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Introduction

This year the 33rd ISDT was held in the famous alpine ski resort of Garmisch Partenkirchern in Bavaria, West Germany. A popular destination for the event and well known to many Brits who watch the BBC TV’s annual Ski Sunday coverage of the Winter World Cup ski racing

Our thanks go out to our fantastic helper and researcher ‘STB’ for his help in locating and scanning a copy of the official event programme which we have now added to our issuu.com library and can be read here.

Motorsport in Österreich

Internationale Sechstagefahrt 1958

We now have found a worthwhile collection of images of this event at the web site of the Technisches Museum Wien (TMW) who have gathered a significant collection of Austrian Motorsport records including the ISDT with images, mostly of Austrian competitors and team, from the best resources available – professional motorsports photographers. I am indebted that they have chosen to do this and make the records available for free for the whole world to access

View the gallery of images for ISDT 1958 from the TMW here

On the Map

Our thanks go out to ‘STB’ who not only located a set of maps for each day of the ISDT giving details of the time check locations but also the type of going is identified. Click on image to get an enlarged view.

We shall have a go at bringing the rain swept 33rd ISDT in Bavaria GARMISCH PARTENKIRCHEN full of surprises protests & with entrants initially of 257. Soviets withdrew on grounds of ‘a mechanical fault’ with no further comment, Rumanians did not appear & starters numbers dropped to 213.

We shall get ID of riders machinery plus location of pics as we add text to pics hurriedly added & already in place.

The Hosts became accused of soft attention to various entrants on Speed ratings, Class A etc plus some selective ‘pushers’ aiding chosen entrants on slippery hills, jury had to meet over actions on the last day, nowadays Eurovision Song Contest type assistance levels to whom plus when!. Harro Esmarch, German Journalist & who in the Days of ISDT he used to be Castrol representative, well, He  came to help us provide superb pictures from his own collection, with help also from ‘stb’ who has helped immensely.

Brian Stonebridge in the foreground working on his Greeves. Terry Cheshire can be spotted dismounting from his 250 Royal Enfield.  Six teams not seven emerged, practice sessions saw machines coming to wheelspinning halts, Trials rather than rally sections seemed the order of the event. Trials tyres on fronts Sport scrambles on rear seemed best options for the Brits!. Polish 350 Junak machines were allowed in for Witold Pluzanski & Jan Paluch in place of their 250 Zundapp & Maico entries.

Sammy Miller was to ride this Ariel in 1958 ISDT at Garmisch-Partenkirschen, when Sammy was woken at 5 am he was in a bad way, from some virus, a boon for Non Ariel manufacturers plus all other competitors!!!

The above images were made available by Deryk Wylde. : Images in this section are protected with a digitally embedded watermark.  Copies, without the watermark, may be available – please contact ‘offroarchive@gmail.com’ for details.

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Daily Route Cards

We have gathered the route card for each day of the event which we show day one below and the full set can be seen here.

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The Parc ferme had no overhead coverage & entries were quick to cover machines with tarpaulins.   43 non starters caused a stir, 18 Vase teams, 27 Manufacturers Teams, 17 Club Teams, 13 Nations represented.   Four Cannon shell fireworks were set off at Ski slopes tops, the opening had taken place, then rain came with a vengeance.

Sammy Miller remained curled in bed , ill & had to be replaced by Tim Gibbes in the Ariel Team, first out went Pole Wlodzimierz Szarle with magneto water problems, Jim Sheehan’s Velocette went out with clutch slip to ruin the Brit Vase B efforts for the Competition, Swedish rider Gosta Burland’s 125 Husqvarna started showing ignition problems and even Peter Stirland’s normally reliable Royal Enfield broke a rear shock absorber, changed at lunch stop!.

Tim Gibbes, the Aussie on the British Team recollects about 1958 : He moved to Birmingham and worked as test rider, primarily with the Ariel Leader & Arrow models. He rode International MX 500 GP & many other moto-cross a round Europe as well as ISDT for Ariel 500cc factory. For the ISDT that year took the place of Sammy Miller in the British Trophy Team, moving up from the Silver Vase Team, at the last moment, when Sammy fell ill just before the start. and collected his second Gold Medal.

Vase ‘A’ team had Roy Peplow’s machine only using second gear & that team duly was far too hampered at this stage to be successful. Birmingham 30 Club lost Martin when his Goldie 500 ignition gave up.  Brian Martin had toured in to Bad Kohlgrub stop with 20 mins to spare, restart? dead magneto which restarted instantly when returned to HQ after retirement ‘500 points/marks debited each day from now!  Wet cards, hosed down Barbour suits, mud and rain saw to drying out being a premium 28 had retired & 16 had lost marks.  a 5 o’clock start the following day was less attractive!.

