Alf Wells Chequered Career
Doug Nicolson recalls the trials and tribulations of this popular Kiwi.
Alf Wells chases Mick Handley with Bengt Andersson and Oyvind Berg in pursuit
Alf Wells
Ian Hoskins signed eighteen year old Alf Wells on the recommendation of Dick Campbell who himself was returning to ride for the Monarchs in 1961. He was mainly the team’s reserve but rode in nearly all the Monarchs meetings in his first year, averaging a creditable 4.46. His best score was 8+2 at home to Wolverhampton when Kid Bodie was the only Wolf to head him.
The following year saw him buy a new bike and get into the team main body but a lack of form saw him dropped for a spell in June, but winning the Scottish Best Pairs with partner Wayne Briggs was the precursor to a run of good scores through July and August – and not all at home, with 13 from 5 rides at St Austell, 10 at Leicester and 11+2 again from 5 starts at Newcastle. However his season ended prematurely after he broke both wrists in a second half crash in the meeting against Neath. This meeting had been badly delayed by rain with the league meeting only being completed well after nine o’clock. In current times the meeting would have been abandoned once a result was called but in these days “the show must go on” was the motto. The crash fused the red lights and caused the rest of the meeting to be abandoned anyway. How Alf must have wished the second half had been abandoned!
He didn’t have the best of starts to the 1963 season and a spectacular crash in the home meeting against Wolverhampton was described by promoter Hoskins as “topping his disastrous sequence of three major crashes in four meetings”. He sustained a broken ankle and wrist while Wolves Ernie Baker dislocated his shoulder. Two feet of fencing was ripped out and Hoskins claimed in his programme notes that four girls fainted. He returned in early August scoring 5 at home to Rayleigh but didn’t arrive at the away meeting with the Rockets a couple of days later and was subsequently replaced by Bill Landels for the meeting at Hackney the following night.
He didn’t ride in the Scotland v Kiwis meeting but regained his team place, scoring 2 in the 48-30 win over Cradley. He was back in the groove as the season ended with 7+2 against Stoke and 9 in the Scottish Open. Despite his tribulations he again achieved an average of just over 5.00.
Recently married, he again had a troubled start in 1964 and his 7+2 from four completed rides for the Kiwis against Scotland at Glasgow’s recently reopened White City led to talk of him wanting a move there, something Hoskins denied at the time. Better scores followed, including 8+2 against Wolverhampton and he and partner Briggs retained their Scottish Best Pairs title but he again ended the season in plaster after a leg injury sustained at Newcastle.
Alf was keen to make a go of 1965 and now two bikes on which he had been practicing on a farm at Jedburgh. Again another troubled start to the season and worse than before. He looped at the start of his third ride, having scored 4 from his two earlier outings, and suffered a dizzy spell, something that had happened periodically since fracturing his skull in New Zealand some years before. The doctor feared he may have a blood clot and arranged for him to have an xray the following week. It took a number of weeks and a second xray before he was cleared to resume riding. He was going to be race rusty and so it proved, scoring 1 for Fife Lions against a Charlie Monk Select in mid-June. Back in the Monarchs team he scored 4 from four rides at home to Newcastle but after 1 from three rides against Exeter, he lost his team place to Ross Nickisson. He was restored to the team in early August but was playing catch up till Halifax came to Old Meadowbank at the beginning of September when his 10 points earned him an unsuccessful challenge for Eric Boococks Silver Sash as Monarchs lost 35-42 to visiting Halifax. He failed to turn up at Exeter, along with Kevin Torpie and George Hunter. While the latter was initially banned from all meetings for 21 days, subsequently commuted after Hoskins interceded, both Torpie and Wells were banned from taking part in open meetings – hardly a heavy punishment. He wasn’t included in the Monarchs Select that toured Poland in October but rode in the final meeting at Belle Vue, in what would prove to be his last as a Monarch. He would later remark that it was good not to finish the season in plaster.
Neither of Glasgow’s Kiwis, Bruce Ovenden and Graham Coombes were coming back to The White City for 1966. Ovenden had returned home and Coombes had been recalled to Newcastle and Alf got a move to the west, something I think he always wanted. The Tigers programme said he had had a few sleepless nights ahead of his debut, but he needed have worried. He topscored with 9+2 and settled quickly at his new home. His scoring continued other than a poor night at Edinburgh – take what you want out of this!- but more than made up for this in the corresponding home meeting. He formed an effective pairing with Bluey Scott, whom he later said was his best team mate and was a “banker” to win heat eight most nights.
He scored his maiden maximum against Hackney on the night partner Scott broke his ankle which kept him out for almost two months and stepped up in Scott’s absence. In all 1966 would prove to be his best ever season in the BL, with his average reaching almost 7.50. a bit of a twitchy starter, sometimes it would pay other times not. One night after getting caught out he marched along the track accompanied by team manager Neil Macfarlane and disappeared into the stand, reappearing in the centre stand and going into the officials box. With the crowd chanting “Al-fie, Al-fie”, both seemed to remonstrate animatedly but to no avail. Neil would later tell that he made sure the door was closed so no one could actually hear that they weren’t too sincere in their appeal. All good stuff!
