Barry Sheene dies of cancer

British motorcycling legend Barry Sheene has died from cancer. The twice-world motorcycling champion, famous for defying death on the track, passed away after suffering the disease for eight months. He was 52.

His death marks the end of one of the most daring and distinguished careers in motorcycle racing, which saw him win an MBE in 1978 and recovered after a 175mph crash that broke nearly every bone in his body.

In a similar manner, he had vowed to fight off his illness after learning that it had affected his stomach and throat in July last year.

He had decided to avoid conventional chemotherapy in favour of a "natural" cure that involved relying entirely on a diet of fruit and vegetable juices.

His reliance on the cure, designed by Austrian healer Rudolf Breuss to "starve" a cancer of nourishment, sparked concerns that he would be better off using conventional treatments as well.

However, he said in an interview in August: "I've made a decision about not doing chemotherapy and that's it. I'm putting my faith in the natural way."

Sheene became the best-known face of British motorcycling during the Seventies, winning the World Motorcycle Championships in 1976 and 1977. He was regarded as nearly immortal on the track, notching up so many high-speed crashes that at one stage he had metal plates in both knees, and 28 screws in his leg and his left wrist.

Off track his reputation was no less glamourous, his good looks making him a pin-up for girls and a role model for boys. He lived his personal life equally in the fast lane, enjoying high-life socialising with friends such as James Hunt, Ringo Starr and George Harrison, drinking and smoking heavily.

His cigarette of choice - the heavy tar French brand Gauloises - is thought to have been one reason why he succumbed to cancer.

His love affair with speed began - appropriately, as it turned out - at the Royal College of Surgeons, where his father worked as an engineer. At the age of 10, he was allowed to park the Jaguars and Rolls Royces of surgeons. He then turned to motorbikes, enjoying a meteoric rise in his career thanks to his utter lack of fear of any speed limit, heading up to 200mph at times. It was also to lead to two close brushes with death - the first when a blown rear tyre caused him to crash at 175mph during practice for the Daytona 200 in Florida.

It shattered his left leg, smashing a thigh, breaking six ribs, fracturing a wrist, and wrecking his collar-bone. He woke up in hospital and asked the nurse for "a fag". He crashed again in 1982 during a practice for the British Grand Prix, turning his legs into a "jigsaw puzzle" that took surgeons eight hours to realign.

Asked by a BBC interviewer what went through his mind during a crash, he famously replied: "Your arse, if you're going fast enough."

After his 1982 crash he moved to Australia to recover, amid fears he would never walk again. But while his career at the forefront of the sport was over, he made a comeback of sorts, appearing as a TV commentator and returning to the track as a veteran during the Nineties. His only visible sign of injury was that the top of one finger was missing.

After discovering he had cancer, he made a promise to his two children and former model English wife Stephanie that he would beat the "nasty, evil disease" his way.

Only last November, he took part in a veterans race of former champions at Goodwood, his last appearance before retiring from public life.

Sheen passed away at a hospital on the Gold Coast in Queensland, today with his family by his side.