John McGuinness has announced that he has joined the Honda factory team for the 2022 road racing series in Ireland and the Isle of Man. At 50 years old, is he over the hill or can he still cut it?

John McGuinness Racing into his 6th Decade

Racing is a young man's game, so they say. Yet, history is littered with careers that have gone on long past the age of 40, with no discernible reduction in performance or success.

Juan Manuel Fangio was 47 when he won his final Formula 1 world championship, a year that also included one of his greatest drives at the German Grand Prix at the Nurburgring (the old, 14-mile, deadly one!). Emerson Fittipaldi was 50 when he hung up his helmet in 1996, having won his last championship - the 1989 PPG Indy Car World Series - aged 43 and coming second for two years aged 47 and 48. Mario Andretti won his last CART championship race at the age of 53 and finished second at the 1995 Le Mans 24 Hours race, aged 55. His last appearance at Le Mans was when he was 60! AJ Foyt competed in his last Indy 500 aged 57. He finished ninth.

All that suggests that John McGuinness, winner of 23 Isle of Man TT races, announcing that he would be racing in 2022 for the factory Honda road racing team at the age of 50 shouldn't raise any eyebrows.

The Isle of Man is the one race track on the planet where experience counts for more than outright speed. Often, McGuinness hasn't had the fastest bike at the TT, but he has gone on to win nevertheless.

McGuinness and Honda are one of the great combinations at the TT, having won 12 races together on the Fireblade, all in the Superbike or Senior TT classes. There would surely have been more wins had injury and then Covid not prevented him being able to compete in 2017 and 2018 (injury) and 2020/2021 (Covid).

His path to glory in 2022 will not be easy. While he is still seen as a threat at the TT, the likes of Michael Dunlop, Ian Hutchinson, Dean Harrison and Peter Hickman have been making hay in recent years and have youth on their side.

McGuinness had this to say about the comeback:

“What can I say really, it's like coming back home to the family! I've been in talks for a while with Neil and Harv and it's just something that feels right; it's the 30th anniversary of the Fireblade, I'll be 50 years old and also celebrating my 100th TT start, so it feels like it's meant to be. I've enjoyed a lot of success on the roads with the Honda and worked with Harv back in the day with HM Plant Honda, so I'm looking forward to getting back into the set-up and getting going.

"I had a little go on the Fireblade earlier this year and was impressed with it on-track, so looking forward to getting on the roads and seeing how it goes. It's going to be a special year with everything going on and also just getting back to the North West 200 (in Ireland) and the TT and everyone racing there again - I can't wait to get stuck in!”

Will 2022 be the last year we'll see McGuinness at the TT? That, of course, is impossible to say. It all depends on whether he feels he can be competitive: no racer likes to risk his life to finish 15th. James Hunt, 1976 Formula 1 World Champion, freely admitted he had no interest in racing unless he thought he had a chance to win. On the other side of the coin is Valentino Rossi, who carried on racing simply because he loved it so much and believed he could still win, even though the wins dried up after 2017.

It is always poignant to see any great champion retire, the feeling being tempered with relief that they have made it through alive, especially at the TT. At least we will have one more year to witness the McGuinness style and we should rejoice in that.