Sid Payne National Number 32

SID PAYNE National Number 32

WINNING EVENTS and pleasing fans seems to be second nature for the new National Number 32, Sid Payne. That’s just what he has been doing since he started riding in 1957, although his recent Heavyweight T.T. win at Peoria was his first National Championship victory.

Starting out with a year of California scrambles competition, he soon decided to try the professional side of racing. His event was flat tracking, and by the middle of the 1959 season, this Royal Enfield mounted Amateur was second rated to Troy Lee. Then an accident at Ascot Park took the life of George Everett and gave Sid an injury that sidelined him for the rest of the season.

Back in form the following year, he turned his attention to riding short track at Kearney Bowl in Fresno, although he has competed in scrambles, hillclimbs, and other sporting events (even racing a 50cc machine at one time) throughout his career. He and Clark White have thrilled scrambles crowds time and again with their breathtaking fights to the finish.

In 1962 Sid ventured out of the state for the third time to compete in the 200Mile National Championship road race at Daytona, placing 5th on a Harley-Davidson. With the advent of T.T. popularity on the west coast, he has scored well at Ascot Park and Selma Speedway on a Triumph Bonneville for Motorcycle Center of Bakersfield. At Selma last year he won the Cycle Olympics — an event made up of 12 main event winners.

A slender, self-contained man, Sid has been nicknamed “The Quiet One” by his friends and fellow riders. Born 30 years ago in Oklahoma, he and his wife Dawnyce moved to Bakersfield in 1953, where he owns a general trucking business. In his spare time he enjoys his other hobby, bowling, and he plans to continue racing for many seasons to come. Like Dick Dorresteyn and Clark White before him, Sid Payne has well earned the title of “Mr. T.T.” for ’63. •