Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

eInterview: Road racer Wapre Rainel ~Maybe it's time By Paul Carruthers If things go according to his plan, 1987 will be a very big year for Team Honda's Wayne :: Rainey. The 27-year-old will get married in late March, will ride his first dirt track in over a year in May, and will wrap up the AMA/Camel Pro . . . Se~les Superblke Champ~onShlp on August 30. But Ramey S has seen what can happen when ihe plan fails. In 1986, the plan was to attack the AMA road race schedule like it had never before been attacked. In addition to a Honda VFR750 for the Superbike wars, Rainey was· armed with an RS500 two-stroke for an allout attack on the Formula One class. And with the way the system worked in 1986, he would be able to take bis best finisb hom any given weekend and apply it toward the overall AMAI Camel Pro Road Racing Championship. It was a no-lose situation that exploded in Rainey's face. When Rainey looks for answers to the question of what happeried in 1986, he points directly to bis disqualification at the Sears Point round of the chaIDpionship series on May 18. Rainey and Suzuki's Kevin Schwantz were penalized a lap when found guilty of passing lapped riders under a waving yellow' flag during the Superbike final, allowing thirdplace Fred Merkel to take the win. Rainey, like Schwantz, claimed tbat it would have been more dangerous not to pass the J.appers. sirtee the two front-running factory riders were racing at much greater speeds, but AMA officials disagreed. . Rainey critics, bowever, quickly point to his Mid-Ohio crash as the reason for his not taking the title. . Rainey. led early, but tire problems caused him to fade. Merkel passed, and Rainey crashed. Second place at Mid-Ohio would have given Rainey the crown. Despite winning six Superbike races in 1986, Rainey lost the title to Merkel by two points and the loss still hurts. "The political side was a real disappointment," Rainey said. "But as far as my racing went I was pleased with what my team and I did last year. I had some bad luck and some calls that went against me and it cost me the championship; Merkel lucked into it because of those calls. "But hell, you've got to forget about it. I dwelled on it for most of the year last year. You can't just have a race taken away hom you after you've won it. With it 'only being a nine-race series, there weren't a lot of races to come back on. It was tough to forget about, but it's all behind me now. You learn from these kinds of tbings that not everybody you work with is professional." .Rainey has put last season behind him as he prepares for the upcoming championship ballie. Tbe Honda factory star has been working on his· home in Downey. California, a Los Angeles suburb. Rainey purchased the home a year ago; it's not a huge, overdone mansion, just a clean, singlefamily dwelling in a nice Downey neighborhood. Rainey also has been riding his motocross bike (two CR500s), preparing his 1987 program and getting ready for a wedding - his own. "I'veJm,?wn.Shaesincesbew~s 12ye.ars-old, Ramey SaId of the glr! he Will marry on March 28. "I wailed .until she was old enougb and then I started dating her when she was 18." A few things have changed in Rainey's program for 1987. This year he will try the "keep it simple" method. For one, tbere won't be the hopscolCh-planofjumpingbackand forth from the two-stroke 500 class to the four-stroke 750 division. The racing will be Superbike only in 1987. "I really will miss riding the 500 this year," Rainey said. "That thing taught me the most last year; it was the hardest bike to ride. I could jump on tbe Superbike, after not riding it, and five laps later would have fast time. The 500 was different. If I just rode the 500 I could have gone faster, but Honda's main thing was to win the Superbikecbatnpionship and they compromised with me by letting me ride the 500. Not being able to ride it this yeai is going to be tough. To go to Europe I'm going to need more time on one." Ah, the lureof Europe. Rainey, not unlike most talented road racers, wants a shot at the big time, the Grands Prix. And he is planning on taking that shot in 1988. He's been tbere before, riding in the 250cc class in 1984. "I want to go next year," he said. "I feel I've got to go over there and do it because now's the time. I feel I'm ready for it and I don't know what American racing is doing. It's changing so much every year, but I want to go over there and race against Eddie (Lawson) and.Freddie (Spencer) and the (Wayne) Gardners. That's wbere the best bikes are and that's where tb fastest race tracks are and that's where the best in t~e world race. That's where I want to go." Wayne Rainey i. hoping for better luck in 1987; the 1983 Superbike Champion fini.hed second in 1986. only two point. behind Fred Merkel. Backing up to 1987, however, will see Rainey make another switch. After extensive tire testing at Daytona in December, Rainey decided that he will use Dunlop tires on his Honda Superbike instead of the Michelins he used last year. "(At the Daytona test) Dunlop had a lot of different stuff that I got to try and then they ch.anged the stuff that I didn't like, to where I did like it," he said. "I like the profile of the front tire now and the back tire is going to be a little different than it was in our December tests, but I went faster on it. I like the Dunlop because when it starts to spin you know about it instead of it just being automatically sideways. It gives you a little more warning than the Michelin did. They Rainey lean. the Hond. VFR Superbike into a turn at Pocono; R.iney won six race. in 1986 in the Superbike cl••••

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