Hayden Meikle counts down the 150 greatest moments in Otago sport.
No 113: Ireland wins Isle of Man (1982)
Back in 1976, a tearaway 22-year-old from Dunedin resigned as the national china and glassware buyer for the DIC department store chain and set out to pit his motorcycling skills against the best in the world.
His first taste of the big time was the Isle of Man Junior TT, run over five laps of a narrow, twisting, unforgiving 60.73km road course; picture the Portobello Rd without the water, but with more trees, stone walls, kerbing and settlements, plus mist and fog. Or riding from Dunedin to Waimate and back, at an average speed of more than 180kmh, two refuelling stops included.
That year, Dennis Ireland finished 31st. But he kept trying.
It all came good in 1982, the year after he finished third behind boyhood hero Mike Hailwood.
Fresh but quietly fuming following another third place earlier in the week in the Senior TT - "I was leading when the bike went on to three cylinders"- Ireland lined up for the Classic event, the final race of TT fortnight.
Under the unique TT starting system, where riders set off in pairs at one minute intervals, he started 19 minutes behind the first pair.
Riding a Suzuki RGB500, Ireland was on the top 10 leaderboard at the end of the first of five laps.
"The road was damp in places, under the trees. It was quite dodgy," Ireland recalls.
When he stopped to refuel at the end of the second lap he was up to second.
"After that refuelling stop I was leading and I gradually got a minute-and-a-half lead," Ireland recalls.
"The plan was to do just one fuel stop, but with that lead I pitted at the start of the final lap, just in case."
He remains the only Otago rider and one of a handful of Kiwis to have achieved a TT and world championship grand prix double.
Looking back, Ireland muses at the symmetry of that win.
"The bike's number was 19. The last two numbers of the bike's engine and frame were 19. I started 19th, won 19,000 in prizemoney and my birthday's on the 19th."
