Norman Nelson racing his 1956 BSA Gold Star in a WERA Vintage class at Roebling Road in July of 1986. (Larry Lawrence photo)

Norman Nelson had just bought this 1956 BSA Gold Star from Beno Rodi when this photo was taken at a WERA race at Roebling Road in July of 1986. Nelson said he still remembers this particular Vintage class race.

“I was doing fine on the back sections of the track,” he recalls “But this guy on on old Harley Flathead was smoking me down the straights. I remember going down the straight, looking over and seeing Beno and Robert Linkins and doing the paddle motion with my feet trying to illustrate how slow the bike was.”

Nelson was a Delta Air Lines pilot, who enjoyed racing for fun. Linkins, after seeing how well Nelson was riding the twisty sections of Roebling, later asked if he’d like to race Linkins’ Norton Manx. Nelson took him up on the offer and over the years won six AHRMA Class C finals during Bike Week at Daytona.

“Robert had a champagne party after ever race down there,” Nelson added.

Back to his Gold Star, Nelson said he sold the bike not long after this shot was taken, but later bought it back. He wrote to a registry in England that has records on BSA exported machines and he was pleasantly surprised to find that his particular Gold Star was one of the five factory racers brought over for the 1956 Daytona 200. So it proved to be a good decision to buy the bike back. There aren’t many Gold Stars out there that were original factory racers, so Norman has a rare piece of history on his hands.