Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

cash in for 1982, which is exa ctly wh at we'r e going to be a ble to do . We made a n investme n t in ourselves and ' endura nce racing. We'r e approaching raci ng just like a nybody 'else a pproaches a b usiness p ro position . You tak e a certain a mo unt of mon ey, inves t it in a business, and you hop e that wit h a lot of work a nd a litt le luck the b usi ness will be pr o fitabl e . Wha t Tea m Hammer is fa cing in 1982 is not massive profits , bu t at least we'l l be operating in t he b lack , maybe margi na lly. but still in the b lack. At the sa me ti me we'll p rovid e a lot of peopl e wit h some exciting racing a nd we'll have a lot of fu n out th er e , see a lot of th e co untry and m ee t a lot of neat people., I hav e to ad m it that th e m a in reason John a nd I race motorcycl es is t ha t it's a fun thing to do . If it were only a business we'd go out and buy hou ses or some thing . What we're tryin g to do is fulfill what many racers dream of. I' ve heard peo ple say, " Boy, if I co uld just race a nd h ave it pay for itself, never mind making any profit , that'd be fan tastic. " Motorcycle ra cers really love motorcycles. a nd th at's th e ma in reason th ey're out th er e . If they ca n make a little mon ey a t it a t th e sa me tim e , th at's even bett er. Still, isn't the fact that you were able to afford to pick up the bills wh ere the Chevron money ran out rather unusual? You must have some other source of money not available to mo st racers, Here we go on th e meg-abu cks trip again! We've hea rd it all before . Some guy was harrassing John in th e win ner's circle at Riverside , pissing a nd moaning about how if he had a nice job like John's he could afford a good bik e , too , Well, John Ulrich and Bruce Hammer weren 't born with monev . not with any amount big or sma ll. We bo th pu t in lengt hy training programs in our respective professions . W e bo th spe nt a lot of time getting to the po int where we could afford to go to the lim it credit -wise and hav e the credi t rati ng tha t a llowed us to bo rr ow the mo ney we need ed to go ra cing . W e di dn't just dream a bo ut bei ng a bigtime ra cer. we worked on our dreams and made some thing happen. We both hold down full -time jobs, .a nd th at's one rea son why John had to fly to most of the races. He raced on his .vaca tion days, not company time. So other people thought that was an exa m ple of our megabucks. that this guy would fly all the way to the eas t coast for an end u ra nce race . In real ity he had commitments at his job that required him to be a t h is job, so he had to fly even though we would have been better off to spend the money on tires or race gas or whatever. You don't just walk int o being executive editor of a magazin e or one of the top gu ys in a custom cabinet shop. I was a four-yea r apprentice , starting at th e bo ttom a nd working m y way up, John had to go to journali sm schoo l, co llege and gra d uate a nd get his diploma and su p po rt him self at the same time. While we were doing that we wer e working on o ur racing careers, Ch evron didn't j ust pick me ou t of a hat. O ne of th e reasons th ey went wit h T eam Hammer was that we 'ha d some sta tistics a nd results to ba ck u p o ur po tenti a l. At the time I was ran ked number two in AMA Formula One . which was no small feat for a privat ee r guy who drove ' his own truck and, work ed on his own bike and made pay · merits on th e bike to his cred it union . In 1980 I m ade it to the winner's circl e a t a n AMA National. When is the last time that these guys wh ining about T ea m Hammer 's Chevron co n necti on d id that ? John had been very su ccessful in endurance races in 1980 , although th e I l' • I I • I Hammer privateers a Yamaha TZ750 at National road races , Ch evron guys didn 't even kn ow he was co .ridi ng u nt il after I sign ed my contract. T he point is. T eam Ha m mer wasn 't j ust a cou ple of Johnny-come-Iat el y's showing u p a nd sayi ng "W e'd like to go racing, how about some money?" W e made commitments not onlv in our ra cing career s, but in our o'ther careers, wh ich obviousl y required ca reful p lanning of you r time and a little bit of comprom ises. When you've got a fa m ily and you've go t a full -tim e job that you've got to hold down , it makes ra cing m uch more com plica ted . Team H am mer is not going to apologi ze to anybody for what we have . It was n't a gift from Chevron . They hired T eam Hamm er to test a new motorcycle oil th a t is going to be on th e m arket soon , It 's a rea l fine produ ct a nd motorcyclists throughout the co u ntrv will be nefi t fro m our test hi red Tea m prog ram . . Ch evron Hammer speci fica lly because of m y background a nd results as a ra cer a nd because our end u ra nce racing per.fectly suited th eir test bed needs for their motorcycle oil. Don't get excited 1 I'm just asking the questions people want to have answered, W ell , a lot of people also think tha t we bought this magic bike and it worked perfectly everywhe re and we won big , no swea