Industry Insights | Ft. Rodney Smith 3

In this edition of Industry Insights we catch up with a legendary off-road racer and Hall of Famer, Rodney Smith. Rodney discusses his early career racing pro motocross and Supercross and how that led to racing in Brazil and then the MXGPs. He talks about why he switched to off-road and his success there. He's now an ambassador and does press relations for Beta Motorcycles.

For the full interview, check out the Vital MX podcast right here. There are a number of additional Rodney Smith stories in the audio version. If you're interested in the condensed written version, scroll down just a bit further.

Jamie Guida – Vital MX: I’ve recently started getting into off-road and doing some GNCCs, so having another off-road legend on is exciting for me.

Rodney Smith: It’s a bit different of a sport, and people who don’t do it don’t realize what it’s all about or how hard it really is. 

Vital MX: I believe the athletes are underrated. 

Rodney: It’s like any other sport. We’re trained to do that type of racing, and it’s brutal, but every type of racing is brutal. You have to train yourself for it, and me coming from the West Coast to race against guys in the East Coast woods was harder. I wasn’t familiar with those types of conditions, such as tree roots. 

Vital MX: You grew up in Northern California. Did your family ride?

Rodney: Yeah. My dad rode enduros and stuff like that locally around Northern California. I had an older brother who rode, and my mom rode. We went camping and were weekend warriors. We went almost every weekend and loved trail riding. I developed quicker than most kids my age, so I was always on a bigger bike than the kids my age. Around 1978, when I was about twelve, I talked my dad into buying me a Suzuki RM80 to ride at the campgrounds and get on the little tracks with the kids my age. We did well, and our friend, Al Posey, ran a motorcycle shop and talked my dad into taking me racing. I was thirteen, and in that era, when you turned fourteen, you had to ride a big bike. So, I could only ride the 80 for half of a year. At fourteen, you were in the Sportsman class. What’s funny is I was trail riding on an IT175 because we didn’t have the money to buy me a motocross bike. Once I outdated the 80 class, I rode my IT175 in the 250-novice class and turned intermediate on it. I did well on it because I was small, so it fit me. Then, when I turned intermediate, my dad bought me a YZ250 to race motocross. I turned pro on the YZ250, and my dad got me my first 125. We got into the pro class on 125 and 250s. I developed quickly, and the off-road riding was on the back burner. I was a full motocrosser for about fifteen years. 

Vital MX: You started your pro career in 1982 and did some nationals, correct?

Rodney: 1982 was my senior year in high school, and I did a few nationals to get my feet wet. In ’83, I did the whole circuit with Yamaha and got tenth. 

Vital MX: How did you get involved with Yamaha?

Rodney: Back then, we called it a support rider. I got two bikes and maybe a couple of thousand dollars in parts. Enough to go racing. There was also contingency, and it was a good deal. It opened the doors. The only issue I had was the ’84 bike was very slow. Me and Mike Bayer struggled on them. I was doing a lot of testing because their tester was up in Northern California. I learned a lot because we’d get a bike that was the fastest I’d ever ridden around the block, and I’d go out on the track and be the slowest. Once you put a load on the motor, it wouldn’t pull. Long story short, we struggled. I had some good motos. I got third in a couple of motos, but then DNF another because we were trying different things. Yamaha promised me that in 1985, the bike would be much better because it was all new. So, I stayed with them, thinking ’85 would be my year. The ’85 was way slower than the ’84. We got to Gainesville, and Keith Bowen and I were the only ones on them. I asked if I could ride the 500 class, but they said, “No, you guys are the only two in the 125 class. We need you in there.” I didn’t want to go another year fighting, testing, and having up-and-down results because it was time to prove myself. I went to the Daytona Supercross; it was only a 250 class back then. I got thirteenth, and some scouts had come from Brazil and asked me to come race there. So, I took that route.

Vital MX: Why would Yamaha let you go to Brazil if there weren’t many guys riding the 125 in America?

Rodney: I didn’t realize how big of a deal it was then. Yamaha of Brazil talked to Yamaha of Japan and got us out of our contracts. Kenny Keylon and I both went. I believe it was a bit of a struggle for a while. When we went to Brazil in ’85, they had some decent factory Honda riders in the 125 class. Their bikes were so much better that Kenny and I struggled. We didn’t dominate the 125 class. Then, in the 250 class, he and I would run away with it because we had the power.

Vital MX: What was the moto scene like there? How did the locals feel about you racing there?

Rodney: They didn’t like us originally. They would say, “Gringos go home.” A lot of people did want us there, but a good number, like the Factory Honda riders, didn’t. There was one who really gave me a fuss down there. From day one, he tried to get us out of there. He tried to make sure the Americans couldn’t race, which I understand. There were about three Factory Honda riders, and they were making about 500 grand a year. Kenny and I went down for less than a third of that, which kind of ruined it for them. Honda was like, “These guys are beating you. Yamaha isn’t paying them that much. We’re just going to go to America and get some riders.” So, they didn’t want that to happen. The first year, they made a rule that Kenny and I couldn’t earn points in the championship. We could get the prize money and trophy, but we wouldn’t get points until we lived there for a year. In the second year, I won both the 125 and 250 championships. In the third year, I won three because they also had a national class championship. 

