Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

; III • ~ = 1C) r--. 0'1 ~ 00 C'l ~~ ~ Q,) ..0 0 ... · u 0 AN INTERVIEW WITH 'ROCKET'REX'STATEN By Rex William Reese In Cucamonga , Califo rn ia lives o ne of the pr ime candidates fo r the first Amer ican Motocross Wo rld Champio n. But at his cu rre nt rate of success, it won't happen right awav . Rex Staten has bee n plagued by bad luck for th e past year. Rex won the firs t race he entered. All his races have bee n fun for hi m. While oth e r longhaired, wildeyed Pro wo nderkids rave about partying all night and flyi ng WFO the next day, Rex is out running his t hree m iles a day, working ou t with we ighU , and rid ing h is bike un til it dis integrates. When he rides , he has fun - do ing wheel ies and cress-ups to please the paying spectators - another facet of his life that is based upon his de sire to become World Champ. The day before I talked wit h Rex, he had just raced the AC·Delco Championship in Riverside with a busted wrist, a cracked rib and a screwed up bike. Wh ile lead ing the race for seven laps , the CZ's head started leak ing and the bike started dy ing, bu t Rex managed to stave off Mitch Maves until th e last lap, winn ing second overall and $390 for all his time, pain, and effort. Rex's dad met nie at the door of the Staten home, and showed me to the kitchen where Rex and his fr iend Harry Klem were having breakfast. Harry had fin ished his meal, and Rex was int o his second helping of eggs and potatoes. There were at least a half dozen vitamin bottles on that table. Rex takes good ca re of himself. Later we talked in his bedroom, where he keeps all of his trophies and racing mementos. Rex sat down on his bed with a pa ined loo k in his " es because he knew ey that he could have done a lot better t he day before. Then he talked about all t he things that were on his mind that cloudy September morning. 14 Not many people know a lot about you, except that you're regarded as very fast, and have been described by many as very crazy. . I do n't think that I 'm crazy. I just like sports. I grew up riding motorcycles. I just want to be a p rofessional motorcycle rider, because I want to be World's Champion on e of these days. But my lu c k ain't too goo d yet. How bad is your luck? I broke my arm, [in West Virginia] , and hurt my ankles on Hondas. I ke pt breaking my ankles riding, because the fo otpegs kept hitting the ground. So I just quit. And I started riding Maicos because they pr omis ed a good ride. But the n they didn 't give me nothing - they only gave me th e shaft . T hen I went to CZ, an d I do n 't get no salary, or nothing. When d id you tum Pro? My dad thought I was ready when I was 17 . Jim Fishback's dad was always pushing h im to turn Pro real fas t. And he di d . But he really didn't know that much when he started racing, an d he got hurt a couple o f times. (But) I did good . I never was an Intermediate, I always was a Junior. My dad kept me back for a long time because he didn't want me to become an .Expe rt. and get hurt. I stayed back two years and rode all different tracks to get use to it. Then, when I went Pro, it was a lot easier for me. I knew a lot more, instead of going right into it without knowing anything. I rode desert for a year, and motocross for a year - Novice. Then, after that, I went to a CMC race in Utah and signed up as Intermediate. I had the fastest lap time in practice, so they made me an Ex pert, and I was only a Novice! You ju st rode the AC·Delco Champion ship at Riverside and got second overall. What h appened t here? There was the race Saturday for the po le position , and I had the first lap until Mitch Mayes passed me. But before the en d of the lap , I passed him over these do uble jumps, then I had the lead and won it. So I go t the po le position for Sunday . Sunday, I go t th e holeshot for the first turn and almost led it for I I laps. Then on my seventh lap, the (cylinder head) stud started to go out on me, so I started saving the bike so it wouldn't blow up. I was j ust riding and praying it would make it . It got so bad that when Mitch crashed, I had three-fourths of a lap, but I tried to save my bike. And when he caught and passed me , I didn't have power down the straightaway. When he went by me, he just went waaaoo ou uu • . . How did your ar m fee l? Oh , good. My arm didn't hurt me. It was just bad main tenance. They should have really checked it a lot better and put in 10 millimeter studs, instead of eight. How did your arm get busted in the first place? I was in West Virgina [the last 250 Inter-AM even t] . It was in th e seco nd mo ta, and S teve Stackable crashed in front of me . When I hit h im, his back wheel rose in the air, and m y fro n t whe el jammed into it and jammed my hand in to the handlebar, and broke the main bone in my wrist. This thing [the cast on his left arm] has been on for a month, and I have to have it on fo r two more months. When d id you get hit by the crescent wrench? About two mo nths ago . I was ridin g through the pits, and this guy ran out from behind the cars and hit me in the face with the crescent wrench. Why? I was lapping his brother, Jeff Weatherall - he j ust looked back at me and tried to cut me off. I just shut off so he wouldn't knock me down, 'cause I was leading it. I just cam e over to him on the outside and gave him the elbow. Then I "roosed" on him, clutched it to get him out of the way. That's all that went on. Then I went on a co uple of laps to the finish . J im West came in second, and I sh ook his hand. Then I was rid ing through the pits, and I had my head turned to see where I was going. That's when I got hit. It must've really h urt. It did! Just ripped my nose wide open. How does it feel now? It 's OK, but I can't breathe through it. It affects me o n long motos. I'm going to get it reamed out - I tell everybody that I'm getting bored first over to give me more horsepower! Who gave you your first Pro ride? Maico, Warren Burrell called me up and asked me to come down and ride on one of the Maicos, and he'd give me a good deal. Before th at, I was always buying all my own parts and bikes for my CZ. Maico said they'd give me all my parts and bikes and I said " OK, that sounds good," I went down and rode one, and it was the best bike I ever rode in my life. It handled so good. But I rode them for a while, and I broke a lot. I learned how to maintain them, and got them working good. Then Honda came and offered me . They had money and stuff. I though t it was a lot better, and I went with them, but I kept hurting my ankles. I liked the bikes, they were fast, arid I go t along with the pe op le and everything, bu t I just kep t breaking my ankle. I d id n ' t want to break my ankles the rest of my life. How long d id you stav with Maico? A year. I was wit h CZ a year, Maico a year, Hon da a year. Then I rod e an Ossa at the beginning of this year. How did you get the ride? I didn't have a m o to rcycle or noth ing, and a friend up at GT Kawasaki, J oh n Coutee, told me I could ride his Ossa. There was an AMA qualifier at San ta Cruz, and I took the stock bike and got second! Over all the factory bikes? Yeah. Tony DiStefano won. When you were With Maico , you appeared to be very satisfied with your ride ; so was it money, or more than money, that Honda offered? I got a salary from Honda, all my expenses paid. They flew me to all the races, where when you got to drive back East, you don't feel that good. You got to sleep in the truck, and you don't have showers or nothing. With this, they flew me, and paid my hotels. This is the way it should have been with all the factories. But like Maico and CZ, they're small factories, and they don't have th at' mu ch mon ey . Ho nda h as lots of bikes they sell, and th ey got lo ts of bucks.. Were they in need of someone to he lp deve lop the RC 400? Yeah. They'd just come ou t with the 400, and they wanted someon e to test it. And that's what I did all year, j ust test it. But we co uld n ' t get the bugs wo rked out. We got the bugs worked out first race in Daytona. I didn't even ride the bike . I went back to Daytona, hopped on it, and raced. Beat DeCoster in the first mota . It was really fast: I Rot the

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