A NUMBER of legendary riders and machines have been announced for the Milestones of the Mountain Parade lap at TT 2011.
The parade is to celebrate 100 years of racing on the Mountain Course.
It takes place on Senior Race Day, Friday, June 10 and appropriately a genuine replica of the American built Indian machine that Oliver Godfrey rode in the first Senior TT Race across the mountain has been sourced and will be the first bike away.
The bike will be ridden by Dave Roper who was the first and only American to win a TT until Mark Miller emulated his feat in this year's TT Zero clean emissions bike race.
One of the all time TT greats, Stanley Woods, will be represented by former MGP rider Ivan Rhodes, who will be riding a genuine 350cc works Velocette, which he owns.
Stanley originally rode the bike in the 1948 Junior TT and 1949 World championship.
Geoff Duke, the six-time TT winner and six-time world champion will be represented by his son Peter, who will appropriately be riding a Manx Norton, the marque that Geoff rode to five TT victories in the 50s.
Honda - which was the first Japanese manufacturer to contest the event and who has since gone on to win 155 times - will be represented by former world champion and TT winner Luigi Taveri, who will be riding a 1964 Honda RC161.
One of Yamaha's most successful riders, Phil Read, the eight times TT winner and eight times world champion, will be riding the factory 4 cylinder two-stroke 250cc Yamaha that he raced successfully in the 1968 TT and world championship.
Sidecar legend Jock Taylor, a four times TT winner who achieved a podium on his debut, will be represented by Steve Webster, MBE, the 10 time FIM world champion. Steve will be riding one of Jock's old TT winning machines.
The Senior TT winning Honda RC30 from 1988 will be ridden by Gary Dunlop who will be representing his father - Joey Dunlop.
The Northern Ireland racer first competed on the Isle of Man in 1976 and his record of 26 victories makes him the most successful TT rider of all time.
Joey died at a race in Estonia in 2000 - earlier this year hundreds of motorcyclists completed a lap of the TT course to mark 10 years since his death.
Scotsman Steve Hislop, who was the first rider to lap at over 120mph and took part in what is widely acknowledged as one of the all time great races against Carl Fogarty – the 1992 Senior TT - will be represented twice in the parade by close friends Steve Plater and Stuart Easton.
Steve Plater, who has two TT victories to his name and is the current Senior TT race record holder, will be riding a replica RC30 to represent Steve's achievement as the first rider to lap at more than 120mph in 1989, while British Superbike star Stuart Easton will ride the ABUS 588cc rotary Norton from the epic 1992 Senior Race.
Northern Ireland's Philip McCallen, the first rider to win four races in one week, will be riding a Honda RC45.
Phil, who won 11 TTs in a career that ran from 1989 to 1999, will be on the starting grid with the man who this year won five TTs is a week, Ian Hutchinson, who will be riding his history making Padgett's Honda Superbike.
Nine-time TT winner David Jefferies will be represented by his uncle Nick who will be riding the V&M Racing Yamaha R1 that DJ raced in his 1999 campaign.
His great friend and rival John McGuinness, who has dominated the TT leader board in recent years with a total of 15 victories, will be riding his 2007 Honda Superbike. It was on this bike McGuinness became the first man to break the 130mph lap for the 37.73 mile course.
Pictures courtesy of fottofinders
