Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Ricky Graham Chatting with the champ By Gary Van Voorhis Photo s by Henny Ray Abrams R icky Graham's 1985 AMA G ran d National Championship seaso n didn't start th e wa y h e planned. In st ead, th e defending Camel Pro Seri es cham p ended h is racin g at H ouston before it reall y began. H e took a ride to th e h ospital aft er a crash on th e ope n ing lap of th e TT National left h im w ith a slig h t concussion , a compressed vertebra, a broken thumb, two crack ed ribs - although th ey may have come from an earlier accid ent - and en oug h bumps and bru ises to last him th e ent ire seaso n . Gr aham sp ent fi ve days in th e ho spita l in Houston before . returning to h is Seasid e, California, home. We caugh t up w ith Graham prior to his crash for the bulk of th is in terview and added some in form ation from a later phone call. How are you feel ing? Well, I'm bruised a ll over an d pretty scraped up. Wh at reall y hurts now (Friday, February 15) are th e upper part of my legs. I guess I must have sm acked the ha nd lebars when I went down or the bike hit me afterward. . One thing for su re is that I went down h ard . They wouldn't even let me o ut of bed to move aro u nd unti l Wednesday and th at was because o f a m istak e a nurse made in thinking I was going to a th erap y session. I go t up and wa lked around some when she told me th a t and th en I began thinking if I can move this well here then I'm go ing hom e. I flew back to California on Thursday and I'm goi ng to tak e it easy for a whil e until everythin g feels back togeth er. I'm g la d thi s isn 't th e middle o f th e season wi th races every weekend. I'v e go t p lenty o f time to heal si nce th e n ext Na tio na l isn 't unti l Mar ch 30 a t Ascot. You don't seem to have many problems with injuries wh ile racing, yet off the track you seem to be jinxed. What's the problem? I th ink it' s because wh en I'm on th e track a nd ra cing. I'm more serio us abo ut things than when I'm o u t trail riding. You can get out on th e trail an d beg in to hav e so much fun th at you forget about things you sh ouldn't. Near th e en d of J anua ry I wa s o u t ridi ng with my fri end, J eff Haney, a n d we were both in a n accident with a truck. We were loo kin g for new trail s in the mountains near Big Sur an d had been out riding a ll day. I pl ayed lead er in th e morning an d was usu ally sh u tt in g off for th e tight turns. In th e a ftern oon , Jeff led. We wer e heading back to ca mp on a n old dirt road a nd J eff wa s co oki ng ri ght a lo ng a nd I wa s trying to ca tch up . Sudde n ly, th ere was th e truck a nd I was wat ching Jeff run head on into it. I don 't kn ow how he got a way with not ge tting an yth ing more th an a back injury because I th ought for sure he was dead. Whil e a ll this wa s happen in g I was trying to man euv er past th e tru ck , but en ded up sideswipi ng it . I hit my left kn ee reall y hard an d it began to swell up right a way, but since it didn 't hurt immedi at el y I kn ew I hadn 't torn liga ments o r a ny th ing. It kept swell ing u p a n d th en it began to hurt - bad. I was prett y battered a lso. T o make matters worse, I had cra cked a bone in my right a n kle a week befor e, but di dn 't kn ow it. I had th em x-ray it wh en th ey looked a t my kn ee. The an kle injury was a freak accid ent wh ich happened when the kick starter kicked back o n mewhen I was starting my bike to go riding with a noth er frie n d, Sco tt Pearson . Between those two things, I was out of doing an y rid ing to get in shape for Houston . Given you r p roblem s with injuri es, h ow do yo u see th e co mi n g seas on? Barring more injuries or something else stra n ge happening I feel I can win at least six Nationals. I was n't in sha pe for any of the IT Nationals last year because I never seemed to be 100 percent healed from this injury or that a nd I did fa irl y well in them. H ere, we're starti ng the '85 sea son a nd I' m in that same boat. It would be neat to go through a season without inj ury. If I could ever. get both my legs in shape at one time so I cou ld start working on them to get some rea l strength in them then I thi nk I could be an even better rider. Is it any easier defe n ding the ti tle the second tim e around ? I don 't rea lly think about defendi ng th e title. T h is year will be lik e all the o the r ones I' ve raced . I'v e sa id it a number of times th a t being Number One wasn' t one o f my a bso lute goals in racin g. I race to do th e best I can a nd if you do reall y good th en Number One is yo u r rew ard . I still have th e same out look I had wh en I started racin g an d th at 's go to th e track lookin g for th e vict ory a nd if you can' t win th en do your best. I'm ju st go ing to take it easy th is year a n d not try to ac t like I'm Number One, al though I'm notreally sure how a Number One is su p posed to act. One th in g for sure is that everyone look s at you in a different ligh t. I don 't really think it shou ld be that way because I'm the sa m e person I wa s when I wa s plain old 19Y an d a rookie. I'm loo king forward to the amount of co m pe tition I think we' ll see this year. Last yea r th ere were a lo t of stro ng riders a nd we're going to see as many or more. Bubba (Shobert) and I may have won 11 dirt tra ck Nationa ls, bu t we didn 't just smoke everybody . There were a lwa ys a number of riders right th ere and it 'll be th e same this year. There have been a n umber of ri der, machine a n d sponsor ch anges for this season. Let's ru n down a few and you assess their p rograms . Randy Goss and Doug Chandler of Fredd ie Spencer Ra cing? They sho u ld be tough . I think Doug is going to do reall y well. What he ha s to do is get a few of th e slippery ra cetra cks back east like Lima dialed in and h e shou ld improve his program. H e's a super smoo th racer. Last year he didn't adapt too well to so me of th e tra cks and he beca m e disappointed in himself a nd h is performance, which he shou ldn't have. Even Kenny Roberts didn't adapt to cert ain style tracks and do good righ t away. Doug's co m fort a ble on the Honda so all he needs to do is work at gett ing the suspension and hand ling to his liking. Randy migh t hav e a to ugh time and he might not in learning to ride the (Honda) RS750. The differences between the (Harley) XR750 Randy has been riding for years and the H onda aren't th at much. I found it relatively easy to swi tch. He' ll find the ha nd ling characteristics are somewha t different and that the engine is a lot smoothe r. What ca n ca use a rider problems is if he 's picky a nd wants to make lots of changes. I'm not. I'm a p retty basic ri der. If the bi ke ha s a good combi nation, w hy chan ge? Sometimes that frust rates my mechanic beca use he might feel some- The first two photos of Ricky Graham's (1 ) crash at Houston show Bubba Shobert (6 7 ) a bit out of shape while Scott Pearson' (9 5) leads. • 22 l

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