Hunts Motorcycles : Olympic Gold Medal Winner Buys New 'Blade...

It’s not often we get chance to welcome an Olympic Gold Medal winner to our showroom, but we were delighted when Paul Manning, a member of Team GB’s fantastic record breaking cycling squad brought his CBR600RR in for a service just days after arriving back from Beijing.

Due to his hectic pre-Olympic training schedule, it was the first opportunity Stockport based Paul had to call in with the bike. As well as being one of the fastest men on a pedal powered machine, Paul is also a real motorcycle enthusiast and mentioned that he quite fancied a ride on a new FireBlade.

Harvey, Paul and John-plus that Gold Medal!

Regular visitors to our showroom will know that salesman Harvey is also an avid competitive cyclist (you really don’t want to know how many miles a week he puts in on the road on a pushbike and also on Manchester’s now famous Velodrome!). Though not quite ready to make the Team GB squad just yet, Harvey is extremely dedicated to his cycling so was delighted when Paul produced his Team Pursuit Gold medal from his backpack. We had a few customers in the showroom at the time as well who also got to see Paul’s medal and to pose with him for photos.

Paul takes delivery of his new RR8 Fireblade

Racing since he was 14 years old, Paul also won Bronze at Sydney in 2000 and Silver at the Athens Olympics in 2004. He is no stranger to the top step of the podium in other cycling events too, being crowned British National Individual Pursuit Champion in 2001, 2003, 2004, and 2005, as well as being national points race Champion in 2005. He has also been a Gold, Silver and Bronze medallist in the Commonwealth Games. Now aged 33, Paul announced his retirement straight after the Beijing games, but intends to stay involved in the sport in other areas.

Paul took our RR8 Fireblade out on the road and liked it enough to order one for himself in white which he picked up last week. It’s probably a bit quicker than his regular track bike, and certainly a whole lot easier on the legs!

Source: Hunts Motorcycles, Manchester