lusk

No offense, but there will never will be another Jeremy McGrath.

He didn’t ride a Honda until it was too late 

I think the reason he wasn't the next Jeremy McGrath is because he had to race against Jeremy McGrath lol

Inconsistency and crashes. 

Injuries, had to race MC and RC two of the most dominant racers in the history of the sport. 

Ezra is one of the coolest and most underrated guys of that era. Extremely humble and down to earth, great riding style too. 

2000 he busted his shoulder in what was arguably going to be his prime year. Killer rider with awesome style that had a great career albeit no big class championships. I love seeing him throw his double can-can over the triples.

I wouldn’t really ask “what happened” to him lol. Apparently he still rips on a 2 stroke from time to time 

Lusk was no slouch.

Ezra and Trey seemed to have the same fate; fast enough but hit the ground too hard too often.

MC himself has said when Ezra was ON, he was worried....

I can't remember what year or round, but at some race in the 90's there was a whoop section that was so nasty they looked like a row of 3 footers from a rhythm section, and Lusk was the ONLY guy skimming them. On a Honda, if I'm remembering correctly. 

I met Ezra probably 6 or 7 years ago at Talking Rock MX, north of Atlanta, Georgia.  He was so polite, humble, and pleasant to talk with.

He was one of the best in the McGrath era at stringing together massive jumps in rhythm sections; he sure had a nac for stringing together big jumps.

I think injuries and inconsistency kept him from reaching his full potential.

He was one of the very few to have factory rides on all 4 Japanese bikes.  Only other rider that comes to mind is Warren Reid.  There could be others.

Great guy and a hell of a talent.

I think that was Seattle but I could be getting lusk confused with Damon Huffman. One of them gave MC fits there. 

Huffman on the kawi.  I was there.  I was at Woodstock in 69 as well.

Ezra was a local to me in the early 80's when he was just getting started.  If most folks knew what a meager background he came from they would be amazed.  
He was always fast but he did hit the ground way too often.  He punished bikes even when he was on 65's.

I remember hearing how hard he was on equipment. He could do stuff to parts they couldn’t duplicate. Very cool.

I remember watching a national on tv back in the mid 90’s and a Yamaha guy came into the pits with a pair of broken handlebars.one of the sides was broken off and hanging down. Pretty sure it was Ezra ??? That must have been scary whatever the story was. Kept me using crossbars for quite a few more years. 

You, sir, win the internet today with that knockout combo👍

I’ll never forget when he rag dolled on the RM 125. It was at Budd’s Creek if I recall correctly. So gnarly. 

I got my first dog about 2.5 years ago now and wanted his name to have some sort of moto influence. Meet Yogi. 

I suggest watching his interview on Whiskey Throttle. He's very open about several things including his headspace after his brother got injured and the troubles with his parents that were a huge distraction. And of course, if I remember right, which bikes were junk and the ones that were great. But it's one of my favorite. I have a whole new perspective of him and his career after watching it.

The video of Yogi ragdolling to AIC “Them Bones” will forver be etched into my brain… perfect soundtrack for that crash….

This is one of the best posts ever!  Luck was definitely a charger!

Why don't moto people post on vital???

That first gen Honda Aluminum frame is what happened to him … it was atrocious how bad it was, ask Jeremy how bad it was! 

I was a big Ezra fan when I was a kid. I had a bunch of his posters on my walls.  He actually made that POS gen1 frame and bike look good.

This is exactly what happened.

Those 2 gens 97-01 of the frame were terrible. You could hit a jump 5 times and have thay chassis unload differently each lap. Blasting down a straight and hitting bumps and it would just unload the energy in the weirdest unexpected way.  I didn't understand that until I rode a buddys kx125 and another's  yz125

Had yogi stayed on yamaha  I'm pretty sure he might have gotten at least 1. At least a damn good shot

Ezra is my all time favorite rider. So much so I now have a 16 year old son named Ezra. Cool name. Cool rider. 

Ezra always came out swinging but it seemed like once he got to the Seattle round or somewhere close he would have one of those races that cost him a title. Just couldn’t do that with a guy like Jeremy who if he didn’t win.. he was going to get second. 

My favorite Yogi races was the first few rounds of the 99 season. 99 southwick and the year he beat Reed on a Kawi. 

Phoenix ‘03 is one of my favorite races to this day. I raced an ‘03 KX 250 that year so I was all over the Lusk bandwagon. That was his last win, I believe. The race is on YouTube.