Carrera Panamericana

During my research for Laverda500.cc I asked Giovanni Laverda for some images of the works Barcelona 500s from the family’s archives and was surprised when Giovanni sent a picture of PK Davies’ machine with the caption ‘Barcelona 500 in Carrera Panamericana trim’. I had heard of this notorious Mexican road race and had no idea there had ever been a Laverda entry. The Carrera Panamericana was a grueling, no holds barred road race which had become famous during a brief period in the early 1950s. It was initially a car event, launched in 1950 to commemorate the opening of the Panamerican highway, a major feat of engineering at the time.

PK and the old bike, still in original Barcelona form.

In 1988 the race was resurrected and I contacted Roger Slater to ask him if he could provide any details as to how two Englishmen came to be in Mexico in 1988 racing an Italian bike . Roger, as usual, provided a wealth of fascinating anecdotes. It transpired that after the factory’s successful entry in the ’79 Barcelona 24 hour event Roger had asked Massimo Laverda if he could buy the factory machine……

 

“I was always part of the factory team during the Barcelona 24 hour races and I made sure I attended if Pete was riding taking on the role of lap timer for Luciano Zen.  This was a fairly important part of the organisation because inconsistent or falling lap times would alert the team in advance of potential trouble. The lap times of Pete and Augusto [Brettoni] were normally so consistent that any variation in their respective times would indicate rider tiredness or other problems. Augusto had unfortunately contracted a touch of the dreaded Barcelona Belly and was so sick he could only do 30 minutes of his two hour stint before his lap times went to hell in a hand basket. This meant that Pete had to do most of the riding .

Roger and the ‘ponced up’ 500, Note the Brembo floating discs

After the last Barcelona race I asked Massimo by Telex if he would consider selling me the bike that that Pete and Augusto rode. Uncharacteristically, there was no immediate response. Then we received our monthly container of bikes in which we found the Barcelona 500 just inside the rear doors! No invoice was included….

 The bike still had the Barcelona grime on it so our first job, [after a run up the road] was to clean it off. It was fascinating to discover that the rear wheel only had two spokes that were not cracked near the hub.  It would only have done another few laps before sudden and total collapse.  Both wheels were exact replicas of the standard cast wheels except  Luciano had had them sand cast in magnesium. Magnesium is light, but in certain circumstances it can have a short service life”

 

The bike is now part of a private collection , nicely preserved in its Carrera specification

Roger’s comments demonstrate the esteem in which Slater’s efforts must have been held by the factory. To donate one of the valuable factory race machines, especially one which had just secured an important class win in one of Europe’s most significant endurance events was an extraordinarily generous gesture by the factory. Roger had worked tirelessly promoting the Laverda brand and had played a major part in creating the legend that Laverda had become. Perhaps it’s not so surprising that the factory would want to recognize these efforts in some way. Roger goes on to explain how the factory 500 and Pete Davies came to be taking part in the infamous Mexican event

 

  “ When I emigrated in 1980 the 500 came with me to California and later to the current house in Washington in 85.

A few years later my old pal and former near neighbour, Cliff Carr, then running a Harley dealership in Santa Barbara, sent me a flyer on the Mexican Carrera road race he was helping to organise.

I phoned Cliff for more info, he always was a good salesman but the wild nature of the event got my interest and didn’t need much selling!

Pete [Davies] had recently jumped ship from England and was working with Lance Weil in Costa Mesa.  I phoned him and asked him if he was interested in doing one last real road race in Mexico?  I think I might have left out the Mexico bit at that stage…..

Hesitant and rightly cautious, Pete pointed out we had no bike and where the hell is the race anyway?

Yes Pete, we do have a bike , we’ve got your Barcelona 500 and the race is coast to coast on public roads just down the road from you. Where is just down the road? O h…. Baja, don’t worry, it will be a good laugh.

