TALENTED TONY!
“A TALENTED RIDER, AN ASTUTE BUSINESSMAN AND BIKE SHOP FRANCHISE OWNER, TONY JEFFERIES LIVED HIS LIFE SURROUNDED BY MOTORCYCLES.”
From enjoying a short but spectacular career as a racer, to running one of the country’s best bike dealerships, to guiding the career of a TT legend, Tony Jefferies’ entire life revolved around motorcycles.
As the son of trials expert, TT racer, and bike dealer Allan Jefferies, the brother of hugely successful trials rider and road racer Nick Jefferies, and the father of all-time TT great David Jefferies, Tony seemed to be at the centre of the motorcycling world throughout his life.
Born in 1948, he left school in 1965 to take up an apprenticeship with the BSA Group, although he would finish his apprenticeship withTriumph in its service and experimental departments. In 1968 he started racing because of very particular circumstances, rather than having a burning desire to take to the track.
“My first road race was at Croft, on an old Triumph,” he explained in 2008. “It was a real funny bike, built by a local guy who had tried to copy a Featherbed Norton. He put leading-link forks on it and sunk a tuned engine into it – he did a lot of clever things on it.
