Flashback. July 3, 1949. Two weeks earlier, the first GPs of the brand new “World Road Racing Championship” took place on the famous Isle of Man in the Irish Sea. Three categories appeared at the start of this Tourist Trophy, an event created in 1907: classes 250, 350 and 500 cm3.
On July 3, the Bremgarten forests welcome the second race in the world, the first for two other original categories, the 125 cc and sidecars. On three wheels, it is the one who will become world champion two months later, the Briton Eric Oliver, who wins; in his basket, a British journalist with thick glasses, Dennis Jenkinson, who will be known worldwide six years later by winning, alongside the unforgettable Stirling Moss, the “Mille Miglia” cars at over 157 km / h on average. British victory on three wheels and already Swiss on the podium: the Bernese Hans Haldemann and his passenger Herbert Läderach are third in the GP of Switzerland. The tradition was born, that of Swiss excellence in this category that the crowd adores.
The acrobat Florian Camathias – the “shortsighted who saw the best in the world”, as the late passenger, Maurice Büla nicknamed him, left an unforgettable mark. Like Fritz Scheidegger, child of Langenthal who lived for a long time in the valley of Saint-Imier, double world champion. Like the Vaudois Castella brothers … and all the others. Like, soon, a little guy from Baden who, on April 19, 1970, participated in his first hill climb race between Oulens and Villars-le-Comte. Rolf Biland is then the passenger of Fritz Hänzi, alongside whom he will taste the world one year later, before going to the handlebars on April 16, 1972.
In April 1970, Rolf Biland launched a career spanning almost three decades.
Still on the heights of Oulens, this is his first race, his first victory: “Before participating in this event, I of course had to obtain a license. The course took place on the Place d’Armes in Payerne. When I got on the track, it was raining; I went spinning, heading for the jury car! Mr. Paul Castella, the head of the Swiss Federation, just had time to get away: “Finished! Impossible! No license for this guy! ” Fortunately, the other members of the jury knew me and they managed to make him change his mind, ”laughs Rolf Biland today.
The championship is no more, the champion is leaving
October 26, 1997. The Spanish circuit of Cartagena hosts the last round of the Sidecar World Cup. The one who has long been considered with the 500 cc class as the queen category of GP lost twelve months earlier its status of world championship. She will find him a few years later, but via races that are no longer included in the MotoGP program.
A final one for the road on the Cartagena circuit on October 26, 1997.
This October 26, his loyal Kurt Waltisperg by his side, Rolf Biland had started from pole position; he had been forced to abandon, out of a concern for a loose chain. A curtainsider like a career: seven world titles, certainly, but at least four “offered” to the competition for technical decisions too bold. Because he always wanted more, sometimes too much. That evening, in Cartagena, the joy of finding a small troop gathered around the same table was at times forced. We avoided meeting certain glances and, when it was impossible, we did not speak, we replied with gestures, a shrug: “Yep, it’s over!” Rolf Biland played self-persuasion: “For the moment, it’s okay. Maybe the question will have to be asked again at the start of next season, when I realize that my little friends are starting their tests. ”
An eternal young man
It was found 23 years later. Always so fit, always so dynamic. Last year, however, we were afraid for him, when he was the victim of a fall at high speed on the circuit of the Ring of the Rhine. Because Rolf Biland, the best sidecar driver of all time, brilliant during some tests and single-seater races, who dreamed of Formula 1, this Rolf Biland is not clumsy at all on the handlebars of a solo motorcycle . After his sporting retirement, the Seelandais created a company which organized events, in particular with quads.
From now on, we meet him on the Lignières circuit, in the canton of Neuchâtel, where he still officiates as an instructor for the TCS: “Competition is really something that I took out of my mind. I still love riding as much, but I prefer fun rather than time. When you are 70 years old, you say to yourself: okay, you can experience as much driving pleasure by driving a second slower on the lap. While my whole working life, we were fighting in the tenth, ”laughs the seven-time world champion.
