Surfing around the classic sites I was intrigued to see the claims and counter claims regarding the terminal velocity achieved by fizzie owners in ancient times.

The claimed top ends ranged from a conservative 40mph to an incredibly high 70mph. Unbelievable? Perhaps not!

I myself witnessed fizzies travelling at such dizzy speed on more than one occasion.

Here is one such example:

Back in ‘77 I was travelling up the Ormeau Road on my Yamaha RD250C with my buddy Trobb on his Kawasaki 250 triple when we happened upon our wee mate "The Kin" on his popsicle purple fizzie coming out of Annadale School. As was our normal M/O we positioned the RD and the KH strategically with our front discs in line with the fizzies rear indicators and we each applied a DM boot to the fizzie’s rear number plate. Both wicks were twisted and the fizzie was connected via the DM boots to 500cc worth of 5 cylinders two-stroke technology. Funnily enough, when a fizzie is shoved up to 70 MPH plus it makes a weird honking induction type noise, I’m not sure why.

As we progressed on up the Saintfield Road at full impulse power the fizzie jockey finally worked up the courage to look round. I will never forget the look of fear in those saucer-like eyes. We were actually shunting the wrong bike!!

Our mistake seemed perfectly understandable as it was an identical bike, same school uniform, same art deco haversack, same ox blood DMs, same day-glo lid; just the wrong guy. We eased off with the shunt and the fizzy returned to it usual 45 max mph. We then dropped a couple of cogs and left the poor kid, still suffering  from post traumatic stress disorder, enveloped in a cloud of blue two-stroke fumes. Not even so much as a by or leave from his 2-stroke hooligan tormentors.

In the land of the blind the one eyed man is king. In the land of the bike-less the fizzie jock is also king. Later that weekend at a church youth club the same kid was holding court with all his 13 year-old subjects drooling as he waxed lyrical about his fizzie. My friend’s young sister was also there and, on seeing the bike, attempted to break the ice; “My brother Stevie Kerr rides bikes, do you know him”?

After initial signs of apoplexy, the kid was quoted as saying “One is more than well acquainted with Brian Gibson, Steven Kerr and their band of comancheros. They are very rude boys”

70 mph fizzies – they were a fact!

Brian