Dave Pearce of Tigcraft came from racing his own bikes- amongst others a Norton Manx- to building racing and prototype chassis, so it was only logical the new C652 chassis found its way on the racetracks.

At the time Dave ran Tigcraft as a little workshop, and one of his assistants was Gary Cotterell, later to pursue his own brief career as a racing chassis builder.
Gary and Steve Marlow raced two C652s, in the first season under the Norton trademark, in the British and the European Sound of Singles ("SOS") championships.
They ended up in 2nd and third place in the British, and 3rd and fourth position in the European championship in 1998.

In 1999, after having parted company with Tigcraft, Cotterell continued to race his bike, then calling it a "GCR" (Gary Cotterell Racing).

Years later I received an e-mail from Holland, stating the sender had the raw bones of what he was told was a Norton originally. It turned out he had the frame, swinging arm, seat and various other bits from Cotterells bike. After Dave got a new exhaust system and petrol tank made we entrusted Steve Campbell of Thunder Engineering, himself a top racer on singles in the 1990s, with the completion of the bike. The finished article can be seen above and on the right.

We have received some pictures of the sister bike when it was raced by Steve Marlowe as a Norton in 1998 through Mr. Michels of "PAMI" which gives us a guideline at last (left picture).
That bike just turned up, twenty years on, in South Africa, where it is now being raced by Bill Annetts.

Should you have any more information on these motorcycles we will be happy to receive it.