Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

" Show me a good loser, and I'll show you a loser," says Clark w ho's been In motorcycle racing since 1952. Negotiat ing contracts w ith Yamaha' s 500cc World Road Racing Champion Ken ny Ro berts is only part of Clark 's re sponsibility. Ke.n Clark The man behind Yamaha's racing success By Pat Eagan Few people in 't he world have'a job that requires m ore of themselves th an Ken Clark's. H e puts in his nine to five at the office , and then , on m ost weekends, he will catch a p la n to a racetrack far from his home in Cali forni a . A dozen times a year he will fly to Europe or South Ame r ica to oversee the activities of 20 "King" Kenny Roberts , ? ur newly crowned 500cc Road Racing W orld Cha mpion . If . he is not assisting Robe rts. he WIll probabl>: be a t a mot<><;ross. track somewhere In the .U.S. coord ina ting th e efforts of th e highly successful Ya ma ha team . Many a re the . weeke~ds that he has gone a lmost entl,rely w~t~out sleep because of the . . d utJe.s of h is ~ob . It I~ Clark s competitive na tu re th a t go t him where he IS today , He has an o ve r p o.we r i ng ~ e s ire to win ~t everrthlng he tries . Wh~ther he IS pla ying racque tball or gOIng after a Worl~,Championship, first place is t~e . goa l. Show me a good loser and I II show yo~ a lose~ , "?e sar s . ~lark s ~egln mng in motorcycle racmg was In 1952. After on ly a yea r of compet ition in sou thern Cal iforn ia's AMA ~ist.rict 37 scra":lbles racing, he was t h ~ rd In Expert points. In fact, .he won his ~rst race , the famed Catalina Gra nd Prix. His range of competition is not restricted to just motorcycles He has successfu lly rac ed go karts , AA Fuel dragsters , and drag boats. But , his main passion must be motorcycle ra cing for he returned to it from th e world of top fuelers. W hen asked about his relationship with Yama ha , ho w he got to where he is today, and wha t were his plans for the im media te future , he replied : "T he first time I came to Yamaha was in Novem ber , 1972 , to stra ighten out th e motocross program. I came in here as th e assistant to Pete Schi ck who was the raci ng manager the n, ; nd hired Pierre Karsmakers and Tim H art . Pierre was t he National Ch ampion th at Year , which ....as 1973 , the first fu ll vear that I was here, Tim did well, I th ink he was th e firs t American in th e T ra ns-AMA tha t year . "T he followi ng year, I d id th e Daytona ro ad ra ce and a few other things and th en I resigned a nd went off o n m y own . I work ed fo r Ca rroll Shelby getting his marketing p rogra m stuck together for h is wheels, and worked on my own in a construction business. Tha t took up abou t a year and a half a nd then , two years ago in November of '76, I was in here to ge t some pa rts for my dirt bike a nd one of the J apan ese vice-preside nts saw me a nd asked wha t I was d oing. I told him , Just loafi ng at the m oment .' H e asked me if I was still interested in motorcycles. I sai d 'Sure, I always have been .' "T h ree days later I got a ca ll from one of the Am eri ca n vice- pr esiden ts asking me if I'd be interested in ta king over the whole ra cing department since they were going to tra nsfer Pete some whe re else. I sa id 'Sure .' I ca me bac k and I've been here ever since, which woul d be No vem be r of '76 . That's two years now so total abou t th ree and a ha lf yea rs, almost fou r . I'm going to try to win everythi ng again thi s year , a nd after th at , it's open." In the real world , som etimes it's difficult to ' estab lish the co rrel a tion between th e sport (racing) and the p roduct (sa les). Upon be ing asked his opinion on whether or not mo torcycle, sales are generated by racing success, Clark repl ied without he sitation : "Absolutelyl I just talked to a dea ler in Florida th is morning, RayHempstead . His son rac es out of his shop and he says his son accoun ts for about four YZS a month - just from his son 's racing - and he's only an Amateur. Last yea r we went down and did th e Florida series on th e production bikes and swept every thi ng ou t dow n th ere and sold out th e YZ allotment fo r Flo rida insi de of a mo n th . It absolutely does sell motorcycles. It's a little, m ore d ifficult to prove t h e relationship between (Wi nston Pro Series) d irt track a nd sa les. It 's very eas y to p rove the relationship between motocross and mo tocross bike sa les." Ken Roberts is our new 500cc Roa d Racing World Cham pion , and yet, at th e start of his victorious season , he was hamstrung by equipment that was infe rior to h is Japanese fa c t ory cou nt erp a rt Oohnny Cecotto). "At the sta rt of '78, I tri ed to conv ince th e fac to ry tha t Kenny Roberts was the best road rac er in th e world," sai d Cla rk . "I was met with a great deal of res istance . They sa id , ' He hasn't proven himself in the rain .' When I

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