G
UY MARTIN’S UNIQUE
PERSONALITY has
always lit up the road
racing paddock. No
aspect of his career
to date however will
be more remembered than his famous
150mph fireball crash at the 2010 Isle of
Man TT, which quite simply… he should
not have survived. But he did…
And since then his career has soared
and spread wings like an eagle, with
offers coming from a diverse range of
arenas. Whilst he still loves two wheels
and working on Scania trucks, the
boy from Grimsby is now so popular
he’s even been linked with Top Gear
as a possible replacement for Jeremy
Clarkson.
Six figure salaries are not something
Martin will be drawn on discussing, and
in reality, even the most unlikely of TV
presenters are now in the seven-figure
bracket. He’s uncovered the Golden
Ticket if you like, but still finds it a
hindrance, telling me, “I think they’d
film me opening a tin of beetroot at the
minute!”
He has a massive thicket of dark brown
hair, which acts as a comfort blanket
as he twists and twirls it, allowing him
time to think up intensive and energetic
replies. I ask him “When are you getting
it permed?”
His deep trademark laugh is followed by
a frown, a brief pause and then: “A perm
boy, what the fu*k would I want with a
perm?”
“To stand in for Clarkson!” I reply.
“Aww,” he cut’s in, pointing his finger at
me as he slurps another mouthful of tea
from a blue plastic cup during a break at
the pre North West 200 test in Northern
Ireland. “That job’s not for me boy; not
for me.”
“The people that take on that job are upyour-arse-celebrities and naw… I’m no
celebrity. I’m actually taking a year out
from TV work.” This is his creative way
of deflecting the attention.
So what of the racing? I don’t need him
putting his guard up, as he’s got a better
defence than Brazil [football team] when
he needs it! I’ve known and worked with
Guy for quite a while, but like legendary
boxing promoter Barney Eastwood once
said of boxing legend Barry McGuigan,
‘I taught him all he knows, but not all I
know.’
Guy lets you close, but not skin close.
Yes he does enjoy talking racing and
mountain biking but if you have an
engineering brain (which I don’t) you are
onto a winner; so I have to work harder
to keep his attention.
“So what about retirement? The talk is
you’re retiring from racing”, I ask him.
He’s back on the hook or so he makes
me believe!
Again he grasps his hair, twists and
twirls it and rubs his chin and sideburns.
Then comes the thousand-yard stare
and the deathly si lence, before he
replies: “I did the press day at Donington
Park a few weeks ago and it was ten
deep at the back of the garage and I
was thinking, ‘I’m making a phone call,
that’s it, I can’t be bothered with all this
sh*t. What am I doing this for?’” he says,
referring to his first test ride with the
Smiths British Supersport team, whose
675 Triumph he’s scheduled to ride at
this year’s Isle of Man TT Races.
“Then I thought, ‘I don’t want to let Philip
down,’” he offers without prompting,
speaking of Tyco BMW team manager
Philip Neill, whom he’s ridden for, for
the last five or six seasons. “I love riding
my bike but I can’t be bothered with all
the rubbish really. I really couldn’t be
mithered.”
“I was about to make that phone
call, then I came to Cookstown and
the people of Northern Ireland have
manners. Yes they want a lot of things
signed and ask a lot of me, but they
always respect me,” says Martin of his
Irish fan base.
Steering him back to the all-important
question that has been circulating for
months, and used by others to market
their events, I simply ask “Will this be
your last North West 200?”
“After the first lap of practice at
Cookstown I thought, ‘bloody hell,
where am I ever going to beat this sort
of buzz?’ It was the dog’s bollocks and
you just can’t match that.”
Still thinking of how to tackle the answer,
he continues in his typical northern
dialect: “It’s the mither boy, the mither,”
basically referring to the hassle of it
all. “Work is a big thing for me and I’ve
taken a year off filming, as I’ve said.”
“I’ve a lot of other things I’d like to do
and if they don’t clash with my racing
and Philip [Neill] is happy to let me do
less, then I can’t see me calling it a u
£ Guy competes in
the 2015 Cookstown
100 road race