Pat Hennen only completed one TT race, but he certainly left a lasting impression on the event and motorcycle road racing in general. 

He was on the verge of achieving legendary TT and GP status when he suffered a career-ending crash in the 1978 Senior TT. 

The first American to win a 500cc Grand Prix, the quietly-spoken 25-year-old had taken a break from the world championship to enable him to squeeze in a second assault on the Mountain Course. 

To some extent, Hennen’s debut 12 months earlier had been a low-profile affair because of Mike Hailwood’s return to the event. 

The factory Suzuki star finished an excellent fifth in the first non-world championship Senior TT (held that year on the Monday) and won by Phil Read in his comeback to the event. 

Hennen was only 10 seconds down on fourth-placed Joey Dunlop at the close, the latter going on to win the Schweppes Jubilee TT a few days later in the regular Friday slot as many of the leading riders (including Hennen) had by then left the island for a Grand Prix on the Continent. 

Hennen was challenging for a top-three place in the Classic (held on the Wednesday) after the oversized 653cc Suzuki’s crank broke on the Mountain Mile on lap five. 

When John Williams crashed his Suzuki at Creg-ny-Baa, Charlie WIlliams took over second place behind Mick Grant, with Hennen third. Williams stopped at half-distance to fill up the tank of his Yamaha twin, enabling Hennen to briefly move ahead on corrected timing.  

He was still second, with 26.8s in hand on Williams when he made his second stop with the thirstier four-cylinder Suzuki. So when Hennen’s bike rolled to a halt at the Verandah on lap five he was lying third. 

Back to 1978 and, having scored a second place behind Heron Suzuki ‘team-mate’ Barry Sheene [they were far from being friends] at the season-opening Venezuelan Grand Prix, Hennen won the third GP victory of his career at Jarama in the Spanish Grand Prix. 

Kenny Roberts then took the next three rounds with Hennen posting two second places, as the US pair were separated by a solitary point at the head of the championship standings prior to the TT break. 

Hennen had dominated the Transatlantic Match Races a couple of months earlier - winning three races, finishing runner-up in two and third in another to become the top scorer in the prestigious Easter weekend event. He was in the form of his life. 

On the Thursday afternoon of practice week the Phoenix-born star had unofficially become the first rider in TT history to lap the course in under 20 minutes. 

Four days later, with Formula One race winner Mike Hailwood sidelined from the Senior by a broken steering damper on his Martini Yamaha and 1977 Classic TT winner John Williams similarly retired at the pits, it was a straight two-way battle between the works Suzukis of Herron and Hennen. 

The latter officially lapped in under 20 minutes with a new record average speed of 113.83mph to close the gap on the Ulsterman, but then crashed at high speed exiting Bishopscourt on the final lap, suffering brain damage. 

In an induced coma for 10 weeks, he did not return home to California until late October after a long period of care and initial recuperation in Walton Hospital, Liverpool. He had no memory of the race in which he’d crashed. 

As he virtually had to learn to speak again, his mother noticed a ‘toning down’ of his American accent when he phoned her on his run up to his departure back to the States. ‘That’s all down to that crazy accent in Liverpool, it’s catching,’ he joked. 

Although he did make a slow, reasonably good recovery, he suffered from some mobility and speech issues thereafter. He never raced again. 

Pat rode a lap as a pillion in the mid-1980s and later completed a lap solo on closed roads. He turned to religion in the latter years of his life and last visited the island in 2013 as a guest for the Classic TT.  

Most unassuming and extremely positive about the Mountain Course, he said it had been a real privilege and an honour to have raced on it.  

He became unwell earlier this year but only spent four days in hospital before dying on April 7 at the age of 70. 

Supported in the early part of his Grand Prix career by former TT winner Rod Coleman, Pat Hennen was initially invited to the island in early 1977 by former TT competitor Dennis Brew. 

The latter was a founder of the Manx Motorcycle Federation initiative, the aim of which was to continue to attract quality riders to the TT following the loss of GP status in 1976. 

It was assumed that the Hennen’s initial opinion of the event was influenced by Barry Sheene, but Brew managed to talk to the American star when attending the UK launch of a new range of models. 

Brew, who had run the local Suzuki dealership in Ramsey during the early part of the 1970s, overheard Hennen discussing the TT in a somewhat derogatory manner to some members of the motorcycle media [probably based on Sheene’s impressions]. 

He chose the appropriate time to talk to Hennen later and told him that he took offence at his comments.  

Dennis’s youngest son, Andy, recalled: ‘Dad had a chat with him and invited Pat to come over to the Isle of Man at his [Dennis’s] expense and look over the course for himself.’ 

A little while later, Rex Whyte, Suzuki’s race team manager, contacted Dennis by phone when he confirmed that Hennen was keen to take up the Manxman’s kind offer. 

So Hennen made a short visit, during which he rode round the course on a Suzuki 380 road bike loaned to him by Allan Lund, whose father Bernie had bought Grand Prix Motorcycles off Dennis Brew. 

He also viewed it from the air in a Woodgate Aviation Piper Cherokee [Dennis had a private pilot’s licence]. 

Liking what he saw, the team then made tentative arrangements for Hennen to enter the 1977 event and he made two longer visits to learn the course.  

Andy continued: ‘I was aged 12 at the time and it was so amazing to have a superstar calling at my house. He took great interest in my first bike, an 80cc Italjet motocrosser. I had a picture of him sat on it.’ 

The Brews continued to assist Hennen and Andy well remembers the shock and sadness when he crashed the following year. 

‘I was at the old grandstand watching the race and heard of the crash, but then overheard someone saying that Pat was reported to be sat up in bed in hospital. 

‘I tried to phone dad to tell him, but he had already spoken to someone else who had given him more accurate information, and it wasn’t good.’ 

Dennis brought Andy with him to Liverpool to visit the injured rider during his 10-week stay in Walton Hospital. 

‘Pat never slated the TT, although his brother Chip – also his personal manager – was critical of the event. He was quite bitter.’ 

Hennen returned to the island two or three years after the accident when he and his fiancée Karin stayed with Dennis and the family at their house, “Jadar”, a converted telephone exchange on the corner of Queen’s Pier Road and Albert Road. This was next to his garage business, Ayre Motors, literally alongside the course. 

A social event was arranged at the old Talk of the Town (site of Ramsey’s original swimming pool) and Andy said it was packed. ‘Pat received a standing ovation.’