Death of motorcycle ace

News Archive > Sport > Death of motorcycle ace

Gareth Rowett18/02/2010

Motorcycling fans across the region have learnt about the sad passing of Adrian Kessell, 83, who died peacefully at home on Monday, February 8.
He was born at Whitegates, St Dennis in October 1926 and was the older son of Tommy Kessell, a pre-war motorcycle champion.
In September 1945 Adrian started his racing career in a local meeting riding Tommy’s 1926 Zenith where he came third.
This was the start of an extremely remarkable story that was to span seven decades.
Over sixty years later Adrian was still riding.
In his riding career he scooped over twenty Cornwall Centre Grass-track Championship’s, won the Southern Centre Championship and had wins in the Wessex, Midlands and Western Centres making him the most consistent 250cc champion of all time.
Adrian also rode competitively in Scrambles, Trials, Hillclimbing, Sprinting and was a member of the St Austell Gulls team back in 1950.
Following in Adrian’s wheeltracks came his brother Trevor who also rode in both scrambles and grass-track racing with some success.
Many of the older generation always recall how Adrian beat England speedway stars Norman Parker and Bill Kitchen at the Bodmin Racecourse grasstrack in 1949.
Adrian’s success on two wheels also helped Cornwall by him representing the Duchy in the Inter Centre Team Championship, in 1977 he won the British Best Pairs with Richard Eslick of Ladock.
The records continued to tumble and in 1980 in front of a crowd of 7,000 spectators he took fifth place in the International grass-track meeting in Holland.
Well into the nineties Adrian was still winning Vintage classes at National Grass-track events.
Besides being sidelined due to ill health in 1974 he continued riding into his eighties in both local grass-track meetings and hillclimbing.
Unfortunately he was unable to attend the 2009 40th Wiscombe Hillclimb in Devon, due to ill health, the first time he missed in many years.
Despite being very ill Adrian continued building reliable racing engines as long as he was able to.
Sadly MND beat this sporting hero but he will live on in hearts of grass-track fans forever. His funeral takes place today, Wednesday February 17, at Carne Hill, Methodist Church, St Dennis at 2pm.
Donations in lieu of flowers for Cornwall Hospice care and the motor neurone disease association.