It is more than seven decades since Jimmie Guthrie suffered a fatal accident during the 1937 German Grand Prix, but the passing of time has not dimmed the achievements of the great Scottish motorcycle racer.
Motorcycling During the Great War
Jimmie Guthrie (commonly misspelled as Jimmy Guthrie) was born on 23rd May, 1897, in the small village of Wilton near Hawick. Guthrie’s first experience of motorcycling was as a dispatch rider during the Great War. He was given the role after being injured fighting at Gallipoli.
After the conflict Guthrie joined his local motorcycle club and began competing in local and national events. The greatest moments of his career would be on the Isle of Man, which he visited for the first time in 1923. That year also saw Stanley Woods score his first TT victory. The two riders would go on to become great friends and team-mates at Norton.
Isle of Man Success with AJS and Norton
It wasn’t until 1927 that Guthrie returned to the TT, and the trip was rewarded with a fine second place in the Senior race. Three years later he scored his maiden win on the island, winning the 1930 Lightweight TT on an AJS. As the thirties progressed Guthrie added five more TT wins to his tally, all of them achieved on Nortons. In addition to his Isle of Man performances Guthrie also recorded three wins at the North West 200 road race in Ireland during his career.
In 1935 Guthrie became European Champion after a fantastic season of Grand Prix racing. At the very fast Montlhery circuit, near Paris, he also set numerous speed records for Norton.
Guthrie Killed in German GP
Guthrie was in unbeatable form at the 1937 German Grand Prix, held at the Sachsenring. Sporting number 86 on his bike, he had started from the front row and, by lap four, was leading. As he started the last lap his lead stood at over two minutes, but Guthrie was never to complete it. A bemused crowd of 250,000 was surprised to see the German rider Karl Gall cross the line first. Despite the delicate political situation of the time, Guthrie was hugely popular with the German spectators, and even Adolf Hitler himself.
What exactly happened to Guthrie on that final lap remained a mystery for years, until his friend and team-mate Stanley Woods gave a surprising account in 1992. In the book, “Jimmie Guthrie, Hawick’s Racing Legend”, written by Gordon Small and published by the Hawick Archaeological Society in 1997, Woods is quoted talking about the event shortly before his death;
“I am prepared to go on oath that Guthrie was fouled… Two riders passed me, a German and Guthrie… the German couldn’t take it flat out, slackened, and pulled into Jimmie’s path, forcing him off the road and into a line of saplings.”
The crash left Guthrie mortally wounded and he passed away in a nearby hospital a short time later. His funeral in Hawick was attended by thousands wanting to pay their respects to a local hero.
Memorials and Statues Remember Guthrie
The place where Guthrie retired from his final TT, on the mountain, is now named in his honour. So highly thought of was he in Germany that the German people paid for a memorial stone at the site of his fatal accident. Today, it is still tended to by locals. Adolf Hitler admired Guthrie so much that he had a bras statue of the goddess Mercury commissioned in his memory and given to Guthrie's mechanic. In his home town of Hawick there is a permanent Jimmie Guthrie exhibition at the museum in the town’s Wilton Park, to which entry is free. A short distance away is a statue of the late rider. Nearby is a statue of Steve Hislop, another native of Hawick, who’s hero as a child was Jimmie Guthrie.
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