Herbert Schek

Herbert Schek (born December 30, 1932 in Wangen im Allgäu ) is a German motorcycle enduro racer and motorcycle manufacturer.

biography

Herbert Schek became active in motorcycle racing at an early age , especially at the annual skijoring event in his hometown of Wangen im Allgäu. On the morning of his 18th birthday he got his license and started his first race, which he won straight away. The prize money was 30 DM , which was almost a week's wage. He discovered that you could make money in motorsport. He was often able to start in two classes with the same motorcycle, and after installing a sidecar in additional classes. With four starts and four wins in one weekend, he once earned 120 DM.

In 1952 it started for the first time in an off-road sport event , the forerunner of today's enduro competitions. He also won this race. In 1962 he became world champion in this sport for the first time. In total, he was German champion 14 times. In his career he started on motorcycles of the brands Puch , Maico , Jawa and BMW , as well as on a Schek-BMW he built himself and on a Hercules Wankel .

BMW

Schek often started in six-day competitions that were driven in a team. In 1965 he was given a 600 cc BMW with which he won a two-day race in the Netherlands. From 1966 he was a works driver at BMW. Due to an accident at work, he wore a plaster corset for almost the whole season that year; nevertheless he finished second in the German championship.

In 1967 the crisis at BMW was so great that motorcycle production was temporarily stopped. Motorsport was out of the question. In 1969, however, Schek got a prototype of the BMW R 75/5 , with which he won the Six Days in Garmisch-Partenkirchen . In 1970, Schek received another work contract. Although the BMWs were able to win in the national competitions, they were at a disadvantage in international competitions due to their weight of approx. 200 kg and their moderate reliability. The British won the championship with their smaller motorcycles. Schek explained the problem to those responsible at BMW and they came to an agreement with him by placing the solution in his hands. In the winter of 1970, Schek began working on his “own” BMW, which ultimately only weighed 130 kg. Schek won the Six-Days on the Isle of Man and even the final road race on the Man circuit.

In 1972 BMW stopped participating in competitions again. But because the US market was becoming increasingly important and the Six Days 1973 were to take place there, Schek was commissioned to build three factory machines. Shek won one gold medal and the rest of the team won two silver medals.

In the following years, two-strokes , especially from Maico, increasingly won one title after another. The “Top 500 cc” class started with a machine that had been reamed from 400 to 500 cm³, which won easily due to its low weight. Schek convinced BMW Director von der Marwitz in 1977 (in his function as a member of the Supreme Motorsport Commission ) to promote a class above 750 cm³. The plan worked, and Schek got permission from BMW to build ten machines himself.

Shek-BMW

To his horror, Schek discovered that he had to take care of the homologation himself . His self-built motorcycles were not covered by the BMW licenses. Schek had ten name badges pressed and presented his “Schek-BMW GS 800” for testing. Without his intention, he had become a motorcycle manufacturer. After all, Schek built seventeen motorcycles under his own brand name. Like BMW, Schek used a Maico telescopic fork , but he also made many parts himself, such as magnesium connecting rods , pistons, and hollow titanium drive shafts. The Schek BMWs were 70 hp and weighed 128 kg. Schek himself became European champion in 1980 with such a machine.

Paris-Dakar

After 1980 the heavy BMW was inferior due to a rule change, but the Paris-Dakar rally had been taking place for several years . Schek was asked by Karl-Friedrich Capito to build a suitable BMW and he immediately made one for himself. He took part in the rally in 1981 but had a serious accident in which he broke his pelvis and was in a coma for two weeks in the hospital in Wangen. In the summer of 1982 Hubert Auriol asked him to build a new BMW for the 1983 season. Auriol had won the rally in 1981, but the factory BMWs failed miserably in 1982 with transmission problems.

Auriol won in 1983 and Schek took part again. In 1984 BMW took the Schek BMWs into the works team and Gaston Rahier won the rally. Schek was the best amateur this year and won the “marathon class”. In the years that followed, Schek took part a few times with other motorcycle brands, a total of 15 times, including as a supervisor for his daughter Patricia .

Web links

• Herbert Schek among the Enduro Seniors
• Herbert Schek: The motorcycle legend turns 80 !, Speedweek from December 29, 2012, accessed on May 16, 2013
• Südwest-Presse from February 15, 2012, accessed on May 16, 2013
• Schwäbisches Tagblatt from February 15, 2012, accessed on May 16, 2013
• Portrait of Herbert Schek in Classic Motorrad 2008
• Portrait of Herbert Schek on his 75th birthday, Wheelies from October 27, 2008, accessed on May 24, 2013 (PDF; 4.3 MB)

literature

• Steffen Ottinger: “Around Zschopau. The story of a motorcycle off-road trip ", Volume 1 . Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft Marienberg, Marienberg 2004, ISBN 3-931770-49-4 , p. 53 ff .
• 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. 43 ff .