Scott didn’t return from Australia for 1967 and Alf now was a Tigers heatleader, meaning he no longer got the easier heat eight ride. His average possibly fell due to this. There was a shortage of Jawa spares and Alf suffered more than most, missing the away meeting at Belle Vue as he couldn’t get his bike repaired in time from the previous night and then seizing it the following week in his first ride. So far so bad! While he won his first race of the season at the end of April his bike again let him down the next night at Halifax. There was double woe a few days later when he blew his motor at West Ham and his car broke down on the way home. Lucky white heather! With no serviceable bike he missed the away meeting at Sheffield two days later and was reported to the BSPA. He borrowed Brian Whaley’s bike for the return fixture at the White City. Fortunately he reached calmer mechanical waters as May ended, scoring 10 in the win over Long Eaton and 8 at Newcastle on a very wet night. June and July were far better but he fell and damaged his ankle in the Northern Riders Qualifying Round at Glasgow at the end of July. He told promoter Taylor that he wouldn’t make the Wimbledon away meeting the following Thursday but would be fit for the home meeting the next night. Taylor was not amused and instructed him to travel to London. He didn’t and was again reported to the BSPA but when he turned up at The White City the next night Taylor told him he was being dropped as a punishment. A brave move by Taylor as Tigers lost the meeting. However things came to a head when the BSPA fined him for missing the meeting and he refused to pay and was suspended. He also vowed never to ride for a Scottish team again.
Unsurprisingly Alf was allocated away from Glasgow for 1968 being lined up at Newcastle. The Tigers had a traumatic season and never got an adequate replacement for Charlie Monk who moved to Sheffield. They badly needed strengthening by mid season and Alan Jay was allocated to them but he refused to join them. Alf hadn’t been having a great time at Newcastle and Glasgows new promoter Les Whaley agreed a swap that sent Jay to the Diamonds and brought Alf back to Glasgow, where he formed a stuffy third pairing with Russ Dent. All seemed well in Alf’s world as he recorded an average of around 7.00 in the latter weeks with Glasgow. Curiously he arrived late for the meeting at Newport and chose not to ride.
Things were to change markedly in 1969 with the Tigers moving to Hampden, a move that didn’t suit Alf at all. With Charlie Monk returning to the Tigers, he was no longer a heat leader he would now be paired with Jim McMillan, Charlie Monk or Oyvind Berg, which would no doubt curtail his scoring. The move to Hampden should have been good for him. Always a smart starter, he would have been expected to defend his early advantage on the narrow Hampden track. Unfortunately it didn’t turn out this way. Some say he tired on the big track – although it was actually 10 yards shorter than the White City – others thought he didn’t like riding on a track with a board fence. Whatever the reason, he seemed very unsettled at the start of the season and had tapes exclusions in his opening race in three of his first four meetings.
By the end of April, he had an average of 4.00 and looked pretty ill at ease. Tigers had no obvious number eight and Les Whaley took the rather rash decision to drop Wells in favour of the untried Jim Crowhurst for the home meeting against West Ham. The guy had never seen Hampden before, let alone ridden on it! As it turned out he was well off the pace and was released back to Canterbury where he toiled to retain his team place.
Alf returned and had marginally better meetings scoring paid five at home to Belle Vue and paid seven at Coventry, one of his favourite away tracks. However a first race spill in the local derby with Coatbridge saw him nursing a wrist injury, which caused him to miss some meetings.In his absence Tigers signed Berwick’s Maury Robinson as their number eight. Alf returned with a bang. His nine paid eleven on a rain soaked Swindon track sparked Tigers first away win of the season. Perhaps better times were ahead – sadly no. The next two home meetings saw Tigers lose to Halifax and be held to a draw by Poole, with neither Wells nor Dent being in any way impressive. Whaley said that, while both were off form, he was dropping Wells as his loss of form had been “long standing”. Robinson would take his place, while Wells got rides at Berwick, starring in a challenge meeting with Long Eaton and winning the Danny Taylor Memorial meeting.
With Robinson being required for a Berwick fixture, Wells returned for the home meeting with Wolverhampton but turned in another poor performance with paid two.
Then things got crazy. He was told he could not ride for Berwick, nor indeed any other Second Division team as he was “too good”. This at a time when he couldn’t hold down a team place at Glasgow. He decided to retire. Some years later when asked if he enjoyed his time at Hampden he replied “no, neither the track nor the person running it”
He came out of retirement the next year signing for Mike Parkers Nelson team which subsequently moved to Bradford where they linked up with Hampden promoter Les Whaley! He was a top man in the lower tier, regularly knocking up double figure scores. Something he continued into the 1971 season. By his own reckoning his worst injury, and he’d had a few, was a head injury sustained at Rochdale in July when the meeting was abandoned after his crash as the doctor accompanied him to hospital. He was out for six weeks but seemed as good as new on his return with a maximum in Northern’s 41-37 win at Teesside. However this form shaded off as the season drew to a close.
He seemed to be in dispute with the promotion as 1972 began and was suspended after missing the first five meetings. Their differences were resolved, and he returned in mid May soring 9+2 against Canterbury but he turned in some erratic performances
thereafter and,after a run of low scores, retired.
Two years later he returned to the track with Berwick and had an eventful start to what proved to be a short time back at Shielfield. The first meeting at home to Workington was fogged off after just one heat; in the second he scored 8 points at Coatbridge, never one of his favourite tracks as Bandits defeated the Tigers on their home debut in the Second Division but he left all his riding gear at Coatbridge and chose not to ride the following night at Berwick saying he had a firm rule about never borrowing a helmet, probably the correct decision given his medical history. He had a mixed bag of scores in the following month and being booed after laying his bike down when his throttle jammed in the last heat decider against former team Bradford, who took an unexpected draw, looked to be the final straw. He missed away meetings at Sunderland, Crewe and Workington before being persuaded to race at home to Workington but two pointless rides convinced him to call it a day.
It wasn’t quite his last track appearance as he made a return at the Grahame Dawson Benefit Meeting at Blantyre in 1977, masquerading as Neil Macfarlane in a promoters’ race with James Beaton and Dick Barrie, when Neil pulled a flanker to avoid riding.
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