Let's talk about Roger

I immediately thought about Roger Federer

Roger needed to retire 20 years ago.

You mean, in 2005, when he was managing RC at Suzuki? Why?

Absolute living legend! Comment about retiring 20 years ago is absolutely ridiculous considering what he has done at KTM in the last 10 or so years.

I’m 24 and met Roger in the pits after Tampa SX this year and it was one of the only times I’ve really felt star struck. He talked with me and a friend for as long as we wanted and was cool as can be. Roger’s a legend, definitely on my Mount Rushmore of Motocross. 

Roger is the hero of more than 1 generation of my family and has been for over 40 years

I'd say most folks today think that Moto is a USA sport, not realizing it was imported from Europe and Roger probably more than anyone else is responsible for establishing Moto to what it is today in the U.S.  Just typical of History...most currently players think they are the sport and ignorant of the people before them.  I know we talk about Hannah and the greats in this forum, but there were a lot of great riders before the 80's too.

Yep...that's Roger.  For me, an old fugger that watched this whole thing being born, Roger was and is moto.  

He told me that he was thinking about retiring around 2008 but the real estate financial mess hurt him pretty bad.  Probably a blessing in disguise...he's not the sort to sit around sipping umbrella drinks and he seems to have done ok after Suzuki.

It is crazy to think how long he has been very active in the industry, considering how much of a grind the travel can be. 

Roger is a true icon of the sport. I don't think there is anybody in the sport that even compares, except for maybe Mitch.

Yeah, I don’t know if Mitch goes to every round anymore, but when you think about how much harder his travel can be than for most of us, it really makes you understand how passionate he is about his place in the sport. It doesn’t seem like he ever uses his injury and condition as an excuse for anything, but damn it’s got to make so many things that most of us take for granted incredibly difficult. I know it may sound hyperbolic, but he has to be seen as a hero and an incredible inspiration to those who have suffered an SCI, and really for those of us who haven’t as well. 

I had some minutes with Roger at a diner over breakfast one cold Sunday morning.  It was before a Trans AM event back in the day.  I had just started riding my shiny new Suzuki JR 50, and he was my hero.  He told me a few things I should do to be safer, and to quit putting so much sugar in my oatmeal.......  "That is what your jam on your toast is for Son..... "

Roger can retire when Roger wants to retire. Legends have earned that option. The Man was racing Marty Smith and Bob Hannah, and he is still relevant in the sport. That's amazing! 

When I was like 12, I wrote a letter to American Suzuki, asking them to give me an RM125. I got some stickers, patches and an autographed photo of Roger. Been a fan ever since. Two decades later, I finally got to see him in person at a round of the pre-season Golden State series at Perris Raceway. He was managing Team Honda, and it was the first full year of some French dude named Bayle…

I talked to him briefly at Budds Creek in '22. I thanked him for giving us Dungey and Cairoli for the summer. 

His response? "I'd  like to see them on the podium." Classic Roger. Gotta love that old dude. 

Bob Hannah totally respects Roger. 

You can hear this in various podcasts he (Hannah) has done. Ping has a great Hannah Whiskey Throttle show as a reference. 

It's the complete opposite of how he feels about Howerton

I met him in the pits many years ago during the phx SX when he was the mgr of Team Suzuki and my young son was with me. It was my first time meeting and talking to him. When my son saw him he said... " Wow a living legend" to which Roger replied. To Dads maybe. What a great day it was for me . He was very kind, humble and fun to talk to. I talked with him about a works bike of his on display at a Oldsmobile dealership in Tucson from his trans AMA days. I had finally got to meet and talk to my moto hero and I left even more impressed and with more respect for him than before. He is and always will be a massive icon in the sport of Motocross. Huge, HUGE respect for him and all his accomplishments on and off the track .

     It does seem like sometimes the depth of DeCoster's influence and impact, globally, is less than fully appreciated now... This is a great thread, and it's so good to see him still going strong after so many years.
    I've been having some fun in my own geezerhood in setting down memories from some early years spent riding local motocross in New Mexico, and this bit came to mind when reading through this thread (I was 17, and had just gotten my first actual race bike, a CZ 125)...  Ye Gods, this was over a half-century ago:

    Two years in a row some of us drove to Phoenix to see the Trans-AMA round there.  The second time we went, Roger DeCoster kindly signed my program under his picture; no lines, you just walked up to the riders in the pits.  I didn’t speak Belgian, but then I was so nervous I wasn’t really speaking English either when I approached him: “Ughhhable brenolg uhl?”  Well, he probably got that a lot.  Back home, I found that I somehow had two programs from the race, probably a mixup when packing at the motel.  I found myself staring at DeCoster’s signature (which is really cool) in that one, imagining what it might feel like to have some stranger walk up to you all tongue-tied and wide-eyed and ask you to sign something for them, then walk off thrilled, just because you could ride a motorcycle extremely well...  I got some blank sheets of paper and tried to copy his signature, and suddenly hours had passed, several sheets of paper now covered with my attempts.  I compared the latest ones to DeCoster’s, and had to admit they were pretty good.  Now it was almost time to go to work, I’d lost an afternoon’s practice laps, but who needed to practice anyway?  There’s no telling how fast I would ride if I could just perfectly copy DeCoster’s signature, I reasoned.  Ah, to dream...  I opened the other program and signed his name exactly where he had done so in the ‘real’ one.  Wow.  It REALLY looked like his signature.  I thought about calling in to work and going riding instead, to see how much faster I was now, but it was almost sunset anyway so uncharacteristic sanity prevailed.  I set the 
programs aside and went to work. 
    Strangely, though, I wasn’t riding any faster at all in the ensuing days.  How could this be?  I could sign DeCoster’s name almost as well as he could, why was I still going so slow?  And, as the programs got shuffled around in the course of daily doings, I soon found that (Shit.) I could never again know for sure which one of them was the one he had actually signed, rendering them both basically useless as keepsakes.  

There was a lesson somewhere in all that, but if I had been smart enough to know what it was I wouldn’t have done it in the first place. 

We can't have a post without some pics of "The Man". The rider DeCoster.

Roger IS motocross... period

And think how many champions he managed after RC. What a ridiculous comment 

Where is that?

Ozzy was the lead singer of Black Sabbath...that, as well as his awesome personality, kindness, and great sense of humour, is why he's an icon. 

He's done more for the sport than anyone. Total legend and completely deserved. 

https://youtu.be/0y6KAW72ix0?feature=shared

Paraphrasing here but this was from month or so ago and he basically said he's doing this for as long as he's physically able. 

1977, Trans AMA. Cycle World St Pete Missouri

https://racerxonline.com/issue/august-2020/gate-pics

I believe this is the first downvote I've handed out. Roger is a legend, and his contributions cannot be understated. 

Why wouldn't he keep doing this? Roger is MX. Some people are just driven winners, Roger is the epitome of that. I don't think he could mentally live a life away from MX.  It's funny how many of us old guys met him and he took the time to talk with us. Can you imagine any and everywhere you go you can't get away from people who idolize you? You have no personal time as everyone wants to come up and talk to you. I can't think of a name that has advanced the sport through riding, equipment, management, and making champions of others. Anyone remember when MJ became manager of the Lakers? And he said something to the effect of this new crop of players are unmanageable because of their own ego? To think how many generations of riders he's molded into champions in spite of their own ego is in and of it's self is unimaginable.