Halfway through the season and the Velocettes are now coming to the front of the 500cc NZ Classic Racing Register Championship. 
This has been dominated by Gold Stars and Nortons for the past few years and last year we decided to start the Velocette campaign. 
There are three Velocettes contesting this year, one is owned by Peter Butterworth and ridden with aggression by his son Kevin, one is owned by Nick Thomson and ridden by Dallas Rankine (owner of British Motorcycles and Spares) and the other is co-owned by myself and Nick and ridden with style and tenacity by Bill Biber. Click HERE for a picture of our machine
Two of the bikes have Norton frames and the other is all Velocette. 
My bike is pictured HERE, or for a racing shot, click HERE. This was taken at Taupo at Easter when the challenge really begun. At this stage we were just behind the Norton ES2's with the Gold Star's following hot on our tails. Since then we have made some modifications - Roller Cam Followers and a new cam using the Manx Norton valve opening profiles. We also use a Belt Primary Drive - and again at a meeting in Taupo I can proudly say we are in the front! 
All of the Velocette owners now have one focus and that is to beat the rest of the field. I even think we are on the road to giving the Factory racers a run for their money, especially beating a G50 and Manx Norton in some of our races. 
The next challenge is at Pukekohe on Oct 21st. This is a big circuit and at the last meeting there the Nortons left us for dead. In three weeks we will get a new moment of truth and see whether these cams and followers are really what we have been looking for!

Roy Harvey