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John Madden never played a single down of Pro football. - Yet he is in the pro football hall of fame.
Testing and setting up a motorcycle is a lot different than riding one fast.
Based on the logic of some here, the only people who are qualified to make an observation and/or critique of James are people who can beat him on the track. Is that right? Okay, so from now on, we can't comment on any rider we can't beat. Damn, this place (Vital) is going to be a ghost town.
crazy , forgot that preston rode the kawi , but i bet he didn't ride james suspension specs on it, i doub't he did a single lap on jame's setup.
To say that he doesn't look better on the Zook than he did on the Yamaha destroys TP's credibility, however. Anyone with a brain can say that, when comparing the two, he looks much more like the Stewart of old.
Pit Row
For what it's worth, I agree with Preston. Just because the guy knows how to set up a bike better doesn't mean he would have to automatically be faster than James, so saying he isn't qualified to critique JS is Bush league.
Oh. Was Travis Preston Stewart's coach? I know he teaches kids how to stand on the balls of their feet on a 50cc machine, but didn't realize he coached James.
Anyway, this got out of hand in a hurry. What I meant to say was, I personally don't give two shits about what Travis Preston really thinks about anything. He was a good rider, so were dozens of other people whose opinion I also couldn't care less about.
He won 2 races and crashed out just like he did on the Yamaha this year. I would hold back on saying that he looks like the Stewart of old, unless you mean the Stewart of old 2012 supercross.
That's pretty vague and I can make such a claim about a lot of people without being wrong.
Also he's not telling James HOW to do it. Just that he's doing it wrong. I don't know shit about putting on makeup but I know when a woman fucks that up.
on a motocross track that is 1.5 miles long, if you complete a lap 4 seconds faster than someone else, how much faster are you going on average in miles per hour?
this argument that a former top ten pro motocrosser doesn't understand bike set up is odd to me. can't we assume that james is making time on some other riders, by fractions of a second in each corner and other fractions through various sections of the course. but it isn't anything more than a fraction of a second if it at the end of a lap it totals 4, right?
the idea that somehow he or ricky or chad, etc, are on some other plane, when really they are fractionally faster (and can maintain that) seems mistaken.
please show me i'm wrong by addressing what i said, i'm sure that you can point out how i'm stupid in other ways.
Look at every other sport and you will realise that the majority of the time the coaches are able to see what works and what doesn't but most likely could not perform the skills themselves.
I'm from Australia so can't really apply this to any American sports, but in Rugby here in Australia we have seen many former rugby players progress into coaching roles, and not many of these transitions have been successful.
I assume that the vast majority of NBA coaches never actually played NBA?
Look at a sport like Tennis, was Rafa Nadal's uncle a great tennis player? No. Yet he has developed and pushed Rafa into the player he is today.
Why should this be any different for Motocross? Why do you need to have a "resume" to critique a rider? Why do many professional riders hire past legends to coach them? Why is it assumed that to be a good coach you needed to be a great rider?
And besides, Travis Preston does have a strong resume, is now a successful coach, and was known to be an excellent test rider.
Post a reply to: Preston on JS7