Chris Hawkes hasn’t moved too far in his 50-plus years.

Born in Cheltenham, he’s lived in Bishop’s Cleeve all his life and now lives with his wife Charlie just 150 yards from the family home in Station Road where he was raised by his parents Ann and Keith.

And he hasn't moved too far in his work life either. The former Bishop’s Cleeve School pupil was taken on as an apprentice by Dowty and 35 years later he is still with them, albeit they are now known as Safran.

But when it comes to racing motorbikes, Hawkes, who is 52 this month, has certainly moved, and back in the day he moved at a very rapid pace!

He was very good, too, winning national club championships and competing at many of the top tracks around the country.

It was his dad, who still lives in the family home with Ann, who got the young Hawkes into motorbikes.

“My dad used to road race in the 1960s, he’d race Nortons and Triumphs,” he said. “When I was a child he was always tinkering with mechanical stuff.”

Hawkes didn’t follow his dad into road racing straight away, however.

“I played football for Cleeve Colts for 10 years when I was growing up and it wasn’t until I was 25 that I went road racing,” he said.

But he soon made up for lost time, winning the National New Era Formula 400 Club Championship in 2002 and SuperSport 600 championship in 2005.

“I was on an FZR 400cc Yamaha in 2002 which would do 150mph and three years later I was riding a 600cc Yamaha R6, that would go 170mph,” he said.

Those titles meant he was the best in the country at club level and he was soon ready to take on new challenges.

“I competed in the Suzuki GSX-R Cup National Series from 2007 to 2009,” he said. “I was third the first year and second in 2008. I would have won that year but for crashing at Brands Hatch, that was the championship over for me.”

He was forced to retire midway through the 2009 season because of problems with his arms but came out of retirement in 2013 to compete in the NG National Club Series, finishing second in the 600cc SuperSport Class on his old GSXR600 Suzuki from the National Cup days.

That was another impressive performance in what was a standout career.

“The two titles have to be the highlights but there were quite a lot of good moments,” he said.

“I remember riding in the Suzuki GSX-R Cup at Donington Park in 2007. It was one of the support races for the MotoGP, there were 120,000 people there, that was pretty cool.

“And I remember racing at Castle Combe, it was in front of 15,000 people and I won both races.

“I was taken out for a lap of honour in the back of a truck.”

They were very good times, but Hawkes, whose younger sister Becky was a top junior diver back in the day, had a few scary moments too.

“I remember going into the hairpin at Mallory Park at 100mph with no brakes,” he said.  “I crashed and the bike flew 20ft up in the air, I got away with just a few bruises although I was limping a bit. The bike was a mess!

“There was a pile-up at Cadwell Heath as well I remember, but I was lucky, I didn’t get too many injuries, although I am struggling a bit in older life.”

That hasn’t diminished his love of motorsport, however, and these days he is the proud owner of five or six bikes.

“Charlie and I usually go to Britanny in the summer, there’s a few of us who go,” he said. “I take the Honda 750cc, she jumps on the back.”

Happily for Charlie, he rides at a much more sedate pace these days!