Yahoo Autos 'Motorcycle Mary' Showcases the Life of Racer Mary McGee
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Motorcycle Mary begins with the titular character, racer Mary McGee, showing off one of her Hall of Fame rings. "It says, 'Drinks gas, spits nails,' " she says, and then laughs. It sets the tone for the story of her life. McGee is tough as nails, but never afraid of a good time.
The film covers the bad times too—the discrimination she faced, the death of her brother Jim Conners in a horrible racing accident—but always comes back to McGee in the present day, in her 80s at the time of filming, still glowing with love for the sport. Director Haley Watson really lets her shine, despite having a brief 30 minutes in which to do so.
Watson's film is part of the ESPN film series 30 for 30 Shorts, which focuses on documentaries about sports and sporting legends, all in a half-hour format currently available to stream. Watson became interested in McGee while researching people who had achieved amazing solo feats. She saw that McGee made headlines in 1975 after running the entire Baja 500 race on a motorcycle with no rider swap. McGee was the first person, man or woman, to "iron-woman" the Baja 500. "I'm very proud of that," she says in the documentary.
The Baja run is just one of McGee's firsts. A decade before she began desert racing, in the late 1950s, McGee began driving sports cars with the encouragement of her husband and her brother, both of whom were avid racers. She wasn't the first woman to race SCCA, but once she stopped racing in the all-women's races and joined the main events, she was often the only woman on track. Her performance impressed Porsche dealer and racer Vasek Polak, who encouraged her to try road-racing motorcycles. When she called the American Federation of Motorcyclists in 1960 to see if there were any restrictions on a woman getting registered for a race, the officials answered something like, "We don't know. No woman has ever asked before.” Eventually they came back and said if McGee got signed off on a tryout, they'd consider giving her a license. Bear in mind here that she'd already been racing high-end sports cars for Polak and had been riding street bikes for her daily commute for three years. Despite the blow to her pride, she passed and became the first woman with a FIM racing license in the United States.
McGee added bike races to her calendar and raced both two- and four-wheel events until 1963, when a notice of rule changes came out, declaring that all women racers needed to get points in the 50-cc class before they could race the higher classes. It's worth watching the film just for McGee's retelling of this moment. She pauses, and looks at the camera: "I was the only woman racing motorcycles at that time and I was already racing 125s." It was clearly a move to get her out, and it worked, only instead of giving up racing, she simply moved from pavement to dirt, encouraged by her friend, a minor actor named Steve McQueen. You might have heard of him.
With McQueen's encouragement, as well as coaching from top endurance racers like the Ekins brothers, McGee roostertailed into desert racing, running Mojave, Nevada, and Baja California. She took part in the very first official Baja race, the Mexican 1000, in 1967, and in 1975 she spent every one of the 500 miles (and more) of the Baja 500 on the seat of a 205-cc Husqvarna. She recalls coming into the pits with a blown shock and a wire wheel "with no spokes left in it." She finished 17th, but her solo run was a first.
McGee's life is much bigger than would fit in 30 minutes, but Watson captures her bold take on life—"Be a participant"—and her enthusiasm for adventure—"Say yes, then figure out what you agreed to." It's wonderful to see McGee's story reach a mainstream audience, and we hope she will continue to inspire another generation of racers and riders.
Motorcycle Mary is a production of Breakwater Studios, produced by Rachel Greenwald, executive-produced by F1 champion Lewis Hamilton and Oscar winner Ben Proudfoot, and currently available on ESPN.
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