance, nor indeed for his reputation.

Declining to do the required third lap, he became of course a non-qualifier and left the Island!

Shrewd man.

:wink: