Georg Thumshirn

Georg Thumshirn (born August 31, 1893 in Nuremberg , † August 22, 1955 ) was a German motorcycle racer .

Thumshirn had two brothers, Hans and Konrad , who also drove motorcycle races. After an apprenticeship as a locksmith, he began his career in 1920 as a works driver for the Nuremberg motorcycle brand Ardie and remained loyal to this brand until the end of his life. This year he won the 350 cm³ class at the Bavarian motorcycle derby on Ardie Minimax , which was popularly known because of the conical shape of its tank and the red paint, similar to the fire extinguisher of the same name. Thumshirn won the cement railway races, which were quite popular at the time, such as the Reichelsdorfer Keller track in Nuremberg, the Opel railway in Rüsselsheim , the Leipzig cement railway and the AVUS in 1924. He also competed in numerous hill climbs and reliability drives as well as ice races in winter. Together with his brothers, he also made the difficult journeys to the Reich at the beginning of the decade.

From 1925 onwards , Ardies equipped with four-stroke built-in engines from JAP were used. This enabled the series of successes to continue. In 1925, Thumshirn won the Swinemünde bathing race , the Deutschlandfahrt , the industry prize at the Solitude . He won u. a. at the Jilowitz hill climb , the Semmering hill climb , the Eilenriederennen in Hanover , the Ratisbona hill climb , Würgauer hill climb , Ködelberg race . Georg Thumshirn won the 1000 cc solo class and the east-west ride at Solitude in 1926, and he was Bavarian mountain champion in those years.

The greatest successes, both for Ardie and for Thumshirn himself, were his victories at the Austrian TT in 1926 and 1927 and at the Hungarian Tourist Trophy in 1927 on Ardie-JAP against very strong competition.

Towards the end of the 1920s he turned to team racing and was also very successful on three wheels with Ardie and the 1000 cc V2 JAP racing engine, which at that time already had 56 hp. With this team he had a very bad crash at the Zirler hill climb in 1929 and then concentrated on reliability rides until 1933. He won a gold medal five times at the Three Days of the Harz Rides and successfully took part in the International Six-Day Rides several times .

After the end of his racing career in 1933 he took over an Ardie representative, albeit less successfully, before he returned to the Ardie factory.

With the start of production at Ardie after the Second World War, Georg Thumshirn was also on board again and looked after the Ardie factory drivers. Among them was the young Werner Haas , who later became three-time road world champion in the 250 cc class at NSU . In 1952, at the age of 59, he himself won a bronze medal in the Deutschlandfahrt on Ardie B251.

Georg Thumshirn was killed in 1955 at the age of 61 while riding a motorcycle because a tractor driver overlooked him while turning.

Race wins

year	class	machine	run	route
1922	350 cc	Ardie	Eifel tour	Nideggen
1925	350 cc	Ardie	AVUS race	AVUS
	350 cc	Ardie	Swinoujscie bath race	Swinoujscie
1926	350 cc	Ardie	Eilenriederennen	Eilenriede
	350 cc	Ardie	Kolberger bath race	Kolberg
	500 cc	Ardie- JAP	Austrian TT	Breitenfurt near Vienna - Laab im Walde - Wolfsgraben
1927	500 cc	Ardie-JAP	Austrian TT	Breitenfurt near Vienna-Laab im Walde-Wolfsgraben
	500 cc	Ardie-JAP	Hungarian TT	Budapest

literature

• Matthias Murko: motorcycle legends . W. Tümmels, Nuremberg 1994, ISBN 3-921590-27-2 .
• Various authors: Yearbook Motorcycles 2003 . PODSZUN, Brilon 2002, ISBN 3-86133-302-3 .
• Steffen Ottinger: International Six Day Trip 2012. The story since 1913 . HB-Werbung und Verlag GmbH & Co. KG, Chemnitz 2012, ISBN 978-3-00-039566-6 , p. 17-21 .