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36
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9/4/2014
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CA
Edited Date/Time
9/30/2014 11:17am
I write books about motorcycle racing (TT Full Throttle, and Thunder Road - release date 2015) and the publisher has asked me to write a MG (middle grade) book about motocross racing. I’m totally psyched because it’s different to the Isle of Man TT Road Races. I’m doing my research, reading books, talking to riders, watching videos and have attended the Amateur & Pro Parts Canada TransCan at Waltons. I’m hoping you guys can help me with something…
One of the themes in the book is the temptation to ride dirty. Anyone got any tales you can share about someone who's wronged you on the track? Obviously I’m not looking for names of who did you wrong, just the basic jist. I know about the block pass, brake check and elbowing, but I’m packing the book with a lot of race scenes and your comments will help me think outside the box. Thanks.
One of the themes in the book is the temptation to ride dirty. Anyone got any tales you can share about someone who's wronged you on the track? Obviously I’m not looking for names of who did you wrong, just the basic jist. I know about the block pass, brake check and elbowing, but I’m packing the book with a lot of race scenes and your comments will help me think outside the box. Thanks.
Coward.
It is much much different now than in the 80s,guys are all friends now ,back then I had no friend on the gate,it just was that way.
I will post a couple that were really violent later tonite.
The Shop
As for stories, I don't have many. My only thought on dirty riding is this. Regardless of how intense a race is or how much you want to win, we are still all regular people in the end and everyone wants to leave the track safe. I feel that there is a fine line between what is too aggressive and what isn't, bumping into someone in a slow corner is one thing, but cross jumping or intentionally taking someone out in a fast section doesn't have any justification in my opinion. Everyone gets jacked up and excited when racing, but it is our responsibility to calculate the potential risks not only to ourselves but those around us. Here are my few stories, they all are from BMX but they can easily relate to motocross as well.
At a large national, I believe is was during the semi final, I got completely cleaned out in a long, fast berm that looped around the inner part of the track ( think like the ring of a horseshoe). I don't remember what place I was in, but I was somewhere mid pack when out of nowhere a kid cut into my back wheel so hard that both of us hit the deck. I can't think of any reason why he did that, but that's just part of racing at the larger events I guess.
Next year, same national, a different kid decided to do the same exact thing. Luckily, it was in a slower corner, but what made it really dumb was that it happened during the first lap of practice! Again, I have no idea what he was thinking, but apparently he felt the need to take us both down for no reason.
Not sure if those are any help, but good luck on the book!
It was all in fun, so no harm or foul.
(Sorry, couldn't resist.)
Study Friese's career and you've done a Ph.D. in dirty riding! Just Google "Friese" and "Vitalmx" and you'll dredge up all of us going nuclear over the years. It's one of the few topics where nearly everyone agrees.
This next one was just on the site recently. It shows Tyler Evans taking out Grant Langston. Langston then gets up and rides his brains out to catch Evans. He does, and then proceeds to completely clean his clock. It's kinda long but it's a classic. The payback.
http://youtu.be/ugP8AHRZnqA?t=11m51s
I totally blow the start of my first moto, not used to the intensity. 2nd moto, I'm lined up at the gate and the kid to my right is laughing at my handguards with his buds before the start. (to be fair...they were the big bulky kind with the aluminum since I spent most weekend smashing through the trees)
We take off side by side, and he's barely got an elbow on me going into the first left hand corner. I'm not feeling particularly generous at this point after my first moto, or after listening to this dude on the line talking crap, so I decide I'm going to stay in it and see if I can make something happen here with the start. (Worth mentioning here that I was a pretty big guy back then, 6'3" and about 225, and it's '98 and I'm on one of the first YZ400's at the track. It's a bit of a tractor compared to the rest of the field. The guy beside me is much smaller.) So we are going into the left hand corner and the guy's handlebar get caught on top of my handguard. Of course, we are just starting to lean left, so as I lean for the corner I pick his handlebar and front end right up with it. This guys starts yelling for me to stop. ( I guess, wasn't paying much attention to him honestly) I figure it'll sort itself out any second, and I don't want to lose this start.
We'll about a third of the way into the corner, this guys comes off the back of his bike, but it's still hooked to mine. Amazingly enough, I dragged that KX all the way through the corner and onto the start of the next straight. I finally did have to slow down a bit to get that thing off.
I half expected that guy and his boys to come track me down after the moto, but I never did see him. Not sure if I should've felt bad about that or not afterwards, but I didn't. Normally I would have at least stopped once the guy came off, but my opinion was he lost any consideration from me with all him crap talking at the start.
I'll out myself as well and I'm not proud of this story. When I moved up to 125's and 250's, I started out in the B class and Schoolboy class. With my hormones raging, I admit I had a very bad temper. Went to a local race and I was the only B rider so they put me on the line with the novice class. I let them go off the gate and took off aafter they got through the first turn. I caught up to about 4th or 5th and got stuck behind 3 guys battling. It was holding me up and I got pissed. After 2 laps of not finding a way around, we dropped into a pit that had a 180 degree turn and I dove hard inside, purposely trying to take out one of the guys. I ended up taking him, another rider and myself out. He got up and gave me a WTF so I jumped him in a fit of rage. I'm not proud of it and that was one of the last times I ever raced (may ave actually been my last race). I was a very angry kid and a pretty big ass hole at the time. Like I said, it wasn't my proudest moment and I regret it to this day. Someone could have been seriously hurt because I was unable to control my emotions.
I have known him for 30 years now and he is the sales manager at a huge Honda dealer so I need to buy him lunch one of these days and fess up even though he probably knows I did it on purpose and yes I would do it again.
Pit Row
What are some things that guys say at the starting gate to psych out each other?
Another time I made a pretty aggressive pass on a rider who I won't say because he is still in the industry and hss a fadt kid. Anyway after the checker flag he ghosted his bike at me so hard it bent my sub frame.
I had a Yamaha factory rider want to kill me because I was getting to close to him on the downhill at Mammoth and I was screaming the whole way down. It did it for two or three laps and he wasn't happy at all.
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