By five, he was tearing around on a mini-bike built from scratch by his father, who was a maintenance man at the nearby Royal College of Surgeons. An utter natural, he mastered this and later machines quickly before an inevitable progression into motorcycle racing at the age of 17.Perhaps fittingly, Sheene's very first race, at Brands Hatch in Kent, ended in a crash when his 125cc Bultaco seized. Undaunted, a few minutes later he clambered on to a 250cc Bultaco and came in third One week later he recorded his first win. An 11-plus failure and virtual drop-out at secondary school with an aversion to authority figures, perhaps he saw this as a way out of his dead-end job.For 1969 Franco and son planned a full season of racing.

Even in those early years the young Sheene was well aware of the power of publicity. He was already sporting the "Donald Duck" helmet design that he was to make famous – chosen precisely because it would make people take notice. Later he'd drill a hole in the chin piece so he could smoke on the grid. A raw rookie, he finished the season runner-up in the 125cc British Championship. A year later he won the same title, also placing third in the 250cc series.During 1970 Sheene heard that Stuart Graham's ex-works twin-cylinder 125cc Suzuki was for sale, and borrowed £2,000 to make it his. Although this was a staggering sum for a six-year-old machine, it would launch Sheene's international reputation.

In a one-off grand prix ride in Spain he almost beat the local hero Angel Nieto, 13 times a world champion.Racing the same machine in a full world championship campaign in 1971 Sheene scored his first grand prix win at Spa-Francorchamps in the Belgian Ardennes, a fearsome road circuit at which he would usually excel. Two more wins saw him leading the championship going into the final round at Jarama, but Sheene was not in good shape. Riding with a rib broken a week earlier in a crash at Mallory Park in Leicestershire, he again lost out as Nieto won race and championship. In the same year Sheene somehow wrapped his lanky frame around a tiny 50cc Kriedler to win in that class as well.Still, number two in the world isn't bad. But Sheene knew better than to expect fanfares on his return home. As he said some years later, in the early Seventies motorcycle sport "was still a bit non-U in those days in the eyes of the daily papers". It would be Sheene, practically single-handed, who would change all that.After a disappointing and injury-prone year contracted to Yamaha, Sheene was signed by Suzuki for 1973.