One Lap on the Isle of Man Course

Interview by Frances Sayre with Jaime Smith

1. Jaime, briefly how long have you been riding motorcycles and how does your riding define who you are?

I went for my 1st ride when I was 4 with my Dad’s friend on a 1967 Triumph TR6R Tiger. I was completely hooked and spent the next 6 years obsessing on how to get my own bike. In 1972 Wilson Rawls came and read his book Where The Red Fern Grows to my 3rd grade class. That became my blueprint to getting my first bike. I saved every penny from every odd job that I could think of and just around my 10th birthday in 1974 I bought my neighbor’s minibike. So that makes 52 years of riding.

Motorcycles are still my biggest obsession 50 plus years later. I often say “I’ve never met a bike that I didn’t like” or at least turned my head around to check them out. Riding has brought me an immense amount of confidence, freedom, adventures and I’ve met some incredible friends as a result over the past 50 years.

2. Tell us about the riding group you are in (a member of) and how you got the invitation to ride the Isle of Man TT 2026 Legacy Lap?

In 2019 a friend from SMRI, Heather Borland, called me up and said “Hey I just read about this Woman from the UK, (Hailey Bell) who has started this Women’s Round the World Relay (WRWR). They are passing a GPS tracked baton around the world country to country. You should check it out.” I kind of hemmed and hawed at first but ended up writing to Liza Miller, who has a podcast called Motorcycles and Misfits, who was heading up the USA leg. I went up to Calais, Maine on a Triumph 1200 Explorer. There were around 8 of us that rode across the country to the west coast and then back to Laredo, Texas and crossed into Mexico to hand off the Baton to the Mexican women. Each day or leg of that cross-country journey we were joined by anywhere from maybe 5 to 75 women. At that point in my life, I had only ridden solo or maybe with 1 to 2 others. That experience of being around so many women who rode motorcycles and joining a team focused on accomplishing a goal was fantastic. I made some lifelong friends, and we have continued riding together in different countries; Iceland, Pakistan (twice) and Nepal.

This was such a well-loved event that women from around the world kept asking when are we going to do it again? My friend Liza came up with the idea of starting an Online WRWR app that you could hand off as a digital pass. Each country had ambassadors who kind of coordinated and represented from their area. Lisa Brain was the Ambassador from Isle of Mann. She is the one responsible for asking the IOM TT committee if we could participate somehow. I think it kind of snowballed from there and next thing you know (and a lot of hard efforts to coordinate), 155 women from around the world, who were connected thru either the original WRWR or the WRWR app, came together to lead off the IOM TT Legacy Lap.

3. What were the practical steps to prepare for this adventure and also
the emotional preparation?

Logistics were the main thing. From arranging flights, rental bikes, ferry tickets from Liverpool to Douglas, IOM and securing a place to stay. Hailey Bell, Liza Miller and my friend Lili were really great helping me out. I had been taking care of my 90 y/o Dad who just had a stroke, for about the first 7 months of the initial planning of the trip. I kept thinking I wasn’t going to be able to go, but they just kept calling me and saying “oh, by the way here’s where were staying, and this is the day and time of the ferry and btw call this rental place and secure a bike.”

My Dad ended up passing away in Jan about 5 months before the trip. I still didn’t think I was going to be able to go because then I was inundated with the closing up of my Dad’s affairs and getting caught up with my own life in Santa Fe from being gone for 7 months. I was seriously thinking about bailing on the idea. Then Liza shows up on my doorstep here in Santa Fe in early March and basically just says “hey, you’re going, so you better get packed.” I’d never been to the UK and really, all I knew was it rained a lot, was foggy and they drive on the other side of the road. I was not feeling confidant about anything for sure, but that was probably more related to losing my Dad. Actually, it was my friend Franny from OCD who met me for coffee after my Dad died. She really listened and encouraged me to take the time I needed to get over the loss. I kind of woke up after that and realized that it was OK to be excited about the trip and be feeling the loss of my Dad at the same time.

