It’s been a few weeks now since Easter. We held off on publishing this feature as a mark of respect to a good friend who sadly never made it to Scarborough.
Still a buzz
Scarborough at Easter has become the norm since VFM were forced to drop Whitby, but it’s a town with plenty of scooter history and nostalgia. It’s also a decent ride and you always see plenty of scooters along the route. As usual, the socials were buzzing in the week leading up to the event, and despite this being my 38th Good Friday, where I’d be spending the day riding with a group of mates, it was still just as exciting.
Messing around
After our group of four left SLUK HQ, we headed across country to meet with loads of other friends and clubmates. Once all were assembled, we had 18 scooters in our pack. We waited almost an hour for ‘never-on-time’ Daz to arrive, and we eventually set off from Ollerton. It had been two hours since leaving home, and we’d done about 18 miles. Par for the course when riding in a group.
Tortoise and the Hare
As with most groups of scooters, your time in the saddle is governed by the fuel in your tank, so most of the time we stop at around 50 miles. The time in between fill-ups is spent enjoying your own particular ride, whether you’re a speed merchant or steady plodder. We all meet up again at the next predetermined stop, and the slowest riders are usually only a couple of minutes behind the leaders. They also use a lot less fuel (at the present Trumped-up prices, that’s a blessing!).
Scooters everywhere
It must be said that on this journey, I saw more scooters heading to the seaside than I have for a very long time on a Bank Holiday, always the sign of a great weekend.
Our next stop was for the customary Gentleman’s lunch (in the spirit of diversity, ladies are also allowed to dine).
Fallen rider
We’d been dodging mild showers for the last hour, and not long before our pub stop, we were alerted by lots of oncoming vehicles of a problem ahead. We assumed to begin with that we’d be seeing a speed trap, but as time went on, we realised it was something far more serious. Cars were turning around in the road, and we followed suit. Google gave us a diversion to follow, and we arrived at the pub just as it started chucking it down.
One of the riders who had been further in front said it was an accident and the air ambulance was in attendance. That’s something none of us wants to take a ride in. We were hoping that the accident didn’t involve a scooter. We would later find out that it was indeed a head-on collision between a car and a scooter, involving Nick Fallows from Wakefield.
More about that at the end of this feature.
Fuelling issues
At the lunch stop, I decided to swap my carb; I’d been having some (what I assumed were) fuelling issues during the ride and thought this might cure things. As soon as I pulled away from the pub, I realised that I’d actually made things much worse. After 100 yards, I stopped and changed back to the original carb. Unbeknownst to me, this was just the start of a much bigger problem for my Series 1.
That Friday feeling
We all arrived in town late afternoon, the 100-mile journey should take just over two hours, we’d smashed it out in seven! That wasn’t a problem though, we’d all had fun and worked up a thirst.
Scooters chained up and Premier Inn checked into, we were soon showered and ready for a few beers.
The Beat
Friday really was a very good night; everybody seemed to be in good spirits, with plenty of laughter, scooterist piss-taking and merrymaking. We toured the usual haunts before heading down to The Spa to sample VFM’s entertainment, where The Beat were headlining.
After a good night, the lights came up, and we were literally swept out of the building at around 2:30 am for a stagger back to the town and some much-needed shut-eye.
Dark days
We managed to get a lie-in on Saturday morning, which was nice.
Sadly, before I’d even had a chance to open my eyes, I was given some truly awful, devastating news.
Linsey had her phone in her hand and had just seen the tragic news that Nick Reeves from Swindon had been killed on his way to Scarborough the previous night whilst riding his Lambretta on the A1. It took a few seconds to register and for me to take in the full gravity of what I’d just been told. Nick was one of the big people in our friendship group. The news would make Saturday a very difficult day for the many scooterists who could call Nick a good friend. He’ll be missed by us all.
By all accounts, Nick had been riding up with Andy Lamb. Andy’s Lambretta broke down and was relayed home. Nick carried on as it was getting dark. He was hit by a van that rejoined the A1 from a lay-by. The full circumstances will no doubt come out in due course.
Sometimes our lifestyle comes at a price.
The show must go on
Breakfast was a sombre affair, and the morning was spent speaking to friends about the tragedy, and about the other Nick who had suffered very serious injuries.
We still had to muster up the enthusiasm to carry on with the day.
A smile for the public, but behind the bright facade lies sadness…
A stiff upper lip
It hit home when I got to the custom show and saw the VFM organisers, as well as several other friends, visibly upset. The scooter world is a close-knit one, and our friendships run very deep. We’re family. Losing somebody hurts. Having to carry on running an event, knowing that one of your friends died on his way there, is incomprehensible. Respect to them all for carrying on.
Although we know two-wheeled travel can be a risky pastime, it’s thankfully very rare that we have deaths while travelling to or from rallies. When the person in question is such a great character, always full of mischief and with a face full of laughter, it makes things even worse.
Less chaotic?
The road leading down to The Spa actually seemed less manic than in previous years, whether that’s because it was being organised much better by council attendants or not, I don’t know. It was still impressive, but just not quite as full as it usually is.
