A pint on the Fulham Road changes Speedway racing forever.
When JAP began it's motorcycle production for the civilian market in 1919, Herbert "Bert" Le Vack was brought in as Development Engineer/Factory Racer (DEFR) and Val Page rejoined the company as Chief Designer (CD). This led to the radical design of a double overhead camshaft (DOHC) racing engine. On October 27, 1922, Bert LeVack made history by lapping Brooklands at 100.29 mph on a 980cc JAP-powered Zenith becoming the first rider of a British machine to reach 100 mph.
By 1924 JAP held 95 World and British Records, set up by only eleven riders which included Bert Le Vack and Teddy Prestwich, one of John’s five sons.
Stan Greening, a longtime member of the JAP experimental department, had begged John Prestwich to take a trip down to the Fulham Road to Stamford Bridge Speedway track. Prestwich was not impressed in the least telling Greening he believed that speedway was little more than a passing fad. But Stan had faith in the sport’s long-term prospects; the factory’s involvement with speedway racing became the subject for further discussion during the 1929 Motor Cycle Show at Olympia when Bill Bragg, Captain of the Stamford Bridge Pensioners Speedway Team, stopped at the JAP booth while John Vivian Prestwich was on duty. Vivian realized that perhaps Speedway had more to offer than his father had suspected. After long arguments that sometimes lasted until morning, and with some further persuasion (ale) John Prestwich changed his mind and gave the project his blessing. Greening soon started working along the lines that Bill had indicated and in about three months an experimental engine was delivered to Bragg. By 1932 the legendary JAP Speedway engine had become a reality, at the time it was the world’s most powerful un-supercharged engine of its size and one that would dominate Speedway tracks for the next 25 years. That year Fergus "The Flyin' Scot" Anderson picked up an engine which was guaranteed to produce 37.8 bhp at 5,750 rpm, which he installed in a Grindlay-Peerless machine. In his first lap at Brooklands on April 21, 1932 Fergus brought the virgin engine across the finish line at 98 mph and his second was 109.22 mph. Fergus would take home the One Hour Trophy when he averaged 100.52 mph.
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