Gus Scott - Part 2

"24 hours before his death, Gus Scott wrote this heartfelt account of a 115mph lap at his first TT. We couldn't think of a finer tribute to our friend than to publish it."


Continued from Gus Scott - Part 1...

I'm on the climb to Sarah's Cottage. Third gear uphill, I ran out of road here before and thought, "I'm in the bales." You don't want to look at what you're going to hit, so I looked up the road. I was lent over at full tilt, I had my knee down, boot on the ground, everything, then I felt the wheels hit the bales, flick me up, and I was still going, so I just kept racing. this place gets you like that.

My heart was trying to pound out of my ribcage, I had eyes like frisbees. That could've been it. Get it out of your head, get it out of your head. You think about pulling over, then just keep building up speed top Cronk-y-Voddy. It's hard at the end of there. I had some nasty slappers, lock-to-lock with loads of people watching. On the video it looks like DJ just rolls it off, but I've found it better to pull on the bars to take the load off the front.

The funny thing about this place is you accelerate in to a lot of the corners before you see them. that lifts the front end and you wont believe how smooth it makes it.

Into top gear, towards the big bottler at the bottom of Barregarrow. what's going to happen this lap? Back a gear, brush the brakes, and accelerate into it. you've got to do your turn beforehand because everything bottoms out and you can't turn it, everything compressed, the bike won't go anywhere.

Then into the 13th milepost. the first time I went into there I thought it was straight. it isn't. It's bumping all over the road, a kerb on the right pops out right under your wheels, brushes your footrest. Then you're onto the nice smooth tarmac towards Kirk Michael.

In the first practice I floated round and thought this is the next best thing I've ever done in my life. Next time I went a bit faster and had some big scares. I got lost, I nearly ran into some walls and then a Swedish lad I was out with on Saturday night was killed. He got lost and ran into a wall going into Kirk Michael, a tight, third-gear right-hander. Spectators said he went on full tilt, he just got caught out. I know how it felt. He was over here for all the right reasons. He was 39 and wanted a bit of a ride. It really fucked my head up.

Part 3 (final) coming up soon.