PEOPLE Part one
The Hanks family has always gone racing, and I’m here to talk to Roy Hanks about his new book, but he is talking about his granddaughter... and then continues.
So, in Roy’s own words:
When it was announced she’d be joining Faye Ho’s team, Jamie and her mum came to see me. It was a delegation really. They weren’t sure how I’d react to her swapping Hanks orange for the turquoise of FHO, but l couldn’t have been happier.
Crumbs, I wish I’d had the option. The nearest I came was in 1976, with Würth Oils. They were talking about £10,000, a fortune. They could have bought the entire shop for that, but they said that there was another hat in the ring. This other chap was going off to do the World Championships and when dad hears this, bless him, he pipes up: ‘Oh, in that case it’s no contest. You’ll have to go with him.’
He was as honest as the day was long, but I could have killed him. George O’Dell got the money and became World Champion. Was I resentful? Too bloody right! Well, not really. A lot who went Grand Prix racing lived on bare boards. They ended up penniless, and anyway at heart I’m of the TT not the GP generation. The TT’s been my life. It was the sidecar centennial this year: ‘100 years of sidecars at the TT.’ Well, I know
