Alan's lap was following the Paton yes. He said that in lots of places Ryan was holding him up through the corners, but it did give him a tow down some of the straights. How much difference following the Paton made is tough to know, typically they're so much faster down the straights that it's impossible to slipstream them, so Alan must have been coming onto the straights a hell of a lot faster than the Paton to be anywhere near it.

Bill's TT bike was a 500, I believe Andy Reynolds can verify that as he used to ride it. Bob Heath played about with 650 G50 engines, alloy swingarms and more modern forks, but never really got it all working.