 PK getting down to some serious high speed testing prior to the event

So, having secured Pete’s agreement, I dragged the bike from under the covers, gave it a major service ,ponced it up a bit and contacted Tony Mills for a pair of endurance Dunlops, the same spec as we used at Barcelona.  I mounted these to a pair of standard alloy wheels. From Cliff I learned that the road was bumpy so I changed the bone hard Barcelona rear shocks for a normal road set.  I loaded it all into the back of the pick-up and set off for the long drive to meet Pete in Ensenada.

 

Pete had arrived two days earlier on an old air head BMW and was busily out on the road trying to see if he could make heads or tails of the very challenging 120 miles route. It went over two mountain ranges with desert in-between, plus several villages with the normal assortment of animal life, domestic and otherwise. 

We needed to test the 500 and Pete had found a couple of real high speed blind curves that needed work because the speed though these curves governed the speed on the ensuing long straight; getting the curves sorted would gain several seconds. The BMW's poor high speed handling and open roads were not conductive to using the entire width of the road at 100 mph.

Out we went with the 500 in the pick-up to the principle curve.   I took up position on the apex to afford a view of both directions.

Pete would go a mile or so down the road then come toward me at a very high rate of knots, comfortable in my hand signal that there was no oncoming traffic he could use all the road for a perfect line. The bike was not happy and it seemed to have developed a hinge in the middle which we cured by refitting the stiff Barcelona suspenders.

Off we go again, this time the bike was handling OK and Pete was notably faster but still wanted another couple of tries to perfect it and build confidence. Bear in mind this was on a public road not closed to traffic and the blind curve was being taken at approx 100mph.

 

Chatting with old hand Cliff Carr before the start, Cliff advised Pete not to trust in the claimed closed traffic free roads and to stay on the right side of the road on blind corners. Pete, an old hand at paddock banter and misinformation, was well aware of the common practice of offering ‘well meaning’ advice designed to slow down ones fellow competitors. Pete smiled politely as he filed the "advice" away. True or not, the advice was disconcerting never the less.

 

The start of the race disintegrated into the usual chaotic Mexican Fire Drill. Bikes were lined up in a very long line in numerical order and each successive number was flagged off at one minute intervals.  After sitting there in the boiling sun for half a hour with nothing but confusion  and no forward movement, a farmer’s truck came lumbering into view from the opposite direction of the course. How the hell can that happen? All roads were supposed to be closed….. Cliff’s "banter" had come back to haunt us.

 

At roughly the half way point there was a compulsory pit stop. This was done because many riders did not have the fuel capacity to run to the end at San Felipe. It was not necessary for us because we had the fuel and the economy to run the full distance none stop. We were not comfortable that we had been forced to stop simply because others had unsuitable equipment to do the distance.

The stop turned into another organisational mix up. We believed that it was compulsory to be stopped for five minutes and upon arrival our two helpers advised Pete that he was in the lead.  PK dismounted, had a leisurely cup of tea and was enjoying a pee up a cactus tree when it dawned on our lads that other riders were coming in, stuffing in fuel and taking off again in the shortest possible time. Realising this, Pete jumped back on the bike and took off in a cloud of dust.

 Pete Davies enjoying a cool one with his bike. Is that an MV Agusta T- shirt? Surely not.....

 

Meanwhile back at the start point, I had missed all this excitement, all I could do was sit and wait at the start area until all riders had left.  After a reasonable interval, but still on supposedly closed roads I could leave to drive the 120 miles to the finish.

Despite the pit stop fiasco Pete finished with a average speed a tad over 100 mph, winning the 500 class and coming second in the overall unlimited class. The winner was a top Southern California road racer on an out and out purpose built road racer, on slicks etc, built by Ron Woods. Pete seems to remember it as a Ducati but I believe it was powered by a full race 600 factory Rotax.

 

And so ended the Laverda racing career of the extremely successful Davies/Slater partnership, still a winning combination almost a decade after the bike had been officially retired. The bike was eventually sold and now resides in a private collection in the US. The Carrera adventure is yet another fascinating episode in the history of the 500cc Laverda and I`m truly grateful to Roger and PK for taking the time to fill in the details.