Another friend of mine, WRWR Michelle Lamphere, met me in Denver for a Performance Cycle Gear shopping spree where I got a good rain jacket and a 2025 closeout Arai Corsair Isle of Man TT helmet. I then convinced my lovely spouse to come to Scotland with me first to spread some of Dad’s ashes. I decided to also take some of his ashes with me to the Isle of Man as I went around the IOM TT course. We had watched Moto GP together and I had shown him footage from the IOM TT races from years before. My Dad loved car racing and restored vintage cars, then started building street rods. He was very supportive of my motorcycle adventures and road racing. He used to sponsor SMRI’s Heavy Weight Vintage class. I figured having him out there with me would keep me pretty grounded.

4. While you were riding this historical lap, what were some thoughts, emotions along the way including moments of joy and fear. Did anything happen of note while on this legacy lap?

The IOM TT Legacy lap is something very special and really reflects the culture of the Manx people and how they honor their racers and even participants who have died at the TT. They see it as a valiant and brave death. I think that over the years it has grown to be inclusive of all fallen racers and a remembering of those who have taken risks and have lived their lives racing.

Besides my Dad, I was also carrying the memory of a racer I knew from SMRI, Hurley Wilvert. I met him when I first started going out for track days with Kraut Racing. He was standing in line behind me for some coffee at the track one morning. I didn’t know him at all or just how amazing he was at that time. We started talking and he encouraged me to start coming out to race in the middle weight vintage class. I think it was the following summer that I bought Tracy Riffe’s purple 400 Honda and Hurley was always kind and had great tips for me. I used to buy him coffee and gradually started to understand how important Hurley was to AMA and what an amazing racer he was. I remember in 2013 when Hurley was getting ready to go over to IOM to ride in the IOM TT Legacy Lap and I think it was Tracy Riffe who filled me in on Hurley’s racing history and that he had been on the podium at Daytona with Kenny Roberts and Giacomo Agostini.

Just before the IOM TT Legacy Lap, there is a moment where all the motorcycles start to rev their engines – in that call and response kind of way that racers and riders often do when they are warming up their engines or, I think maybe it’s more like calling out their challenge before the race. What a moment that was, hearing the sound of a thousand engines starting up together and the revving of those engines, raising a call to the heavens, sending up the memories of those that had fallen and honoring them at the beginning of that legacy Lap.

Norton has a special history at the IOM and they were sponsoring are part of the parade lap. They had pulled out 6 vintage bikes and put some of the most prominent women riders up front just behind Carolynn Sells (first female to win a solo motorcycle race on the Isle of Man TT Mountain Course at the Manx Grand Prix in 2009) who was riding the new Norton Manx Race Bike. Norton had a van that was loaded with cameras in the back looking out at the parade and filming for a promo about Norton’s long history with IOM and their new Manx Race bike.

Those old Nortons were really loud as they lead the way. It was amazing to see people lined up on both sides of the walls and along the streets and behind fences in the pastures. So many women – were there in the crowd. Grandmothers, mothers, young girls even babies in strollers – waving wildly at us. It was a historical moment and infectious. We all waved back hoping that those young girls and women might see us and start their dreams of riding and racing.

The whole parade stretched out 14.5 miles and we pretty much stayed in formation behind the Pace Cars. That was until we hit the mountain course. Some of the guys who were in the back behind us came up aggressively trying to get their mugs in the Norton cameras. That was the moment when the combination of being on the mountain course and my instincts not to not let those guys pass, came together. We all abandoned our positions and jockeyed to the finish line. That was exciting. I’ll always remember that mountain course!

Afterwards, we all met up at the Manx Museum and watched the Film Motorcycle Mary about Mary McGee and listened to Carolyn Sells talk about her experience growing up racing in Europe and then racing and winning the Manx races in 2009. Perfect ending to an amazing day. Then I asked her if she would sign my helmet and she did!

5. After completing your ride, what are your reflections and deeper meanings you received from this amazing experience?

Sometimes you just find yourself in the right place at the right time. This was one of those magical moments and I was fortunate enough to meet some of my biggest Sheroes like Carolynn Sells and Erin Sills and some fabulous women from around the world.