FAST motor bikes and cars were a passion for Basingstoke businessman Roy Adlam, who recently passed away.

He not only admired them, but he raced and built them as well as selling them at his garage and showroom, Adlam Motors.

Trading until the 1980s, the business was in Old Reading Road, close to where the Eastrop Roundabout is today.

Roy was a man who liked a challenge, recalled his wife of nearly 64 years, Vi Adlam, who said he passed away peacefully at Basingstoke hospital on May 3, aged 85.

The couple had two children, Ross and Beverley, as well as three grandchildren and a great grandson on the way.

“It’s a pity he won’t get to see him, as he was a very good father and grandfather,” said Mrs Adlam.

“He was always very helpful and did a lot of charity work for diabetes.”

Tragically, the couple lost their daughter Beverley, when she died of diabetes aged just 41.

“He got her moved from Cornwall back to Basingstoke and he looked after her when she became diabetic,” explained Mrs Adlam.

For the past two years Mr Adlam, who suffered from Alzheimer’s, lived at Pemberley House care home in Grove Road, where he would always join in with a sing-song.

“He was very happy there,” said Mrs Adlam, who added, “He was a member of the Basingstoke Male Choir for 12 years – he loved the choir.

“At Pemberley House they always said ‘we will get Roy to start off the singing’.”

Roy, who was a one-time president of the local Chamber of Commerce and president of Basingstoke Lions, was born in Hampton Hill, in London.

He moved with his family when he was six to live in South Warnborough, where by all accounts he had an active childhood.

The headmaster at Long Sutton School, which Roy attended, let him clean his motorbike, which unbeknown to him, he used to ride it in the grounds of Lord Wandsworth College.

As a plucky 16-year-old, Mr Adlam got into scramble and crosscountry racing.

During his National Service, he met his future wife and soon after getting married the couple emigrated as “£10 Poms” to Australia, where Mr Adlam took part in motorcycle racing and speedway competitions.

Three years later, the pair returned to north Hampshire and started a family together in Basingstoke.

Mr Adlam continued his racing, and in 1959, a record crowd saw him win the Southern Centre Grass Track Championship for 250cc in thrilling style, at Houndmills Field, where the Sainsbury’s warehouse car park is today.

By 1963, Mr Adlam made his first venture into the car racing world at Goodwood, driving a Jaguar XK150S.

He later used a Mini Cooper S, before settling for a Lotus Elan in 1964.

Two years later, he bought a racing Elan and, in 1968, changed to single-seater racing with a new Lotus 51 Formula Ford.

He later went on to build his own car called the Viro – named after himself and his wife.

However, a skirmish at the starting grid at Silverstone put the brakes on Mr Adlam’s racing career in 1969.

He crashed over the top of a safety barrier, writing-off his car, but, fortunately, was unhurt in the four-car, 70mph pile-up.

Nevertheless the amateur racer had won an impressive clutch of trophies throughout the 1950s and 1960s.

The successful businessman ventured outside the motor trade, owning a nursery in Kempshott at one time.

Later he opened a car-tuning business at a garage behind a guesthouse his wife Vi ran in Chequers Road.

The guesthouse was subsequently converted into Springfield Motel.

Mr Adlam’s funeral service will be held at Basingstoke Crematorium on Friday May 29 at 11am. His family has requested only family flowers. Donations can be made by cheque for the Alzheimer’s Society, care of Alexander & Dry, at 1 Seal Road, Basingstoke.