Rodger was born in Picton in 1953. After the usual road bikes Freeth gravitated into racing and won the NZ Open Production championship during the 1975/76 summer season. In the ensuring years he became infamous as the first person in the world to crash the then-new Suzuki GSX1100E in 1979, the GSX1100ET ‘Black Piper’ in 1980, an RG500 Mk5, plus an RG500 Mk6. Dallas Rankine thoughtfully made a T shirt at the time to remind Rodger of his horizontal antics!
Fortunately Freeth could ride well too, as a university student winning the NZ Open Racing championship for two seasons in 1976/77 on a Suzuki TR500 and 1977/78 on the infamous nonaero foil Yamaha TZ750A. He earned the NZ Open TT and Senior TT trophies in 1978 and 1980, adding more NZTTs in the 1983/84, 1984/85 and 1985/86 seasons. Plus several NZ Grand Prix titles won in 1984, 1985, 1986, and during the 1986/87 season.
It could be argued that Freeth hit his peak in the early 1980s, winning the 1982/83, ‘84/85 and ‘85/86 NZ Formula One championships, all on McIntosh-framed GSX1100-based machinery to which he became synonymous. Still on a McIntosh, he also took victory in the 1985 Wynns Series in NZ, although he may be best remembered for his two victories in the Arai 500 at Bathurst.
Wings of Fancy
As the reigning NZ Open Racing champion, in 1977 Freeth had an uncompetitive Yamaha TZ750A so decided to spice things up by designing and fitting inverted aerofoils. Large ones. His mantra was to increase the cornering speed by adding downwards air pressure onto the front and rear tyres. Instead it caused considerable angst amongst fellow racers who became concerned the very wide wings might get tangled up with their own machines mid-corner. Only 22, he was a student in Astro Physics at AucklandThere was also concern that if it worked and other riders made their own, they won’t be as good as Freeth’s.