ISDT 1958 Pictures of  German journalist Harro Esmarch (motorsports and wintersports).

In the sixties he worked as representative for Castrol in some ISDT events.
Pic 1   Olympic Stadium Garmisch-Partenkirchen
Pic 7   scrutineering
Pic 14  opening ceremony – East Germany and GB
Pic 16  handing over the trophies – Germany/Trophy and  CSR/SilverVase
Pic 25  Brian Martin, GB, on BSA
Pic 27  Wagner, Germany, on Express

All our thanks for kind use of Harro Esmarch’s collection Courtesy & efforts of “STB” too.

Pic 38   #226 Wicken, GB, on Matchless; #233 Fletcher, GB, RoyalEnfield; I shall try to present this better as time goes on.  (Taff)

Here I must start trying to do justice to the beautiful pics of Journalist & ex Castrol Rep.

Rain stopped, 128 miles to be covered 2 x 12 to 15 miles sections cut out by Clerk of the Course in view of conditions. Terry Cheshire’s 250 Royal Enfield refused to start in the allocated time & eventually took a lot of pushing to get going, POINT LOST. Long term Germany used ISDT Section Ettaler Berg between Oberau & Oberammagau of Passion Play fame saw climbs to 4500 ft in 1 in 5 inclined with mud galore, many efforts & failures until one daring Belgian Alex Colin on a 250 NSU attempted a flat out in 3rd gear Climb & remained aboard at the top to the admiration of all.  Albert Glassbrook crashed his 250 Greeves, Army MCA had Pat Brittain 250 exit with a big end well gone Garth Wheldon 250 James had his 250 James Piston with a gaping hole in it to see one Brit manufacturer less in the fray.   Gordon Blakeway’s Ariel petrol tank pins sheared & bungees, then known as aerolastics were called for.  Nails in tyres of Ken Heanes 650 Triumph and John Brittain’s 350 Royal Enfield were coped with by a puncture sealant whilst Tim Gibbes had to change his Ariel’s rear tube.  Sport (Scrambles Tyres ruled) Sebastian Nachtman after a really heavy crach in the outskirts of Garmisch became the 2nd German Vase A team member to exit this ISDT.

MZ Rider we have no idea who, can anyone help identify please?.  It may be a German helmet & low number.

Wednesday saw Harry Baughan emphasising to ‘a mass’ of just the one! Journalist that Clerk of the Course Otto Sensberg was to make everything harder from here on in & 6 to 7am saw Terry Cheshire manage to start & leave this time Helmut Amthos of East Germany Trophy Team manage to start his Simpson 340 with just 8 seconds in hand, Romano Crippa of Italy Vase B Team  snapped a rocker arm on his Capriolo near Uffing & retired, John Harris on another James left with piston trouble, Alex Nicholson Crashed & damaged himself plus the Dot & later retired.   Only Army Team member remaining was Bill Brooker & Army reserve Doug Theobold was without penalty, Katzenthal would cause wheelspin for all!.

Sammy Miller was too ill to start using this choice machine, a sister vessel to the one used by Dave Langston, Tim Gibbes was placed in the team as a highly capable substitute for Sammy.

At the end of this first day only Sweden had practically given up after Gosta Berglund’s 83 lost marks with his ignition problems.  10 Vase Teams -Austria A & B, Czech A & B, West Germany B, Italy B, The Netherlands, Poland A &B plus Sweden were Clean.

Seven British Manufacturers’ teams Ariel, BSA, Francis Barnett, Greeves, Matchless & Royal Enfield like other countries had not dropped marks.   British Army Club Team had dropped 54 Marks, (Alex Nicholson’s Gearbox trouble) whilst Birmingam 30 had 277 points totted against them, Bryan Povey & Michael Martin on BSAs had waterlogged Magnetos plus Albert Glassbrook on 250 Greeves had Clutch plus ignition problems.  Frank Carey had his 350 Royal Enfield losing 35 marks with Olga Kevelos retiring on her 175 CZ.   A lavish Dinner was arranged for those of Ariel BSA & Triumph mounts by Edward Turner MD of BSA Automotive Division., who was visiting the event, early finish to let the lads meet the 5am start.

