Roger Frogley (1908 in
Ware, Hertfordshire
Ware is a town in Hertfordshire, England close to the county town of Hertford. It is also a civil parish in East Hertfordshire district.
Location
The town lies on the north–south A10 road which is partly shared with the east–west A414 (fo ...
- 1974) was a pioneering
British
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
motorcycle speedway rider. His crowning triumph was beating the Australian star, Ben Unwin, at the International Match Race in front of a 40,000 strong crowd.
Frogley rode for the
Crystal Palace Glaziers the majority of his career. He made his debut on 14 April 1928 at
High Beach
High Beach (or High Beech) is a village inside Epping Forest in south-west Essex, England. Part of Waltham Abbey, the village is within the Epping Forest District and the ward of Waltham Abbey High Beach, and lies approximately north-east of Ch ...
motorcycle speedway located inside of Epping Forest, England; the track was behind The King's Oak public house. A special trophy was put forth that year for the first, fourth place riders to win races at more than 39 mph. The trophies were won by Roger, his brother Buster, Joe Francis, and Arthur Willimott.
Roger and Buster Frogley rode modified 1928 Dirt Track Rudge motor bikes.
In 1929, Roger Frogley rode in forty races, winning eighteen of them. Most significantly, he won the "Home"
Star Riders' Championship
The Star Riders' Championship was the forerunner of the Speedway World Championship and was inaugurated in 1929. The competition was sponsored by ''The Star
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already m ...
at
Wimbledon on Monday 21 October, making him the first British Star Rider.
Roger Frogley was the top scoring rider for England, with six points, in the first England versus Australia Test Match at
Wimbledon Stadium
Wimbledon Stadium, also known as Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium, was a greyhound racing track located in Wimbledon in southwest London, England.
It also hosted stock car and other small circuit motor racing events, and until 2005 hosted motor ...
, Plough Lane, in 1930.
He retired in 1932, due to a loss of form.
and made an unsuccessful comeback at
New Cross Lambs in 1935.
In later life he was a successful businessman and lived in a house on Stapleford Airfield with his wife Sonja and his children William and Tanya. He was a keen aviator and sailor. He was a friend of Rupert "Bob" Simpson a pilot with BOAC and fellow boating enthusiast
He suffered from a gastric ulcer and died from cancer of the colon in the 1970s
References
External links
Roger Frogley Photograph
{{DEFAULTSORT:Frogley, Roger
British speedway riders
1908 births
1974 deaths