Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

pretty much down at all races. So that's why the average age in Europe is older than it is here. But the age in Europe is coming down also. One reason is there are more people who can afford to buy good equipment for their kids. When I was young I had to make the money myself and buy the bike by- myself and tune it myself. I had won Grand Prix, and I was still my own mechanic, and I was traveling by myself, and I was fixing the bike by myself, even ~n the beats. o 00 0'). ~ "If the industry puts all their money z'nto stadz'um races, then the TZ'ding areas are goz'ng to close more and more because the promoters for the outdoor races wzll have no way to compete anymore. " you have some ragged edges early on? I used to be pretty wild and make a lot of mistakes. But I was learning from the mistakes. I watched the good riders of the time who were very smooth, and I would get very mad at myself when I made mistak~. Even sometimes I would win races and people would say, "great race," and I would know that I had made mistakes in the race. There were other times where I knew I did a good race but I finished second. "The most important thing to do is work on your weak points. Everybody has weak points. " 10 Is part of developing smoothness the realization sometimes that if you go a little bit slower you'll have a lot more control? Yes. I think it's important to always keep control of yourself, not to overdo it. That's very difficult in a race be· cause you have so much hangup of going fast that you forget to concen· trate on the lines to t~e and about being smooth. The problem is to pace yourself, fast enough, but not too fast to find your safe point. Did you have to make a mental effort to concentrate on being smooth or did it gradually come from experience? I was always very much in awe of very smooth riders. Like when they jumped they would not touch the ground like a bag of potatoes. Did you have heroes in your early days? I very much.liked Sten Lundin. The Swedish champion. Yes. And I liked watching Joel and racing with Joel. Some of the things he did were so much better than anyone else at the time, so smooth also. And Aberg did very nice things even before he won the World Championship. Some of things he would do would be just fantastic even if- he made mistakes on other parts of the track. Those things gave me so much pleasure. I was so impressed. One thing that really helped me de· velop into a smooth rider was caring about the bike. If I came down hard in a jump, it really hurts me to feel the bike getting hurt. So I have always tried to adjust my riding to save the bike. It really upsets me when I feel the bike getting a hard impact. It's like when you drive with someone who cracks the gears in a car. It just drives me crazy. Like if you are overrevving it or bottoming ,the shocks, it feels so anti·mechanical. You came over in '67, the year after Tonten Hallman fim came over. So you've seen the birth and growth of American motoerwa. What are your surprises' and disappointments of thc.e last 15 yean? I think the riders have done a tremen· dous job of improving themselves. The average riding level is so high. There are so many good riders in the states now. That's a very good side of it. On the bad side, I am disappointed not to see more places to ride for young kids. I'd like to see the industry put more effort into supporting riding areas and tracks within reasonable distance of the city. It's not uncommon for a world champion to be 50 or older, yet in America Weinert is the oldest rider and he's under 50. Why is that? That's a very difficult question. I can think of some reasons. The World Championship series takes more experience than racing in th! United States. Every Grand Prix is in a dif· ferent country, and every country has its own way of organizing the rare. Its own type of track, its own home crew. It's not just one standarized system throughout the world. Here, if you have it down at one race you have it What ·about the gap between Eu~ pean and American riden? How narrow is the gap now if there is one? Well, I think if we have to race in this country, it's very close. The top guys are just about the same now. But .if you go to Europe I think the Europeans still have the advantage. There are more good riders in America today than there are in Europe. The peaks are very close. There are thousands of pretty good motocross riders in America. I think if you compare that mid-range, the Americans come out ahead now. Do you feel the American factories underplay the World Championship? We didn't see much on Heikki winmnlt championships, I think that's mainly because Heikki is not the type of person who enjoys or lends himself to much PR work. Yamaha has tried very hard to have him do more PR work in this country, but he has never really put the effort in that. He wants to train and race. Graham Noyce is not well known here. It takes time to become a name. I think that's why they have not adver· tised them. Have you ever tried to analyze why you have been 10 popular in America? Dicing with an American, the crowd would be cheering as much for you as the American. There are many reasons for that. One reason is that I have been here since the beginning, so the time factor plays a role. Another reason. When someone comes and asks me something I try to be nice to them and answer. I have done the same thing mainly with the press people, so in general I've had pretty good press coverage. And the press can do a lot with making a guy. look good or bad. Plus, I have won more Trans-Ams than anybody else and the Trans·Am was the biggest race series for a long time. How do you feel about Superc1'Olll, both for younell and how it fits into ~e future of the sport? Personally, I don't like thilt kind of race. I think it's different from what real motocross is. Like maybe comparing TT and motocross. There is quite . a gap I think. I think it's good for motorcycling as long as it doesn't take too much away from outdoor motocross. The trend is indoon. This year there are 17 Supererwa races and 21 outdoor races. It's going more and more that way. I

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