Manchester 17 was founded in 1935 and has held weekly meetings on a Tuesday evening ever since. 

We are affiliated to the Auto Cycle Union (ACU) and are a limited by guarantee company (to protect our members from fanatical attack, company number 0583737) and a charitable Community Amateur Sports Club (CASC) registered with HMRC (Tax Ref CH13051) to protect our assets for sporting motorcycling into the future as well as making donations to the cause of sporting motorcycling tax efficient

We generally have over 200 members who are mainly involved completing in and organising Trials, Enduros and riding legal (but threatened) Green Lanes and a few riding road bikes.

Membership fees are a minimal £5 per annum. We debate the membership fee each year at our AGM with the current membership fee reflecting the memberships view that we want members to value their membership and believe that the small £5 fee is just enough to above free membership for members to value their membership over those club memberships which are given without charge.

As a club, we regularly organise and our members compete in:

1. Trials, from club level Dead Easy Trials too full blown Nationals such as the Northern Experts including the big prize money 'Edgar Trophy' series based on our 4 BIG road trials

Incidentally, back in 1985, it was the '17' who introduced the term 'Dead Easy' as a way of describing events designed to be easy for beginners, youth and anyone who wants to be sure they are entering an easy event. More recently, in 2022, the club used the Dead Easy Trial model to introduce a similar type of event for riders who have machines legal for use on the public highway. Called The Manchester 17 'Wobblers Trial' it now has a permanent place in our calendar.

For the detail on our trials events click on the event below

Dave Rowland National Trial - our big summer national event

Northern Experts - our big historic event

Fisher Trophy - our big mid winter event

Hipwell Trial for the John Hartle Trophy - our big end of summer event

Tower Trial - our charitable beginning of spring event

Boxing Day Madness Trial - what it says on the tin

Dead Easy Trials - our year round fun for all events

2. Enduro events - the fast and furious 'Brinks' and the easy introduction to enduro events our Rooky series usually at Tong near Leeds

The Brinks - our long lap, fast, high moorland event high above Lyme Park near Stockport

Rooky Hare and Hounds - our introduction to enduro for all

3. Weekend Trail Riding on legal rights of way

5. Special Evening Events e.g. BBQs, Charity Trials

7. Weekend Ride outs to Rallies

8. Social Events

9. An Annual Dinner for the friends of motorcycling and Manchester 17 in particular

10. The club owns certain land used for trials which it aims to protect for motorcycle sporting use into the future

11. We actively support other clubs in the running of their events

12. The club provides assets and advice in securing land for sporting motorcycling into the future

We also have our own annual club championships, which changes ever year so keep an eye on the relevant part of this web site for details

Main committee click for the full list of the main (or management) committee. All its meeting are open to members.

There are also 2 ad hock sporting committees are open to all members and none members:

The Trials committee which runs 16 events each year from a series of Dead Easy events for beginners and those wanting a lesser challenge to several big road based events of national standing as well as helping other clubs run their events when requested. They meet at the on an irregular basis depending on the needs of event organisation. Dead Easy events has spun off its own small organising group.

The Enduro committee meets as a part of the regular Tuesday evening club nights and runs the popular Brinks open moor land enduro alongside Lyme Park and Rooky enduros at Tong near Leeds.

When you become a member of or renew your membership with Manchester 17 MCC Ltd. you will automatically be registered as an affiliated Member of the ACU. We will provide the ACU with your personal data which they will use to enable access to an online portal for you. If you have any questions about the continuing privacy of your personal data when it is shared with the ACU, please see the ACU’s privacy notice on the ACU website (www.acu.org.uk). We don't share your personal data with anyone else. We don't use cookies on our website and don't track our web sites users in any way.

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In 1935 a group of friends with a common interest in motorcycles got together and decided to form a club after responding to an advert placed by Eric Cave in the window of a cafe in Chorlton, there first meeting was in the April of that year. The question of what to call the new club apparently took some time to settle, until someone suggested that they count the number present and use that as the name.

How do you fancy paying just 'two bob' for the club Christmas dinner ?

Sounds good doesn't it ?

The problem is you're a few years too late....

The Dinner commenced at 6:30pm leaving at 8:30pm, and finally getting all the bikes going at 9:15pm they started leaving for home expecting some trouble as it had been snowing hard and blowing a blizzard.  The roads were not too bad though, none of the snow drifts were more than 2 ft deep!

The first Christmas dinner cost ten pence per person and was held in a cafe in Rainow on January 19th 1936 with a sledging session before hand. Starting from the Princess Hotel on Mouldeth Road at 2pm most of the twelve members were on bikes with the toboggans being taken along in a van.

The first Club Run in the log book was on January 5th 1936 to the Inter-University trial around Cheeks Hill in Buxton, afterwards the six members present went via the Cat & Fiddle to Mrs Tinley's Poached Egg Shop at Rainow, which seems to have been a regular haunt in those days.

Articles taken from "The Club History - Of Poached Eggs & Diamonds" written by Rick Stewart.

You can also see this and mor, much more on the Manchester 17 history page and the Our Heritage page

More on our history & heritage

The club has, over the years, developed its own brand or image in the form of its badge. The classic shape and form of which we can trace back to just after the club formed back in 1935. We believe that current form was produced by Melvin Cranmer in about 1970 for our Manx GP helicopter fund sticker and recently refined by Rick Stewart who had also helped the club in many ways not least by producing artwork and event programs. The badge shape is essentially an inverted truncated equilateral triangle containing at stylised number '17''.  2 horizontal bars cross the centre of the triangular portion with the top one containing the word "Manchester" and the lower holding the initials M.C.C in slightly larger type for "motorcycle club". 2 sets of 4 bar wings complete the image. The club owns its badge and has registered it as a trade mark No UK 00003395395.

The club will allow the use of its trade mark under a licence which is usually granted free of charge but with restrictions as to its appropriate use. To apply for a licence or for further information the club can be contacted here.