No regrets despite the gifts
Awesome jack of all trades, as comfortable on a golf green as in the practice of barefoot, Rolf Biland has often been a step ahead in the technological development of the sidecar class, sometimes going if far away – the BEO, in which its passenger was seated, in 1978 – that the International Federation had been obliged, the following year, to put two world titles at stake, that of the “traditional” and that of the “revolutionaries”, who had immersed in technologies that were then believed to be reserved for racing cars.
Victory at Le Mans on April 29, 1979.
Did he go too far during his career in GP spanning twenty-five years? “There were ideas that we quickly had to forget; we have sometimes gone wrong. But on each occasion, we talked a lot about our projects, which the sponsors appreciated. I am aware that for competition, the development was going too quickly, it was the case with the double championship of 1979. But there too, I benefited from the scandal born around this decision. And those who shared my ideas that year too. ”
Regrets? “We like to remember that I may have ‘offered’ four world titles to opponents, crowns that I should not have lost without my technical experiments; but this research, these attempts, were sacred reasons for motivation and pleasure, because when it worked, it was also some kind of victories … which then provoked real ones on the track. No, no regrets, I’m a happy retiree! ”
An old couple who lived apart
When we talk about Rolf Biland, when we meet him today in a festival of “old”, the black mustache of Kurt Waltisperg is never very far. After the Swiss Fredy Freiburghaus (1974-1975), the British Kenny Williams (1976-1979 in B2A), it was Waltisperg who became the faithful second.
With Kurt Waltisperg, it was not friend-friend. (Photo: Keystone)
Absolute accomplices. Friends? “We never went on vacation together,” smiles Rolf Biland. Between us, there has always been mutual respect for each other’s health. We practiced a common passion, the same business: tests, races, operations with sponsors, autograph sessions. But our common points ended there, we did not have the same leisure. I think it was really the best constellation: we were a couple, but we were always separated. We saw each other for two or three days, the time of a competition, and we set out again on our own. Kurt was the best, and not only in the basket: he managed his business, he brought us sponsors. It’s simple: we both benefited from each other. ”
Gaffs and a feat become famous
In 1977, Biland missed what should have been his first world title. August 15th is the last race of the championship at Silverstone (GB). Rolf Biland-Ken Williams are in pole position, but a sudden downpour falls while the drivers are on the starting grid: the front and rear wheel nuts have been secured with a special product, the mechanics fail to unlock and are unable to exchange the wheels.
Here is Biland in slicks (smooth tires) in pouring rain, he will finish eighth: “That day, I gave the title to George O’Dell, the British pilot”.
Biland has amassed successes and signed some blunders. (Photo: Jean-Claude Schertenleib Collection)
On September 5, 1982, the GP of San Marino was held on the Mugello circuit; as usual (or almost), Rolf Biland / Kurt Waltisperg dominated free practice, with their LCR with Yamaha 500 engine. But now, our man is determined to write history and he launches the assault the absolute pole position of the GP (the American Freddie Spencer, riding the official Honda 500); it’s the accident. Released with a fracture of the right collarbone, Biland must withdraw the next day. Winner two weeks later in Germany, Biland again offered, this time for 3.5 points, a title to an opponent (the German Schwärzel).
On May 1, 1988, the Andalusian circuit of Jerez de la Frontera received a GP from “Portugal”; what the sidecar king had attempted six years earlier becomes reality: Biland / Waltisperg beat 75 hundredths of a second for pole position 500, signed that day by the American Eddie Lawson. Unique feat that does not yet announce the swan song of a category which, after the GP “revolution” in 1992 – the start of the new era, fixed teams are now under contract, the time when a hundred drivers 125 cm3 came to try their luck to obtain one of the 36 places on the starting grid – will gradually be abandoned. Then shared in different championships, before disappearing from GP programs.
Five years and three more titles later, the monument of the category bids farewell. An improperly stretched chain, an abandonment in Cartagena. But Biland / Waltisperg were still the fastest in qualifying …
Jean-Claude Schertenleib
Created: 06.27.2020, 11.55 a.m.
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