Paul Smart knew little about Ducati and didn't even know where Imola was when he accepted the offer to race for the Italian marque in the 1972 Imola 200.
Paul Smart's victory at the 1972 Imola 200 was the start of Ducati's superbike success. It still continues today with Troy Bayliss currently leading the WSBK championship. Paul Smart tells the story.
"At the time, works rides were thin on the ground. Triumph, who I had been riding for, had effectively finished the year before and there was very little available in Grands Prix. "In America, Bob Hansen was running the official factory Kawasaki team but as a contractor to Kawasaki rather than an employee of Kawasaki. This meant that he had a lot of freedom to make decisions which would never happen today.
"I got a ride for Team Hansen Kawasaki in America and I was very grateful for this. But to be honest, the pay was not good. I got a basic wage of $12,000 a year and this was just not enough to live on.
"The problem was that to earn good money you needed a bike to race in all the American Champion disciplines - half mile, mile and short track. I was the top points scorer in road races but I never even entered anything else, so money was really tight.
"My wife Maggie phoned me and said that she'd got this ride for me on a Ducati at Imola. All that I knew about Ducati was that they made out of date singles, and I didn't even know where Imola was, but Ducati paid my airfare and there was £500 wages, win or lose, so I was up for it.
After running in the 1-2 positions, Smart came into the pits at the same time as chief competitor, Ducati teammate Bruno Spaggiari.
"To be honest, I didn't care what the bike was going to be like. We just needed the money to live. I later found out that the Ducati ride had been offered around before I got it and supposedly some riders had refused it because the bike was unknown and the money wasn't very good but as I have said, I didn't care. £500 was a lot of money for us and I was going to race the bloody thing no matter what it was.
"Bob was really good about it. He wasn't bothered about Ducati, and he knew I needed the money, so he agreed straightaway.
"I flew from Atlanta, where I had been racing, to London and then straight on to Milan. By the time I arrived, I was dead on my feet. The only thing I wanted Ducati to give me was some food and a bed.
"I got straight off the plane and was taken to Modena circuit which is in the center of the old town of Modena, near to Ferrari's factory. I got the sense that something big was happening because there was a load of Ducati staff and designer Ingenere Fabio Taglioni himself. The first thing which struck me was that the bike looked awfully long. It was clearly a road machine and didn't look too exciting. The lug for the road bike's center stand was still in place. In the paddock, they put a bolt through this and used the center stand normally. I'd never, ever seen this done on a race bike!
"The bike looked much too long and too big to be a serious race machine but I was immediately impressed by Taglioni who reminded me very much of Doug Hele at Triumph - a good listener, very enthusiastic with a big smile and carrying a very clear picture of the complete race bike in his head. Like Hele, he knew what was needed to make the whole bike work and this encouraged me no end.
"Having just got off the vicious two-stroke Kawasaki H2TR, the Ducati felt really slow because it didn't rev very much - only to 8250rpm.
"The handling was very slow too. It took an age to turn and ground clearance was limited but it was very stable at speed. I liked it a lot.
Smart and teammate Spaggiari celebrate a 1-2 finish, forever etching the 1972 Imola 200 into the Ducati record books.
"Communications were difficult. I never once had a complete conversation with Taglioni because he didn't speak any English. Everything was done through the secretary of Ducati's race team manager, Franco Farné. She was South African and played a big part in the Imola story because she was the only way I could pass on information.
Franco Farné asked me what I wanted changing and I told him that the TT100 road tires had to go. They were worried that race tires would wear out in the 200 mile race but there was no way I could ride fast and safely on road tires. I said that if the tires were worn down to the canvas when we re-fuelled we would work out what to do in the pits, but until then I needed tires I could race on.
"I also needed a much faster action throttle because I had damaged my wrist in the North-West 200 and it was really weak and didn't have much movement in it. "The throttle return springs were also too stiff for my weak wrist so they changed these for lighter ones.
"The only other things that we adjusted were the footrests and handlebars. I'm only a short arse and everything on the Ducati was a stretch for me.
"After the last session, I was completely exhausted and just wanted to go to bed. I brought the bike back to the pits and all the Ducati mechanics were jumping up and down. I had just broken Ago's outright lap record - and he had been riding his 500cc Grand Prix bike.
Smart's victory was just the tip of the iceberg. Mike Hailwood would further build upon the Ducati racing legend by winning the F1 TT riding the 900SS Twin.
"On race day I couldn't believe how many people there were. Thousands of people clogged the roadways and it took forever to get into the circuit. Everywhere you looked there were race fans watching from any vantage point, from rooftops to the tops of trees.
The track was a wonderful old style Grand Prix circuit which did, and still does, run around the hills at the back of the old town of Imola. The race was run primarily on closed-off public roads and its layout encourages really high speeds.
"My only worry was rain. The track was lined in many places by steel Armco barriers and trees and these would kill you if things went wrong. This didn't put me off because I had raced at the TT and the North-West 200 but you still had to take notice of things that big and solid. "The track was a bit damp and I could see this would be a sprint - no backing-off or cruising for the entire race. The critical part of the circuit was the Tamburello corner, the same one where Senna crashed. To win, you would need to go through flat out and be in the right place for the exit.
It took more than skill to get this turn right, it also took a fair amount of courage or insanity to get through at race winning speeds. From the bottom of the hill, and through the turn, it was a full throttle situation and we were pulling over 150 mph. You also have to remember that we used the same tires wet or dry. There were no special compounds or wet patterns.
In the pits, I saw Ago and he said not to worry about him because the MV was certain to blow up and in any case, it was shaft drive and didn't handle. Ago and I got on well. He had been very kind to me the year before in GPs. If he said he was going to have problems then that was good enough for me.
Ducati has a long and storied racing history. This photo shows its 1958 TT team.
