Elton Matlock (1973-1976)

I first read in TRIALSPORT in September 1976 that bicycle trials were actually being held in England—and in the wake of Mick Andrews, of all people! Unfortunately, the report in TRIALSPORT did not reveal whether this was just casual training by a few guys or whether they were also holding proper events.

I had almost completely forgotten about this report when, more than thirty years later, after the Internet age had opened up new possibilities, I finally set about creating my website on the history of bike trials. During my research, I found additional information on the Austrian trials website webermichl.at, which no longer exists today. It said that Mick Andrews himself, after seeing a trials event in his area and becoming completely enthusiastic about it, started trials riding on his bike in his home village of Elton Matlock together with like-minded teenagers!

I decided to call Mick Andrews to find out more about bike trials in Elton Matlock and perhaps in the UK as a whole. To my great surprise, Mick told me on the phone in 2008 that he had never had anything to do with bicycle trials and had been riding motorcycle trials from the very beginning! He “only” started motorcycle trials in 1959 (at the age of 15) on a 197 James, but later, in an interview with retrotrials.com, Mick revealed that he had already been riding to school on a homemade trials James in 1958 (the teachers were furious!) and that at the age of 12 – in 1956 – he had already been riding his father's motorcycle around on dirt roads (and managed to do a turn there that his father couldn't do)! ¹ – In any case, my research on Elton Matlock came to nothing once again.

The photo from Burycliffe

Forty-two years after the information appeared in TRIALSPORT in 1976, there was suddenly new movement in the Elton Matlock case on March 26, 2018. A great photo of it was posted on Instagram! The caption indicated that the picture was apparently taken in 1973, the year Mick Andrews switched from Ossa to Yamaha. Mick's Yamaha can be seen at the top of the photo. It is not known exactly when the cycle trials activities in Elton Matlock, reported by TRIALSPORT in 1976, began or how long they lasted.

Thanks to the energetic assistance of John Stone in Elton, a cousin of Mick Andrews (John Stone's mother is the sister of Tom Andrews, Mick's father), many interesting details about this great photo are now known. It was taken by Ron Duggins, who was a photographer and supplied pictures of his beloved Derbyshire to regional newspapers for many years. He had arranged to meet Mick Andrews for a photo shoot at the Burycliffe quarry. Mick Andrews' “fan club,” mentioned in TRIALSPORT, naturally came along too, and the children built a small section for their bikes. I don't know if they were the secret attraction for Ron Duggins at this photo shoot, but they were certainly a welcome subject for him.

Ron Duggins naturally arranged the shooting location according to photographic considerations. The rugged rocks in the foreground and the spectacular rock face in the background were no coincidence. The section sign stands as an informative accessory at the bottom of the picture and sums up what this is all about in two words – it is “facing in the wrong direction” because it is not the rider but the viewer of the picture who is supposed to be able to read it. At the top center of the picture is Mick Andrews' factory Yamaha. In between, the children are positioned on the steep slope as if on a stage. Mick couldn't resist, of course, grabbing one of the bikes and trying out a track...

One can only assume that Ron Duggins took many more pictures during this photo shoot. In any case, in this picture of Mick on the bike, he captured the exact moment when Mick's front wheel slipped away. The failure elicits a surprised and embarrassed smile from the top rider in the foreground. The boys and girls watching also react vividly, and you can almost read their faces saying, “See, riding a bike isn't that easy after all!” A great, almost ingenious photo by Ron Duggins, which is not only perfectly staged with Mick Andrews surrounded by children and wild scenery, but also has a cheerful spontaneity thanks to Mick's mishap.

It is therefore all the more gratifying that John Stone has managed to bring almost all of the people in the picture out of anonymity. The names of the children or teenagers behind Mick Andrews, who are now (2021) almost fifty years older than they were in the photo, are, from left to right: Andrew Holmes (wearing a cap), Stephen “Sam” Brownlee (half-covered with a cloth hat), John Buxton, and Beverley Grimshaw (wearing a peaked cap); The next child in the background near the front wheel of the Yamaha could not be identified. The same applies to the child who is climbing up the slope and can only be seen from behind. Rosie Musgrave is sitting on the seat of the Yamaha and Peter Glossop can be seen on the far right wearing a woolen hat. John, Beverley, and Peter still live in Elton. Mick Andrews also always lived in or around Elton, apart from his stays abroad working for Ossa and Yamaha. ²

Stephen „Sam“ Brownlee

I would like to briefly mention Stephen “Sam” Brownlee (1962-2020), who is the only one of the young people pictured in the photo who has already passed away. In 1969, Stephen was seven years old when, on his way home from school, he heard the sound of an engine coming from a house in Elton – it was 25-year-old Mick Andrews working on an early trials Ossa. Eventually, little Stephen plucked up the courage to go inside – he was fascinated by the work on the motorcycle and was allowed to watch. He came more and more often and regularly, and a friendship developed with Mick Andrews and his wife Jill. Stephen became a kind of apprentice to Mick, was entrusted with smaller jobs, and at the age of ten helped prepare the machines Mick rode in the European Championship events. Mick now called Stephen “Sam” – perhaps in reference to Sammy Miller?

When Mick Andrews moved from Ossa to Yamaha in 1973, he received two Yamaha TY 80s as part of his contract for further development, which were intended to bring young talent into trials riding.