Between Hollenschtein & Oberau on the Tuesday run, a Marshall warns of conditions, leading is Hermann Wagner 175 Express, next Harald Uhlig 175 DKW, the fourth and last can be identified as Jack Simpson on his 250 Greeves.

NOT the day for Bears to go to the woods! at KRUN.

Thursday saw Vladimir Sedina with ignition problems which saw lips quiver in the Czech Teams until if started on one cylinder them blew out a cloud of smoke & sped off running perfectly.   Frank Carey’s 4 yrs old machine which had carried sidecars thru 4 previous ISDT simply had it’s front brake plate fracture to send him out, Terry Cheshire helped his starting trouble by draining the old oil and filling up with hot oil!.   Scramblers excelled & such as Brian Stonebridge agreed going was tough.   Ton Bakker of Netherlands Vase Team 250 Maico lost marks near Krun trying to repair rear brake problems, by now all the Ariel Team biggies had their tank fixing pins sheared.

138 unpenalized, the  Czechs look good & the course from here goes from Altlach around the south Shore of Walchensee up to 4500 ft in 1 in 5 inclines mud galore, Bob Manns & Dave Curtis on Matchless find it better than many others, Ernie Smith loses his footbrake from his Francis Barnett Peter Baldwin (250 Greeves) has clutch slip problems, burned clutch smells waft about the course, Jack Simpson (250 Greeves) hits a tree and later retires in pain.   Francis Saini of Italy Trophy team on (125 Gilera) has 2 punctures to lose marks.  Czech & West German Teams were on time Polish B Vase Team man Ryszard Potocki on 174 Jawa dropped out.

The man shouting? gesticulating at the photographer when the felt hat wearing pusher of #143 plus the chap at the right with a puller at his front wheel contradicts the outside assistance regulations.  photo can of course be questioned?.

16 Stone  Baldwin’s clutch got worse & cost him 50 point, Doug Theobold on the Army reserve Dot blew a head gasket & left the event.  Only the Czechs plus West Germany & Polish Siver Vase A team were now in with a chance.

Saturday saw a course lap of 78 miles then on to the road circuit 4.35 Near Ettal, Terry Cheshire’s ignition chose to cost all 60 marks, absolute toughie Tim Gibbes with a stone cut eye rode against Doctors orders to get his required 57 mph speed for the big Ariel.  Lorenz Mullen Crashed his DKW fracturing his leg, Karl Zohrer (282 Puch) was struggling to finish with suspensions worn out & hand operated carburetter 54 was the average for up to 350 cc & the British 650’s of Ken Heanes & Johnny Giles were straight into the lead with determined Germans Gernot Leistner (262 Zundapp) & Volker von Zitzewitz (277 Maico) were leading Manns & Brittain after 3 laps by a few yards, they had reckoned without smaller capacity Czech CZ & JAWA machines easily reaching their averages to win after W Germany’s Richard Hessler (247 Zundapp) stopped and had to be pushed home to the finish by him easily. the Gileras of Italy way out of the contest

At the Movies:

In addition to the press articles and pictures we have a few video clips of this event here also for other events for you to enjoy on our video gallery.

The final score! Results

Trophy winners at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany were the Czechoslovakian team members Vladimir Sedina, Sasa Klimt,Antonin Matejka, Zdenek Polanka, Jaroslav Pudil, Bohuslav Roucka, Czechs too took the Silver Vase, Stanislev Stastka, Frantisek Darebny, Alois Roucka, Arnost Zemen.

Adverts.

Lucas were supporting the teams of Ariel, Royal Enfield and Matchless.

Dunlop not to miss the opportunity of promoting its success in the Irish MX were happy that their tyres booted a few of the winning manufactures teams……

Castrol are pretty smug at its decision to support the eastern european teams on CZ and Jawa who cleaned up the ‘Silver Vase’. The two strokes were coming!!!!

Ariel did well in the face of the loss of Sammy Miller with Gordon Blakeway, Tim Gibbes and Ron Langston riding the 500cc Ariel Red Hunters

Royal Enfleld fielded a trio all on 350cc Bulletts including the awesome Johnny Brittain, and a pair of Peters, Peter Stirland and Peter Fletcher winning a manufacturers team prize and a trio of gold medals

Jawa just about cleaned up with two club wins four manufacturers prizes and the Silver Vase and the winning Trophy team on CZ. The era of the domination by big 4 stroke British and German Hardware is about to be hit by the lightweight two stroke Tsunami

Where are they now?

With thanks to Bill Perretti of BMW Motorcycles of Daytona we have this fine 1958 ISDT example.