Thread update!
Just to let any interested persons know, as i hadn’t seen him for just over a year,i called in to see Derek and his wife Jen at their home yesterday.
He will be 81 years young in a few days time and is still fairly chatty and spritely,but is suffering with his short term memory. We did share a couple of Carman and LEP stories and i hope to return and see him again in the very near future.
I worked for Derek for a good while as a second driver,sometimes doubling up with him for urgent jobs.We shared some good stories of haulage and motorcycle racing and i have met some interesting people through working for him.
With great sadness it has come to my attention that the great lorry driver and motorcycle racer Derek Minter passed away earlier this evening.
King of the Road and King of Brands.
He raced against some of the greatest too, Mike the Bike Hailwood, Phil Read and John Mooneyes Coooper.
RIP Mr Minter
Very sad to hear that Wheel Nut. Great memories of seeing him race, and once, at the wheel of his Volvo coming through Derby.
RIP Derek, biker and trucker. A pleasure to have met you.
That’s so sad. As a bit of a racer in my mis-spent youth, I admired Derek and most of his fellow premier-class racers. I met him several times at various tracks but only realised that he was a haulier some time after I had given up on my own aspirations.
RIP, Derek, you were one of the greats.
Now that is sad, RIP Derek
Terribly sad news , a true Gentleman. Rest in Peace Derek.
RIP Derek Minter. Used to bump into him occasionally at Princes Commercials in Maidstone (now MC) when he took his F10 for service. Always happy to talk bikes.
Surprised no mention of Derek Minter on any of the threads. Met him when he subbed for Carmans in 1977. He drove a green 2800 think it was ‘N’ registered. Really nice guy. Felt privileged, at the time, to meet a great british racing motorcyclist.
Has anyone else met him over the years?
Did’nt he run a red F10 in LEP colours featured in a mag years ago?? Think he ran in the TT as well, Top Man!!! 
At one time Derek ran a Dennis Pax tipper, his first truck maybe?
Pete.
Watched him race and met him several times. I remember buying Trucking when he was featured, had the mag in the windscreen and was driving out of Derby at Alvaston when I spotted him in traffic queue at Blue Pete pub in his red F10. Like previous post’s, top man and a real gentleman - even on the track. This is a great bikers forum!
Met him when I worked for Commercial Engineers,the first FIAT agents in Stoke,(My job prior to starting my m/e career).
This would be in 1973/4.
I was called out to a breakdown,a Mr.Derick Minter was the o/d with a new FIAT and was having trouble with his brakes coming on,he was at Stone railway station yard.
When I found him,he was a bit apologetic as while he had been waiting for me with his engine running,his brakes had freed off.
It turned out that he had been doing a lot of shunting turning round in a confined space and had pumped his brakes that much the air pressure had dropped enough to bring his brakes on.I think he was new to the game at the time,however,a thoroughly nice chap.
Pleased that a few of us remember meeting him during his driving era. As I mentioned, I only met him a couple of times when he had his Daf. It was a time when Carmans unaccompanied trailers were flying in and out of Dover, you carried umpteen different types of rear light lenses and bulbs and hoped for the best everything worked,including the brakes on the trailer.
Stoke - Dover - Stoke was a pretty good days work! with no M25 and I,m sure Derek and a lot of the subbies liked this work as I think payment was mileage based. Am I dreaming, as 42p a mile comes to mind. Perhaps I,m talking out of the proverbial. Anyway they were great times on the road in the seventies and meeting Derek is a nice memory.
Really enjoy this site, keep it all going chaps.
As I said in my last post, I met Derick Minter Just before I gave up the spanners and went on for Carmans,and I was doing unacompanied trailers out of and into Dover for my first couple of weeks in an old F88 240 that had been retired from European work.Yes,we had to have a full range of trailer light lens’s and palm coupling adaptors as you didn’t know what you’d be up against until you picked your trailer up.
Then I was told that I was off to Baghdad,in the same motor!.Took a week to get her ready,did the trip but she was retired again after the first trip as it was decided that if a motor was older than one year it shouldn’t really be doing m/e full time.
I left Carmans in '77 so it must have been before Derick Minter started on there as I never ran into him again.
AEH 754H on her first and only m/e trip.
Met him twice. First time when I was racing bikes at Brands Hatch, He’d watched me do a couple of laps then when I pulled in to the pits he said I wasn’t pushing it enough, “rev it higher” he said, this was in the days when you rode to the circuit, raced the week-end, then rode it home and used it for work the next week. I pointed out to him that if I blew it up it’d be a bloody long push home.
Second time I met him, I stopped at a service area on the M6, I had an F89 and pulled along side this beige coloured F10, saw the Minter Transport on the door and a Motorbike emblem, and thought it couldn’t be, but it was. We got chatting, I told him about the incident at Brands, of course he didn’t remember it, but we had a meal and a great chat for an hour.
It certainly, as others have said, a privilege to meet him.
and of course has the Minter straight at Brands named after him. At least I hope so, wouldnt put it past that bell end Palmer to have changed it to the Comma Oils straight or somesuch.
ghinzani:
and of course has the Minter straight at Brands named after him. At least I hope so, wouldnt put it past that bell end Palmer to have changed it to the Comma Oils straight or somesuch.
britishpathe.com/record.php?id=43431
What a great guy!
I love these threads, it makes me want to research these great gentlemen of the tracks
Derek Minter in his first TT year. Usually sponsored by Halletts of Canterbury, haulage contractor, Minter contested twenty four TTs with five top six finishes in addition to an unexpected Lightweight TT win on a semi-works Honda in the 1962 lightweight 250 race. “The Mint” rode REG, Bianchi and Cotton all without the success he found on Norton and Honda machinery.
He also competed in trials on a Norman Motobyk which became Raleigh in Nottingham
