Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Interview: Eddie 'Lawson "I love to race" By Henny Ray Abrams T eam .Marlb oro Yamaha's Eddie Lawson is one of the more reserved competitors on the Grand Prix road race circuit. A two-time 500cc World Champion, the Upland, Ca lifornia, resident doesn' t go ou t of his way to seek public it y, preferring in stead to let his pe~ f orman.ce on ~ h ~ track speak . f?r.ltse~f. A dlsappomur:g th ird pl ace finish in t h~ 5?Occ; pomt sta.ndmgs last year didn t Sit well wI.th th e fo r m er champ. Chan g es i n ~he Ma rlb oro Yamaha camp, in cluding a nt;w te~ ~ma te for. La wson ~e1gIar: Didi er de Radigues replacm g Brit Rob .McElnea, a new. YZR, a nd less machinery for crew chief Kel Carru thers to tend to, wer~ mad e in the. o ff-seaso n . In the m ter view . wh ich follows, La wson ta lks abo ut those cha nges and more. Let's talk about the difference between the 1987 and 1988 Yamaha YZR500s. We heard a lot about front end problems last yea r. Was that over-emphasized or was it a serious problem? ' It was n 't a serio us problem . It was there a nd hopefu ll y with the new changes to the frame 'it's gone. It 's hard to tell unt il yo u have a fu ll load ' of fuel which we ha ven 't rea lly tried. That's yet to be seen if it's fixed or not , but I would thi nk that it is. Can yo u tell us exa ctl y what they changed on the chassis? I' m no t 100% sure wh a t they did. I know th a t it seems to steer a little bit quicker and that 's what I asked them to do. And th at 's what they did and I' m rea l ha pp y with it, wit h th e way it handles. What exactly was the problem last year? It was j ust basicall y, a little heavy to steer, back a nd forth . And it would kind of wear you out. And it was difficult to stay on li ne and change direction as fast as the ot her guys. So hopefull y, we've gotten tha t take n care of now. And you said that sometimes yo u could ease up at the end of the race after you'd use some fuel. Yeah, that seemed to help. You say that this one steers a little better? Yeah, I thi nk it gets back and forth a little easier tha n last year's. And is it as stable as last year's? It 's no t quite as sta ble; yo u kn ow you hav e to sacrifice so meth ing. But we were so stable last year that I thin k we co ul d sacrifice a little of th a t. Looking over th e upcoming season will you see more tracks where you need to get back and forth? It's unfortuna te, but most race tracks are going to real tigh t - chicanes - slowi ng the race tracks down wh ere it's stop a nd go. It 's a sha me that th ey're doing it that way, but I gu ess th at it 's cos t effective. But, yeah, I think the bike wi ll work q uite a bit better. And the other problem you had last year was acceleration - getting out of the corners. ' I think th at ' possibl y it mi ght be a little bit diff erent than last year. I couldn't feel it. But th ey're saying th a t the b ike d oes acceler ate . .. the y're saying th at it has a little m ore power o n the d yno a nyway. And our top speed is up somewhat so I th ink the power . . . I'm hoping it will be better, but we won 't know until we get out th ere. . . We' ve h ea rd th at Didier (de Radigues, Lawson's new ' Marlboro Team Agostini teammate) went 303 kph at a Yama ha test in Sugo, That • sounds like it should be fas t eno ug h. Well , it's hard to say. Yamaha's test course is a lot d ifferent than anywhere else. Whe n yo u' re riding agains t a bunch of Yamahas you rea lly don' t kn o w what you're u p against. I' rri hop in g fo r th e best and I th ink the bike is defin itely better tha n last year 's so it jus t depen ds on what they (Honda) come up with. How did your tire testing go? Real well. Mich elin 's been working rea l, real hard. I do n 't see that being a problem this year at all. T he tire sit ua tio n will be rea l good. We were in good shape last year except for the wet a nd they 've mad e improvemen ts on those.uoo. Wi th the bikes getting so fas t and the tires sticking do you find that the frame som etimes flexes from th e tires sticking too well in the comers? Not righ t now. The tires have caught u p and the tires work reall y well, but sti ll when you 're riding them , rea l hard th ey do go off a nd you can still slide the m. You have that control th ere. I do n 't feel the bike is .too fast ri ght now. • , So you th ink that with the wa y the machines are developing it penalizes . ri ders who rel y more on finesse, suc h as yo u rself, tha n so m eo n e like Gardner who use s more b r u t e streng th? Does that make sense? . Yes, somewhat. T he bi kes are rea lly physciall y demanding now and you have to be in rea l good shape to ride them . Tha t's fo r sure. Still, the finesse has to be th ere and Wayne was smooth, but he was just rea l aggressive a nd it was a good combination. But of course he fell down more times th an I did. So I do n' t kn o w if that mea ns a ny thi ng. I fell down once in the rai n. It co uld Catch up with you, bu t it didn't for hi m last year and he did rea l wel l. So, who's to say which is better. Bu t I' m th inking that maybe being aggressive possibly, eventually will ca tch u p with you. I don't kn ow . And riding aggressively like that would inevitabl y shorten yo u r career. It would me. I enjoy my rid ing. I do n' t ride over my head and I feel rea l com fortable with wh ere I'm a t. I don't know , people say I' m no t even trying. But I ca n assure you that I'm trying, bu t I just don 't like ri ding over my head a nd I've told you tha t many times. T ha t's where I ride a nd I think th at I co uld do that for many more yea rs. At least I hope I can. ' Do you think that having two less riders on the team this year (one less 250, one less 500) will affect the amount of preparation that goes into your machines or is your operation separate? It really doesn't matter to