The rules now don’t really state anything other than it must be of a type used in the period. They used to state that “factory or works” replicas weren’t allowed along with replicas of things such as the Mularney, unless it was the original, Bob Newby ran the original Mularney a few times at the Manx.

As for the Paton’s being available to the public that is tenuous to say the least! With only 2 of the 8 valve 500’s being built and only about 10 bikes in a 10 year period ranging from 250 to 500 it would be very hard to describe them as anything other than a factory bike. Equally the MV became Privit (don’t think that’s spelt right) after MV pulled out of racing, you could argue that they were then available to the public. Incidentally I have raced against one of the Privit MV’s so they remained available to the public.

As for the spec being the same as originally built you could have that argument all day long and never prove it one way or another with out striping one of the originals and a replica and measuring everything as you went. My only comments on this are I remember the fist time I saw one was when Steve rode one at the CRMC Snetterton meeting as few years back. At the time I was riding a Weslake which was probably faster than the Paton now it wouldn’t get close to it. I also had a very entertaining conversation with a former racer who raced against the Paton’s in the era he commented that they were fast but not usually for long! I guess something’s aren’t exactly as they were!

Last comment Alan’s lap. A friend had broken down at 32nd that evening he commented that Alan slowed mid corner as he caught Ryan and as they exited Windy Alan was right behind him but lost the tow very quickly.