A dedicated vintage motorcyclist and racer has died alongside her partner in what is being treated as a suspected suicide pact.
The woman was identified locally as Jenny Westwood. She was discovered at the rented home she shared with her partner, believed to be Victoria “Vicky” Williams, who was in her 40s.
Emergency crews from police, fire and ambulance services were called to the property in affluent Kenilworth, Warwickshire, on Sunday evening. The house stands on a private lane overlooking paddocks on the town’s outskirts.
The landlord is understood to have contacted the authorities after being unable to reach the couple for several days.
Bob Badland, secretary of the Midlands Vintage Motor Cycle Club (VMCC), said Ms Westwood had been a highly valued member. She also volunteered with a 30-person team he managed at the National Motorcycle Museum near Solihull in the West Midlands.
Mr Badland said the group learned of the deaths on Monday, prompting widespread shock and sadness among the volunteers.
“Jenny was well-liked,” he said. “She marshalled events at the museum and joined rides organised by the VMCC.”
“She was very highly thought of — a genuinely lovely woman.”
Jenny Westwood was a passionate motorcyclist who held a licence to compete in track races.
Ms Westwood attended the Vintage Motorcycle Club’s Banbury Run in 2024.
Mr Badland said he had met Vicky only a handful of times but remembered her as “a nice young woman”. He said the couple shared an interest in 45rpm records, and Vicky would accompany Jenny to the museum during record fairs.
Ms Westwood, believed to have been in her early 60s, had a particular enthusiasm for Italian motorcycle manufacturer Moto Morini, Mr Badland said.
She was also a licensed racer, a member of the high-IQ organisation Mensa and, in his words, “a very clever woman”.
A talented fabricator, Ms Westwood had designed an adjustable tool for use on motorcycles and hoped to bring it to market. However, she later discovered that manufacturing costs would probably make the product too expensive to produce.
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Mr Badland, who coordinates volunteers at the National Motorcycle Museum, said the group had last seen Ms Westwood there on the Thursday before her death. Volunteers attend every other Thursday to maintain and polish the museum’s motorcycles.
“She seemed fine,” he said. “Nobody can understand what has happened. We simply can’t believe the news.”
Warwickshire Police said the deaths of the two women found on Sunday evening were not being treated as suspicious. A report will be prepared for the coroner.
In a racing diary published in the June 2024 edition of The Pioneer Motorcyclist, a magazine for members of the Association of Pioneer Motor Cyclists, Ms Westwood recounted a serious crash at Mallory Park in Leicestershire. She had been riding a Ducati when she collided with the race leader and was taken to hospital.
Although she suffered no broken bones, she wrote that she had torn “every muscle in my left shoulder” and was unable to drive for seven weeks.
Ms Westwood, pictured, previously wrote about being hospitalised after crashing during a race at Mallory Park.
Ms Westwood raced bikes alongside her interest in vintage machines
The couple lived down this private lane on the edge of Kenilworth, Warwickshire
A resident who lives near the couple’s home in Kenilworth said Ms Westwood and Ms Williams moved in around a decade ago and ‘came around to introduce themselves’.
The resident added: ‘They were the only tenants at that house who have done that.
‘They were a lovely couple but were very private, although I knew Jenny raced bikes.
‘They didn’t seem troubled, but I think Vicky had health issues, I only really saw her when she was going out with Jenny in Jenny’s van.
‘It’s just so sad.’
A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: ‘An ambulance and a paramedic officer responded to the incident. ‘Sadly, two people were confirmed deceased on scene.’