t. The bike was finished two days before our first event and we went right to the ra cetrack. We had to tune the b ike , get t he suspe nsion workin g , In fact " at every race we made ch a nges and it got better a ll along, We didn't order the bi ke ready to race. We asse m b led it . we b uilt it. T here a re parts on it tha t I made and pa rts th at Jo hn made . We got the fram e fro m Mo riwa ki a nd John had some forks layi ng in his garage, We ordered wh eels and brak es and stuc k all th e pa rts toget her. It 's a one off custo m -fa brica ted th ing and the fact tha t it finis hed everv ra ce we entered is a remarkab le fe~t as far as I'm co nce rned ., It 's remarkable it even worked! W e took a Moriwak i chassis for a Ka wasa ki and had it mod ified to hold a Suzuki engi ne a nd th e cran ksha ft wasn 't even in th e sa me pl ace anymore , so we didn't even kn ow if it would work . W e mad e it work. What's rea lly a mazing is how mu ch negative response we got from everybody when we to ld th em we were usin g Vance & Hines motor parts. They ac tu a lly laugh ed at us! "H al , what do those drag racing gu ys know ? They ca n go \4 -rnile a t a tim e , su re , no I J J - ~; J 1) I I ; I ) J' ," ( prob lem, Bu t when you're tal kin g end u ra nce racing. forget it. T hat thing's goi ng to gre nade before th e first hour. " Peo ple sa id tha t : more th a ri once. It was reall y gratifying for us to d isprove all tho se people beca use T erry Vance and Byron Hines reall y do kn ow what th ey're d oin g a nd th ey know how to m ak e horsepower wheth er it's for \4 -m ile or 24 hours. One of th e things we really felt strongest about was the com b in at ion of th e Moriwak i chas-sis and Byro n Hines' expe rtise in the form of a Suzuki GS 1100 en gine: we felt it had a lot of potential. What can you tell the guy who wan ts to la nd a big spo nsor ? It 's ha rd eno ugh to get sponsorship help within th e motorcycle industry. W hen you 're ta lking a bo ut bringing in some company - not now involved. you're reall y tr ying somet hing diffi cu lt. Bu t it can be do ne . Look at W ra ngl er. Or look at Chevron . T hey 've never been in a ny typ e of ra cing befor e . Number on e , you have to hav e some kind of tra ck record , It's a kind of Catch 22 . If you don'tdo well enoug h. you ca n' t sell you rsel f or your program on pot ential resu lts. You can't go to a spo nsor and say " I never raced be for e but I went to th e California Superbike School and I think I'm t he next Kenny Roberts so give me so me mon ey." You have to do so me racing on you r own . Borrow mon ey. ge t two jobs, wha tever it tak es. One th in g I think people fa il to ca pi ta lize on is 'cl u b raci ng. A guy co u ld be 125 Production cha m pio n and tha t says some thi ng . At least he's esta blis hed hi mself as the bes t 125 P rodu ction guy in that whole clu b organization . Beyond th a t , you have to have a game pla n. You ha ve to d ecide wha t you're goi ng to do with your racing. Most people th ink it's a fun th ing to do and that it wou ld be nice to ge t spon sorsh ip help . bu t they wa it for the gu y to ca ll them on th e phone or to send th em a letter offerin g th em sponso rship . It never happens t ha t way. Never. T he re is only one way to ge t spo n · sorsh ip , and ther e a re guys ou t there right now with fa ctory ri des who will a tt est to thi s: You go tta toot you r own horn . You gotta sell yourself. You hav e to be a marketable commodity. You have to prove that you h ave ac h ieved some success. You have to hav e b usi ness cards a nd stat ionery. You go tta be able to wri te lett ers o r kn ow somebody who will writ e them for you. You gotta be a ble to tal k to peo p le. If people o ut there don't th ink a ny of that st uff ma tters , th eyshou ld think a bo ut th is: Now I come to t he racetra ck with the Team Hammer effort and do wheelies and win . But in th e beginning I was a guy in a Da tsu n pickup truck d riving all over the cou nt ry with a Kawasa ki Big Horn to ra ce on the national circu it as a novice . At th e time , if I had gone to com pa nies like Chevron and sai d " Yea h , I'm gonna go win a ll the novic e ra ces," they would have laughed a t me. For one thing I didn't have enough experience as a ra cer. That's on e th ing you ca n 't get around. You 've got to ha ve enough track tim e to where you 'ca n go fast on a motorcycle , and' you've gotta know what you' re doing . I didn't achieve suc cess ove rni gh t. I' ve been racing motorcycles since 1970 , Took m y Du ca ti street b ike o ut. I used to crash o n t he street and I go t tick ets a nd they to ld me I should go roa d ra cing and do th e real thing instead of pr et end. So I tri ed it and her e I a m , It 's a lon g way from my first trophy for third place inJunior GP , But even when you get to the po int that you ca n deliver results for a spo nso r, you' can't j ust go in there and say, "W ha t are yo u going to do fo r me?" You 've got to go in t here with the Ulrich throws the Team Hammer Suzuki into a corner. 23

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