Meetings 1951 - 1970

TT 1954

The end of an era dominated by British machinery was in sight, despite success in the 1954 Senior and Junior races.

A new course, the 10.70-mile Clypse Course, was used for the re-introduced sidecar and the Ultra-Lightweight races.

Not for the first time the weather played a vital and controversial part in the outcome of the Senior, which was delayed for one and a half hours because of rain.

The Junior race was reduced to five laps and produced the first AJS win for 24 years.

The 250 was reduced to three laps. The previous year Werner Haas had impressed everyone on his debut. He returned with a new twin-cylinder four-stroke NSU, and proved that his previous performance was no fluke. He led from start to finish and produced a superb last lap to hoist the lap record to an incredible 91.22mph.

The first race on the Clypse Course was a great success, although there were only nine finishers in the ten-lap Ultra-Lightweight race. NSU-mounted Rupert Hollaus and the MV Agusta of Italian Carlo Ubbiali fought a real short circuit battle round the new course. After a tremendous duel Austrian Hollaus won by just four seconds.

The sidecars made a great impression on their return, with World Champion Eric Oliver and passenger Les Nutt piloting their Norton-powered Watsonian outfit to victory over the BMW's of Fritz Hillebrand and Willi Noll.