me who 's on th e team or who's not o n th e tea m. I go o u t and do my own th ing a nd, of co urse, all the bikes, if we had one or we had 50, th ey would all be th e sa me. It 's just whe the r we have the peop e 0 0 I or . that wi th just tw0 500s the re will be a little bit more time for us and I'm hoping th at it'll work ou t better. Bu t I don 't reall y see i t being a ny differen t th an la st year. O ur team is a really strong team and, to be honest wi th you, I'm really kind of proud to be a part of it. Because I think th a t I' ve helped make i t what it is a nd I kn ow that Kel (Carru the rs) and all my mech a n ics have hel ped, have . defini tely mad e it wha t it is. It 's trul y a team effort a nd it's one that all th e teams in the padd ock have to look u p to regardless o f winni ng or no t winning. We' re the elite tea m and it's nice to be a part of th at. It seems that there will be more Yamahas out there, but in fact , th ere will be the same number as last year. And that really doesn't affect you at all, do es it? It doesn 't mah er who's rid ing Yamahas or no t beca use I ride my own speed, my own pace and I do wh at I do and it does n 't affect me who's rid ing th em or not. I have to deal wi th th e fastest guy and th at 's it. And that wilt most likely, at least for th e beginning part of the season, be Gardner. Whoever it is I have to go after him . I ho pe it's me. Last year it was basically you, Randy, and Wayne. Do yo u see ' anyone emerging ' from among the newer riders? That's a to ugh question. I think "'!e j ust hav e to wa i t , a n d see what . happen s. I'm not mak in g any predictions because I' ve been kn own to stic k my foot in my m outh a nd I thi nk th e best th ing to do is say th ere are go in g to be 1 for sure that are going to be ri di ng rea l hard in th e beginning a nd the n it wil) all get sorted o ut. But, you kn ow the first two or three CPs are go ing to be real to ug h becau se every o ne 's exci ted because th ey're on new eq uip me nt and new teams a nd th ey th in k th ey've got a shot a t it and the y put it on maniac and you've got to r ace wi th th em . It seemed that at times last year you would allow yourself to get discouraged that the Hondas were so good and that you couldn't, yourself, fix the situation as quickly as you would have liked. Is there any way you can avoid doing that again? ° kept ' trying. But wh at 'can you do? It 's just a situation you get in a nd th ere's really nothing yo u can do about it and It'Sfru strating, but never once d id I give up. So that's wha t I would do again, regardless. You keep plugging away because you kn ow finishing 21 points back a nd not finishing three races, I think was quite an accomp lish me nt for th e 00 whole team. I wo uld look a t next 00 season the same way . If we're down 0") 'we ' ll j u s t keep , p l ug g i n g aw ay ....... because you can win th e championship regardless. There seems to be a consensus of opinion that your best race, in fact maybe the best race anyone rode all year , was your last race of the year , in Argentina. Do you think that's true and if you think so, why? I wa nted number two anyway and th ere was a lot pressu re o n a nd th ere was a lot of confusion a t th a t las t race and a lo t of th ings were said a nd it upset me and may be I rode a little harder because of it. I don 't like to think I let my emotions override my talent, because th a t's a good way to ge t in tro uble, bu t I did pu t the ex tra effort in, I guess, and It worked o u t. Are you 100-percent physically? Yeah, I'v e been training real hard a nd feel real good. What about the incident yo u had testing at the Mi chelin track in , France? . I di slocated my shoulder; It momentari ly popped out for a second th en righ t back in. It was just a lot of discomfo rt for a few days, but I didn't fall off or a nythi ng . , In tile first race last year in rain at Suzuka the tire choice was wrong and you chose to pull in. If that happened again you'd probably go back out, wouldn't you? Well, I told KeI, I'm going to stay o u t un til you tell me that there' s absolutely no way I can get a point. And reall y we were so far do wn a nd then we had people at the end of th e race goi ng 'Well, I thi nk you would h ave gotten a point if you wo uld have stay ed o ut there,' wh ich, if you look at it, th ere was rea lly no way . I was over half a lap down and to mak e u p half a lap and then get into 10th pl ace would have been really physically impossib le. Kel did the righ t th in g. I cou ld ha ve stayed ou t there and tried and, of course, I coul d've fallen down too . It was the righ t move. If th e same th ing happened again I think we wo u ld have learned from o ur m istake an d have the rig h t tire choice this time. But if th e same thing happen ed again we would do it the same way. T he main thi ng is yo u learn from your mistak es and we mad e one and, like I say, we learned from it a nd I certain ly doubt if it will happen again. , Over the last five years you're easily the most consistent rider week-in, week -out. How do you maintain your enthusiasm considering all the travel and other distractions you have to put up with? Things have actually go tten better o ver th e yea rs. There was a' lot of frictio n on th e team when I first came o n wi th Ago a nd myself. T ha t's all gone a way a nd we actually ge t along real well . I come home more often now. Not th at I don't like Europe, but I do like to get away from the racing for a week anyway a nd come hom e, relax, go ou t with my friends, m y fam il y. And then go back and I'm re-ch arged. I'm rea dy to go again. Tha t keeps me go ing. And I still love ra cing. I lo ve to race. T ha t's still th ere and as long as that's there I'll keep doing it. But I certainly don't feel burned o ut a t 'a ll. I .love to do what I do . • 29

• Cover