New product: Circus Life, by Don Cox

Australia is renowned these days for producing sporting champions in numbers that belie the nation’s relatively tiny population, and in the theatre of motorcycle racing it’s no different. However, while recent champions such as Casey Stoner, Troy Bayliss, Mick Doohan, Troy Corser and Wayne Gardner et al were accustomed to the lives of privilege that went with big-dollar contracts and a jet-setting lifestyle in the media spotlight, the experience of their sporting forefathers – the Australian privateers who blazed a trail in the European grand prix championships of the 1950s – was markedly different.

In his new book, Circus Life, acclaimed Australian motorcycle racing historian Don Cox charts the careers of these pioneering Aussie racers as they took the ultimate gamble and faced the world’s best far from home, with nary a luxury motorhome, umbrella girl or press officer in sight.

The synopsis on the back cover of Circus Life gives a good flavour of the pages within… “Welcome to the gypsy world of the Continental Circus private entrants, racing for a living – some on the road with their mates, others with their new brides. Drift a Manx Norton flat out with Bob Brown at Spa-Francorchamps. Learn the Isle of Man Mountain section with Maurie Quincey. Take on race organisers over starting money with Jack Ahearn and Keith Campbell. Cure an electrical problem with your teeth and mend a broken gear linkage with fencing wire. Cross the mine fields into East Germany, where one wrong move could put you in a gulag. Experience the highs, lows and scary hospitals – stories even the men who lived them reckon people would not believe.”

Circus Life is available in a 480-page hardback format and is published by Plimsoll Street Publishing Pty Ltd. It retails for $99 plus $12 postage and handling. For more information and to order a copy yourself visit www.circuslifebook.com.