Jamie Coward

Jamie Coward is no stranger to the paddock having spent many of his childhood years there whilst his father Paul also competed in the Isle of Man TT Races as well as the Manx Grand Prix and Classic TT.

Now an established racer himself, being surrounded by those closest to him continues to be important for family man Jamie, as he attributes much of his racing success to the continued support of his partner Sophie and his mother Sally who are always on hand.

Coward’s unusual career path has seen him racing both modern and classic machinery on short circuits and the roads. Straddling both disciplines has clearly paid off as he has rocketed up the TT leaderboard in recent years. Indeed, the skills he has developed on Ted Woof’s classic machines, especially the 500cc Manx Norton, where corner speed is key, have not only helped him record numerous podiums at the Classic TT but also become a major force in the TT’s Supersport and Lightweight classes.

Although Coward remains yet to land a ride with one of the factory teams, he has instead benefitted from working with several well-established privateer teams including Penz13.com, Prez Racing and more recently KTS Racing - giving him his finest TT performances to date in 2022 and 2023.

Everything began to come together for the Yorkshire rider in 2019, where Coward’s talented performance not only secured him a top ten finish in every race, he also claimed his first ever TT podium - finishing second in the Lightweight Race. It was a defining race for Jamie, as the KTS Racing Kawasaki rider pushed Michael Dunlop as hard as anyone else ever has and he was unlucky to miss out on the win when he fell an agonising 1.2 seconds short.

There were more memorable moments for Jamie in 2019, as he also posted a brilliant fifth in the second Supersport race and eighth in the Senior TT, where he not only broke the 130mph barrier for the first time but also became, at the time, the fastest Yamaha rider ever to have lapped the Mountain Course. 

KTS Racing supported Coward in all classes in 2022 and although he was forced to retire from the Supertwin race, he finished inside the top eight in his other five races. Four of those finishes were inside the top six and it was a superb campaign for Coward, lapping in excess of 127mph in the Supersport class and setting a new personal best lap of 130.398mph on the 1000cc R1 Yamaha.

2023 was another outstanding TT for Jamie and the results kept coming, with a new fastest lap speed of 132.096mph and no less than six top-6 finishes, including a second podium in the Carole Nash Supertwin race, he also found himself taking home the 2023 Privateer Trophy.

Despite being overlooked for a factory ride once again in 2024, Coward remains fired up and if his track record is anything to go by, his continually improved performance will find him hunting down another podium this year.

VIEW FROM OUR RIDER LIAISON OFFICERS

Jamie is a fantastic rider with a huge TT career ahead of him and whilst he can sometimes go under the radar, his results of late have been nothing but superb and perhaps deserve more credit than has so far received. Jamie is a really nice guy with a great team around him which has allowed him to beat many factory riders and teams with far bigger budgets. Jamie is now at the stage where he deserves a factory ride.

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