Vital MX: Your time in Brazil led to an opportunity in Europe. Talk about that.

Rodney: When the GP came to Brazil in ’86, Eddie Warren came for Kawasaki, and Micky Dymond came down. Well, I got second in the first moto and third in the second on basically a stock Cagiva 125. It’s crazy because works bikes were a lot more impressive then. Then, in ’87, I rode Hondas, and I won everything. They were good bikes. When the GPs came to South America, I won three out of six motos on a stock Honda. All the riders were saying, “Well, he knows the track. He lives here in Brazil.” It pissed me off. My boss asked, “Have you ever been to Argentina?” I said, “No.” He goes, “Well, we’re going next week,” because the GP would be there. I won both motos by twelve or thirteen seconds. 

Vital MX: You then got to race the GPs and had some good results. You finished third in the 250 World Championship in ’88 and got seventh in ’89. 

Rodney: Yeah. I struggled and came home for a month before Unadilla because there was a month or two break in the schedule. I bought some jet skis and got an ear infection before the Unadilla GP. That kind of lost me the championship. I had been right there. 

Vital MX: It sounds like in 1990, you were just ready to go home. It had become work.

Rodney: In ’89, I was in third to the last race, and in the last moto, my silencer broke. I ended up fifth or something. I wasn’t having fun anymore. I remember waking up and thinking, “What time do I have to ride today?” I thought, “Wait a minute. I ‘have’ to go riding? I should want to go.” I didn’t want to go. I didn’t enjoy living in Italy as much as I did in Brazil. It wasn’t my kind of lifestyle. 

Vital MX: So, you come home and ‘retire’ but start riding off-road for fun. Somehow, in ’92, you ended up on the ISDE team in Australia and finished second. How does a retired motocrosser end up on the ’92 ISDE team?

Rodney: I returned to my grassroots riding enduros and stuff like that. Virginia City Gran Prix was always a big deal, and it was coming up. I told my dad, “Let’s do that race.” My brother had done it before, and we went up there. Larry Roesler won it like ten times in a row or something. I went up and beat him. I destroyed him. I didn’t even know what I was doing. My dad was pitting me, and you pit right before the finish line. It was seven minutes before the checkered flag came out. The lap before, I had a thirteen-minute lead. My dad said, “You can wait for seven minutes, roll across, and win. If you choose to go, you have to finish this next lap to win.” The laps were an hour. I said, “That doesn’t make much sense. Why would I not win? So, I rode the whole last lap and came in an hour later than everybody. I did one more lap than anyone else. I won the race, and everybody’s gone. From there, I did four qualifiers that year and won all of them. At the time, Dave Bertram was a temporary manager at Suzuki. He called me and asked, “If I could get you on the ISDE team, would you go?” I said, “Yeah, sure.” We went, and when the results came out after day one, we were one, two, and three overall. On day two, I crashed on a test and lost thirty-seven seconds. I lost the Six Days by thirty-three. 

Vital MX: The next year, in ’93, Suzuki hired you full-time for off-road. You won thirteen AMA titles. Five GNCC, three Hare Scramble, and five AMA National Reliability titles. That’s a historic career. You’re also third all-time in GNCC wins. 

Rodney: I saw that the other day. I hadn’t even realized that. When Suzuki hired me, one of their best things was teaming me up with Mark Hyde. He was working for Suzuki doing dual sports, and they made him my mechanic. He kept my bikes back east in Ohio, and I would fly to his house. We’d go do the National Hare Scrambles, the Six Days Series, and occasionally GNCCs. Then Mike Webb makes a change and says, “We’re going to race GNCCs only.” I didn’t like them because they were different. They were tighter and more technical. Now, I had to figure it out and adapt. In the first year, I almost won the championship but had some bad luck. I won the next two years, didn’t win it the third, then two more in a row. Then I didn’t win one but won again the year after when I was forty. It took a lot out of me when I was forty. 

Vital MX: You retired again for a few years until Beta comes calling. You start there as a trainer/rider coach. Talk about that.

Rodney: They called at the right time. It was a perfect opportunity. I did it for six months in 2016, and they liked it. Then, they hired me full-time. About six months later, they wanted me to be the team manager. It was good. It was a lot of work. My whole family transitioned and moved to Idaho, which was fine because I was flying to all the races. Beta had bigger plans for its future and was building a new facility in Paso Robles, California. The opportunity came to hire Carlen Gardner as the Team Manager because they wanted him to be at the shop. I knew I wasn’t going to move back to California. Tim Pilg, Beta USA President, asked, “What do you think about us keeping your salary and everything the same but making you the brand ambassador? You can go do rides and stuff across the country. You would also take care of all the press bikes for magazines.” So, it’s a dream job.