Last of the Armoy Armada
Jim Dunlop is the only surviving member of the legendary Armoy Armada - a group of racers comprising Joey Dunlop, Mervyn Robinson, Frank Kennedy and Jim himself - who enjoyed huge success during the golden era of road racing in the 1970s.
On August 8, he flagged off the first new road race to be held in Ireland for 50 years. The Armoy Road Races had been organised as a tribute to the Armoy Armada and as a memorial to its lost riders. In a rare interview, Jim reveals what it was like to be part of group as well as a member of the most famous family in road racing.
Jim Dunlop looks, speaks, uncannily like his late brother Joey. Born five years after the road racing legend, Jim dislikes the limelight just as much as his brother did. So it is a rare privilege to be able to share a few pints of Guinness with the last surviving member of the Armoy Armada and to listen to a first-hand account of the life that has overflowed with both triumph and tragedy.
No mean racer himself in his day, Jim<s brothers Joey and Robert Dunlop are undoubtedly the most famous road racers Ireland has ever produced – and the most popular. But while Jim shared in the joys of their innumerable victories, he also had to endure unimaginable grief when ho lost Joey in 2000 and then Robert in 2008 due to racing accidents.
In the wake of such tragedy, most people would turn backs on sport, but Jim can still be found in racing paddocks all over Ireland, helping out the next generation of Dunlop racers. “My son´s doing Robert´s young boys are doing it so there´s not much I can do about it,” he says about his seemingly forced participation in the sport.
Even before Joey´s death at on obscure race in Estonia, Jim was no stranger to tragedy. Road racing in 1970s may have been hugely popular, but it was also even more dangerous than it is now. Jim lost his close friend and fellow Armoy Armada rider Frank Kennedy at the North West 200 in 1979, and his brother-in-low Mervyn Robinson at the same event the following year. “When Mervyn was killed, Joey just abandoned the whole thing,” said Jim. “We had a meeting and that was it finished.”
As we know, Joey didn´t quit racing for good – he went on to win a record26 TTs and establish himself as the most successful pure roads racer of all the time.
Jim says his late father, Willie, was one of the brother´s inspirations. “When I was young, my dad had a BSA and he´d take me and my sister Linda to school on it. I sat on the tank and my sister sat on the pillion seat. There were always old bikes about when we were growing up.” Robinson was another inspiration. “He had racer before meeting my sister, but had given it up. When he started courting Helen he started racing again and he got Joey into it. They both had road bikes and the two of them used to race each other coming home from work. There were some S-bends an a local road and we used to go up after school and lie on the bank to watch Joey and Merv would win sometimes and Joey would win other times. They were pretty evenly matched.”
It was impromptu racing on normal public roads that stood the Dunlop brothers in such good stead in latter years. The brother´s need for speed soon found an outlet on the race tracks of Ireland and together with Robinson and Kennedy [another local rider] they became known as the Armoy Armada, partly response to a rival group of riders from 60 miles south, the Dromara Destroyers, consisting of Ray McCullough, Brian Reid and Trevor Steele.
The spirit of these years can still be seen in David Wallace´s documentary film The Road Racers which followed the Armada throughout the 1977 season.
Being five years Jim´s junior, Robert Dunlop was too young to ride for the Armoy Armada, but even when he did start racing he showed no sign of the brilliant rider he´d later become.
“I remember when he started, I took him round Kirkistown and said : ´Just follow me and I´ll show you the way round´.I was going as slow as I could and after a lap or so I looked round and he was nowhere to be seen. I said to Joey ´He´ll never make a racer – he is f***in´ useless´. And so he was at the time, but he went on to prove me wrong.”
Jim may be the last known of the three – chiefly because he retired from racing so early – but he was more than a match for Joey on occasion in the early days. “I remember one 250 race against Joey in England. Ron Haslam and Steve Tonkin were there and I beat Joey that day. Another lap and I would have beaten Haslam as well. Tonkin came off in front of me and I had to go onto grass to avoid him. I caught Joey on the last lap, but ran out of the time to catch Haslam.”
Brother´s they may have been - and Joey had helped his younger sibling out immensely by giving him bikes and helping him work on them - but still wanted to beat him. “My bike had been handling terribly in that race. The tyres felt like they were going to let go on and he told me ´You´ve got the wrong tyres on´ and he told me what ones I should have had on. But he only told me that after the race – not before. That was Joey.”
Jim only raced from “about 1976 to1982” not because of any lack of talent [he was leading the Newcomer´s race at the Manx GP in 1978 before his bike broke down], but because of a dire lack money.
His early retirement is something that Jim says he now regrets, but that regret is tinged with a stark realization that his enforced exit from racing is probably the only reason he´s still alive when the rest of the Armoy Armada, and his brother Robert, are no longer with us.
“I do regret it, but if I hadn´t stopped then I might not be there either. You know, there were three of us all racing from the one family at the on time and the law of averages said that on of us was going to get hurt at some stage or other.”
As Joey´s career went stratospheric following the demise of the Armoy Armada, Robert also started to make a name for himself. Yet as brothers, they were very different men. Joey was shy, mumbling and unkempt, while Robert was outgoing, articulate and, usually, a bit more dapper.
Jim offers an explanation : "Robert always had to go begging for sponsorship and was always having to chat to people to try and get a pound or two, so he sort of had to be more outgoing. Joey got in with Honda early on and never had to go looking or talking to people for sponsorship. Robert had to shout that bit louder than Joey.”
Jim no longer rides. A steel erector by trade, it seems he was able to settle into a life after racing – inlike his brothers, who just couldn´t envisage a life without bikes. “I wouldn´t doubt that Joey would still be at in he were here today,” Jim said. “He´d probably be racing some of these classic bikes or something. He owned the pub but he wouldn´t have been content sitting in there, you know?”
Robert, too, couldn´t seem to give up the habit. In 2005 he took a year out following yet another operation to fix the leg he mangled in 1994. He came back, but lost his life during practice for the 2008 NW200. “Hindsight´s a wonderful thing,” said Jim, reflecting on his younger brother´s death. “When Robert had a year out getting his leg fixed you´d have thought that would have been enough, you know? He had the young boys to look after, so he could have retired from racing himself and just looked after them. But it wasn´t to be.”
Jim may be the last original Dunlop brothers, but he´s no the last of the family dynasty – the three brother´s sons have all carried on the family tradition. Joey´s son Gary raced for two seasons, but retired after nasty crash, and because his mother wasn´t comfortable with him racing.
Robert´s sons William and Michael are now established stars of the road racing scene, with Michael winning his first TT this year on the heels of his emotional victory in the 2008 North West 200, just two days after his fatherś death at the same circuit.
Jim´s son Sam has also added to Dunlop family´s incredible win tally around the Isle of Man with victory in 2005 Newcomer´s Manx Grand Prix.
Jim Dunlop hasn´t turned his back on the sport. On August 8, he had the honour of flagging away the first new road race to be staged in Ireland after 50 years on the roads near Armoy. Three young Dunlops battled to try win the race in honour of their legendary fathers.
A new Armada has been formed
Me and my irish friends Ellie & Trevor at Armoy in April 2009