"I never took anything for granted but Bruno Spaggiari, my teammate, and me were both setting very fast times in qualifying, so I felt confident that we would be in with a chance. "My big worry was the bike. It's not like today when race bikes run forever. There was always something dropping off these old things so they needed to be constantly nursed. In particular, I thought that the big V-Twin engine would knock heck out of the clutch and I didn't want to destroy it before the first corner.
"I got away well but Ago was leading. As he had predicted, after a few laps the MV blew up and that put me in the lead. Then I lost first gear. This wasn't much of a problem, since the engine pulled so well, but what worried me was that there might be a piece of broken metal floating around inside the gearbox waiting to lock everything up and kill me.
"This put me off for a few laps and then I got my confidence back, passed Bruno and the job was done.
"The biggest problem we had was passing the back markers. Imola was a fast track and there were some slow riders on some slow bikes out there so we were always dodging bikes breaking down or running out of fuel. The attrition rate was pretty high.
Vignettes from Ducati's racing history. Shown here is Mike Hailwood aboard the 250 Ducati twin.
"We did just one refuel and this was the tensest part of the race and just to add to the drama, both Spaggiari and I came in for fuel at the same time. It all looked, and was, even more spectacular running together up front and then pulling into the pits and refuelling together. Ducati didn't just want to win they wanted the bikes first and second, in formation for the whole race and even for refuelling.
"Ducati wanted it all, and to pull it off would be a magnificent achievement.
Spaggiari had come past me during the race but I had gone straight back past him. He didn't press me again until the last lap when he tried to ride round the outside of me coming out of the Aqua Minerale section. At that part of the track we were going completely flat out and I saw his front wheel coming alongside but I was going to win this one so I just let it drift wide and I thought, 'He's probably doing a bit of grasstracking now.' As I said, I was going to win this one.
"During the last few laps of the race you could hear the screaming voices of the fans above the sound of the engines. I was used to enthusiastic crowds in England but this was something different.
Sammy Miller rides the 125 Desmo Ducati to its limits in the 1958 TT.
"Bruno and I crossed the finish line first and second and I relaxed for the first time since boarding the plane in Atlanta. I remember riding the bike back into the pit lane and seeing the faces of the entire race team, especially Taglioni and Ducati's Managing Director, Fredmano Spairani. Total elation. This was a big deal for Ducati.
"Before the race, the Ducati team manager Franco Farné was so confident that Bruno and me were going to be first and second that he got us to agree to pool the prize money and split it 50/50 regardless of who won. I was pleased to do this and I think I took home about £5,000 - which was a lot of money.
"Ducati had also promised me the bike if I won and, with my past experience of manufacturers' promises, I didn't believe them. But I was wrong and sure enough they did give me the bike and I've still got it today and it's now on display in the Ducati museum in Bologna.
After the race, the celebrations were incredible. They put our bikes in this big glass-sided truck and us on the top and that evening we had a grand tour around Bologna in a long procession of cars honking their horns and waving flags. We stopped for what was supposed to be a minute outside the railway station, but thousands and thousands of people surrounded us and we just joined in the party. I was still in my leathers and so tired and jet lagged, but there was no way you were going to get any sleep at this party. It seemed the entire city came out to celebrate this glory for Ducati, Bologna and Italy.
Fabio Taglione watches as Dave Chadwick speeds by.
"The only thing which still irritates me about winning Imola is when people come and say things like you were lucky to win at Imola, or you won one big race in your career. That's bullshit. First, I was one of the best riders in the world at the time and I was confident of beating anyone.
"Second, Ducati took Imola very seriously and deserved to win. It was nothing to do with luck. The truth is that Ducati built a winning bike and I rode it well."
Ducati Racing Highlights:
1954 - Fabio Taglioni, the father of Ducati motorcycle racing, leaves FB Mondial and starts work at Ducati.
1956 - Launch of 125cc Desmodromic Grand Prix engine.
1956 - Giuliano Maoggi wins the 125 class in Moto Giro d'Italia.
Romoli Ferri and Sammy Miller give it their all around the Isle of Man.
1956 - First GP success in 125cc race at non-Championship Swedish Grand Prix. The new Ducati lapped every other bike in the race.
1958 - Ducati factory's first participation in the TT.
1960 - Mike Hailwood gives Ducati its first 250 GP win with the Taglioni Desmo twin - effectively two singles on a common crankcase.
1972 - Paul Smart wins the Imola 200 on the first Ducati V-Twin.
1973 - 860cc Desmo twins take Barcelona 24 hour race with Benjamin Grau and Salvador Canellas.
1978 - Mike Hailwood wins the F1 TT with the 900SS twin.
1981 - Tony Rutter and Ducati win the first of four successive Formula 2 World Championships, riding a 600cc Pantah TT2.
1990 - First World Superbike Championship with Raymond Roche on the Ducati 851.
1991 - Wins two years running in WSBK for Doug Polen and the Ducati 888.
Ducati continues its racing success, as Ducati Xerox's Troy Bayliss is currently the World Superbike Championship point leader.
1994 - The arrival of the 916. Carl Fogarty wins the WSBK Championship in 1994 and 1995.
1996 - Troy Corser continues with Ducati's dominance of WSBK and takes his first World Championship.
1998 - Fogarty wins another WSBK crown on the iconic Ducati 916 and captures another WSBK title in 1999 with the all new 996.
2001 - Troy Bayliss grabs his first WSBK title for Ducati.
2003 - Neil Hodgson goes straight into WSBK with Ducati and leaves as World Champion. 2004 - First WSBK title for James Toseland.
2006 - Troy Bayliss is back winning WSBK Championships aboard the 999F06.
2007 - Casey Stoner brings home Ducati's first MotoGP title with the 800cc Ducati Desmosedici GP7.
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