Ken Lazell
- m15trb
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Ken Lazell 20/8/32 – 2/1/26
Former Club track and time trial champion Ken Lazell passed away earlier this month, aged 93. Ken was a member of De Laune CC after his National Service, and then Benfleet & District Wheelers, and then St Michaels CC, before joining Southend (& County) Wheelers.
The story of St. Michaels CC was that it was based in Wickford, started by Ivor Evans's father who donated lots of trophies that his son Ivor could win, and then came along Ken, a much better rider than Ivor who cleaned up the lot.
His national Service was with the RAF, which had a very good track team, of which Ken was a part of, and the team were flown around the country to track meetings on hard and grass tracks. He won several medals with RAF CC around 1950-53 and was RAF 5-mile champion in 1953.
One trip was in a Lancaster bomber to a track meeting where the pilot was practising 'blind landings'. It was the very early days of automatic landings, and it was not yet a perfect system!
He also won the Metropolitan Police Sprint Championship.
He raced a sports car class with a Ginetta for a couple of seasons, mostly at Brands Hatch and Lydden Hill in Kent, this was late 60’s.
Ken also raced on track in the 60’s and in the 70’s was time trialling, winning the club TT championship in 1973.
He also did some team pursuiting and in the ECCA track championships at Herne Hill in 1976, winning with a team of “youngsters” Andy Grant, Andy Senatore & Bob Barber.
Ken also won the Club Sprint championship in 1964, only 4 years before his son Geoff burst on the track scene and won the same championship in 1968. The next year Geoff won the BCF Junior Sprint Championship whilst still a schoolboy, had a year off and came back to win the title again in 1971. Geoff should have gone to the 1972 Olympics in Munich but was not selected.
Ken played a big part in Geoff’s track career. Ken was a master tactician, and those riders that benefitted or suffered because of Ken’s tactical advice still talk about it today!
Imagine how cool it must have been for Geoff to arrive at a track meeting with Ken in a red Jaguar E type!
Ken was always in demand as a pusher off in track handicap races, as it always seemed that his rider was away whilst the starter was about to squeeze the starting gun trigger.
Ken was always keen on tandem racing and resurrected the Club’s Open Tandem 30-time trial in the 1970’s.
He built racing frames from his garage business on Canvey, and the jigs and equipment eventually passed onto Malcolm and John Davis with their Dabro brand in Chelmsford.
Ken is survived by son Geoff and daughters Hilary, Carol and Paula.
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