Full to the brim
That didn’t translate to a quieter parts fair and custom show, though. The place was still packed, and once you were inside the building and had worked your way through the main room (which was full of traders) and down the long corridor overlooking the plaza outside (both were full of traders) to what is the soul room at night, a massive queue stopped us in our tracks. This was just the indoor queue for the custom show. Col had already popped in to take a few photos, so we made a tactical decision to head back into town to hit the pubs.
Tears of a clown
The afternoon and evening were a bit subdued, but we made the most of things in the only way scooterists know how. Drinking and having a laugh. Nick was never far from any of our minds, though, and a song from Friday Night’s band is one that summed up how I (and many others) were truly feeling on the inside.
Ghost Town
The do itself had been busy earlier in the evening, but had thinned out more than the top of my head by the time Ocean Cover Scene finished their set.
The soul room was still busy, but it left the main room looking rather sorry for itself. I personally think that times have changed in recent years, and with large, spread-out venues like The Spa, one room for all kinds of music and a band is much better for creating an atmosphere, rather than DJs playing to an almost empty room.
As we all inevitably get older, not many stay up till the end, leaving most of the main rooms looking empty and feeling flat.
Blowing a gale
We’d been warned that a storm was brewing, and as we made our way back to the digs, it was blowing a gale. It was hard to even walk across the bridge, and if it continued, the ride home would be challenging.
The long goodbye
There were many unspoken words as we said goodbye to friends before leaving town; hugs were just that little bit longer and tighter. We all had thoughts racing around inside our heads.
Thankfully, the hurricane-like conditions had settled into a mild tornado, and we were able to ride home, just about missing the heavy rain clouds to the right-hand side of us.
Look after yourself
The incidents over the weekend were on all of our minds as we rode home. I was being extra cautious about cars waiting to pull out and generally giving things much more consideration. Life can change in a heartbeat, and we riders need to help ourselves as much as possible by riding defensively and pre-empting possible situations.
Trouble ahead
At our next-to-last fuel stop, there was no E5 fuel, so I was forced to use E10. It didn’t seem to affect the performance of my cast-iron Stage 4 Lammy, though, and I was feeling quite confident as I blasted down the A1 with about 25 miles left to go.
Confidence in your machine is often rewarded by a kick in the balls, and my scooter farted and started to lose a bit of power. It felt like I’d dropped a ring. It got slower and slower once I got off the A1, and as we stopped for fuel at Ollerton, I knew it was unlikely to start again. I was right, so we chained it up and came back in the van to pick it up later on.
New engine time
It turned out I had dropped a ring/lost a bit of piston and made a mess of my barrel. I don’t know what the cause was; the top end had been brilliantly reliable, and it had been checked over just before Easter (rings were checked as well).
Race Tour
With the Euro looming, I didn’t fancy running in a cast-iron cylinder after a rebore. The decision on what to choose instead was quite easy, though. I opted for an RT. Although the heads were out of stock until recently.
Thankfully, a big box of BGM parts has just arrived for it, and it’ll be an RT230 when it goes to Austria in exactly three weeks…
Help us give our dad the farewell he deserves
Postscript
Tomorrow, we’ll be heading down to Swindon to say our farewell to Nick Reeves. He’ll be getting a full-on scooterist funeral with all the trimmings.
Nick was 57 and rode everywhere, often on his own, usually turning up late and leaving even later for the solo ride home. He was a scooterist through and through. His little giggle will be remembered by anyone who spent time around him. You never saw Nick without a smile on his face.
Nick leaves behind daughters, Chloe and Sophie. The twins are just 24-years-old. They’ve set up a fundraiser to help with the costs of the funeral and to help them adjust to life without their dad.
Help Nick Fallows as he recovers from his accident
Nick Fallows
The other reason I’ve held this write-up back is related to the first accident we’d been diverted away from on Good Friday.
The scooterist involved in that one is Nick Fallows, a well-known face on the scene. We heard over the rally weekend just how severe Nick’s injuries were. They included broken ribs, arms, legs, pelvis and it was later found out he’d also broken two vertebrae and had a bleed on the brain. To make matters worse, he was due to get married just a few weeks after the accident.
Nick was in an induced coma for a while, and when they brought him round, he was unable to speak or communicate. The extent of his brain injury wasn’t known and still won’t be for some time. Nick, a self-employed joiner, started to show signs of promise but suffered a relapse and was put back into a coma.
Positive vibes
There is some good news, though. Over the past couple of weeks, Nick has been woken up and has started to show some major progress. His voice is slowly coming back, and things are looking much more positive. Although a new CT scan revealed the two fractures in his spine and they also found a broken wrist, so he’s had an operation to pin that. Nick will also need a further operation on his right shoulder to try and repair nerve damage; he can’t lift that arm at all at the moment. Of course, being self-employed means he gets nothing more than statutory sick pay, and because he has a physical job, he may never get back to work again.
A good friend of his has set up a GoFundMe; the total currently stands at £6,687. It’s a generous amount, but it won’t pay the bills for long. If you can spare a few quid, it will all go to helping a fellow scooterist and his wife to be.
From ScooterLab, we wish Nick all the best in his recovery and hope to see him out and about again before too long.
Words and photos: Iggy
Additional images: Col & Tori