“Soon Mick let Elton's children ride the new TY 80. (...) Many happy hours were spent with them, putting the TY 80 through its paces under Mick's expert guidance.” ³

It can be assumed that this also boosted bike trial activities in Elton, although no further details are known. In any case, “Sam” rode his first motorcycle trial in 1974 at the age of twelve—on one of the Yamaha TY 80s—and became a good motorcycle trials rider. From 1978, “Sam” worked with John Shirt in Buxton, an old friend of Mick Andrews from his motocross days, on the development of Majesty trials motorcycles, which were based on unsold Yamaha stock. “Sam” brought his Yamaha experience and new ideas from Mick Andrews to this project. More details on the history of Majesty can be found in the English-language article about Stephen “Sam” Brownlee, from which the above quote is taken.

The bike trial riders in Elton

I now have the original text of the passage in Tom Beesley and Mick Andrews' trials book, which Webermichl had reproduced and in which bicycle trials in Burycliffe are mentioned. Translated, it reads: “Almost twenty years ago” – presumably 1957, as the book was published in 1976 – “he and his father attended a trials event near their home town” of Elton Matlock in Derbyshire. “And that was it! Trials was something completely new for Mick.” The then thirteen-year-old "was immediately thrilled by the precision, the slower pace, and the atmosphere at the trials. Immediately afterwards, he and his local friends began setting up simple sections and riding them on their bikes. They chose an abandoned quarry near Mick's home village of Elton, located in Matlock Valley in Derbyshire, as one of their favorite places." However, this phase probably lasted only a very short time, as Mick built his first trials bike at the age of 14, i.e. in 1958.

The book goes on to say: “This quarry, known as Burycliff, would become very important to Mick in later years, as it became the training ground where he spent (and still spends) many hours training and did much of the development work on Yamaha's first trial motorcycle.” ⁴

Incidentally, 500 meters northwest of Elton on Cliff Lane, there is a viewpoint called Cliff Lane View, where an information board not only points out the former importance of the Burycliffe quarry for the villagers of Elton, but also proudly refers to Mick Andrews: “Mick Andrews was twice European Trials Champion in the early 1970s and five-time winner of the Scottish Six Days Trial. He grew up in Elton, attended primary school in Elton, and developed his early skills as a trials rider here at Burycliffe Quarry. He went on to work for two motorcycle companies and developed the Ossa MAR (Mick Andrews Replica) and the Yamaha TY.”

The bicycle trial activities referred to in the 1976 TRIALSPORT article now revolved around Mick's younger brother Barry. Fifteen years had passed, and the bike trial activities were no longer held in Burycliffe, but in the village of Elton on a grass embankment that no longer exists today. However, for the photo with Mick Andrews, taken by photographer Ron Duggins, they moved to the Burycliffe quarry. No “proper” bicycle trials were organized in Elton, but rather small groups simply rode together for fun. John Stone reported on this in 2013 in an article in the local ELTON ECHO, which described the impact that Mick Andrews' success had had on the residents and especially on the young people in Elton at the time. It should not be forgotten that the motorcycle-crazy seventies had begun! I am translating excerpts from the article here:

Mick grew up in Roseneath on Main Street (of Elton Matlock) and went to school in Elton. Even as a child, he was able to perform amazing tricks on his bike. And when Tom, his father, bought him his first motorcycle (a 197cc James Trial), he soon began winning regional trials and turning heads with his skills. So much so that at the tender age of 16, he was signed by AJS and given a brand new factory machine (...) Shortly after his 17th birthday, Mick won the Bemrose National Trial, relegating the legendary Sammy Miller, who was considered unbeatable at the time, to second place. (...)"

In the 1960s, Mick competed in both trials AND motocross. Trials on Saturdays and motocross on Sundays. He honed his skills in Burycliffe and spent his evenings preparing his motorcycles in the former chip shop next to Roseneath. My parents always packed me in and took me along to watch Mick dominate motocross races in Knifeton, Clifton, Bolsover, Mercaston, and so on. It was fantastic to watch—the contingent of spectators from Elton glowed with pride and couldn't believe their eyes. But it was in trials that Mick really excelled. It is a fact that Mick was without question the best trials rider in the world during six golden years starting in 1970. (...)

But back to Elton in the 1960s, when Mick operated out of his old chip shop. For years, the children of Elton had dangled their feet from the much too high wooden bench in the shop and waited impatiently on Tuesdays and Fridays at teatime for Mr. and Mrs. Phillips to announce that the fat was finally hot enough and that the first batch of fish and chips would be ready soon. A few years later, a group of us, now teenagers, would stroll into the former shop on certain evenings and exchange the inevitable lively banter with Mick while he and his helpers prepared the motorcycles for the challenges of the coming weekend. Now it smelled of oil instead of chip fat. Instead of the former deep fryers, motorcycle parts, wheels, and tires were now stacked everywhere. If we were lucky, Mick would test the motorcycles with fast wheelies all the way up the street to the square. It was fantastic!

On our bikes, we were Mick Andrews. Some of us shortened our fenders or removed them altogether. A few also fitted wide handlebars. We didn't go too far, but we could ride up and down grassy embankments like mountain goats on wheels. A grassy embankment (long since gone) that stretched across the entire upper part of Boam's Farm on Back Lane was a particularly popular spot for our “trials.” Not surprisingly, Mick's younger brother Barry was the star, but – even if I say so myself – we were all very useful! ⁵