Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

'em. If you can break away , that's the ,time to do it. You can follo w them D run with th em for 20 laps or even r 23 laps, but if you can go faster, give it a shot. " Don' t get me wrong, I go for it from the get-go, but once in a wh ile you get in a race with five gu ys and you're better off just mellowing out, watching and being real cautious. Som etimes you' ve just got to see what's going on and put yOUT drive on in the end. It seems to work for me." Of the 10 races Parker won in 1989, his victory at the DuQuoin Mile stands ou t the clearest. " I take pride in all of last year's races," he said. "Each one is exciting to win and you have to think that it may be your last or the start of a new stri ng - so th ey all pump me up. If I had to pick a favorite from last year, I'd say it was DuQuoin. I won my first one there (in 1979) and it was kind of neat to go back and win another on e there 10 years later. " While DuQuoin may be his sentimental favorite, it 's the Indy Mile, in the famous racing town of Indianapolis, that gets Parker's blood pumping the quickest. "The last three or four laps is when it's time to start going. The pace starts picking up and if you feel like you can go faster, that's the time to do it." 8 " I like all the 'tracks, but if I had to p ick one that I liked th e most I would say Indianapolis," Parker said . " All my friends go there. It 's within five and a half hours from my hou se and everybody gets to go to it. It seems like everybod y in Flint (Mich iga n) goes to that race, and that's one th at you want to win . But there aren 't an y track s th at I hat e going to." Scott Parker is not just another gu y wi th a steel shoe. He's worked hard to become Grand National Champion , and he takes pride in doing things h imself - and tha t in cludes hi s fin ancial well -being. No bean counte r in a th ree-p iece sui t tells Parker what to do with his money. "When I go t hired by the factory I kn ew tha t th ere was the potential to make good mon ey through racing," he said. " Bu t I knew it wasn 't money tha t I could make forever. It 's not like a job th at you get after you go to school for 10 years and then you make that much money for the rest of yOUT life. So th erefore, I star ted a corporat ion (Scott Par ker Racing) in order to p ut away as much money as I cou ld. You get tax breaks an d thi ngs like tha t. " I don 't have a manager; I like to do thi ngs myself. I like to know wha t's going on and where things are, so I just decided to go th at route. I have a lawyer and a CPA that I work with at th e end of 'each year - we figure out what we want to do and where we want to be the next year. I let them do their jobs because that's what they get paid for. They advise me what to do, but as far as somebod y to manage my money or manage sponsorship and things like that - I do all that. I can't see giving away money. It 's hard enough to make as it is without giving some to somebody jus t to tell me, ' Hey, you 've got to deposit money toda y or you have to go to th e bank and take care of thi s or that.' I just do it myself. It doesn 't cost me anyth ing, and I know where it all is. When I need advice, I pay the lawyer and CPA to give it to m e. " What abo u t life after racing? Does Parker have plans? " Righ t now I'm putting 100 percent into what I do, so to go out and try to get into a business or some th ing like that would take away from my raci ng right now. I think it wou ld take away from my number on e goa l an d th at is to be successful racing. Right now, when I come home from the races I can relax for a day, go riding for fou r or five days and then go raci ng aga in. If I had a business to run, the n I wouldn 't be able to pu t the necessary time into my racing." If there's a golf course wit hin drivi ng distan ce of any AMA National, it' s there that Parker can usually be fou nd. For him, golf is rela xat ion num ber on e. " I like to play golf to relax, and I like to do a lot of riding," he said . "Working around the house is also relaxing to me. Instead of payin g somebody to do the work, I like to do it m yself. Like my new va n, for example. Instead of paying somebody to customize the inside, I just go t some wood and started doing it myself. That's the best way to learn. I could sit back and pay th e gu y $5000 to do it, or I can do it myself. When you 're done, you usually end up happier if you did it yourself an yway. You can take pride in what you 've don e," Parker's next goal in raci ng is to break Springsteen 's record of 40 Nation al wins. He 's 10 away , but he (Above) Parker and his wife Wanda travel to most of the Nationals via a motorhome, (Left) Parker at play motocrossing his Harley-Davidson XR750 in Michigan. q uickly re-emphasizes th at it 's not a goal th at will be fulfilled in 1990. " Breaking Ja y's record is a goal ," he said. " Rea lly, I can't see me going ou t agai n th is year and winning 10 races. I hope I can do it again th is year, but you don't reall y plan on it. I'm p lanning on raci ng for as long as I can mak e mon ey at it. When I can' t, th en it will be time to get out. Here's Springe r at 32, and go ing stro ng . If he hadn 't had his sto mach prob lem he'd been hell for a lot longer, but he's still fast. " I th ink peo p le are more active now then th ey were before. They ea t righ t, they tra in beuer, so I think today's racer can race longer. Gary Scott an d those guys were ou t of there at like 32, I think this generation of racers will have longer careers." Pa rker is also quick to po int ou t th a t h is mecha ni c Bill Wern er is an integral part of his success. " To me, Bill 's o ne of th e best mechanics in the cou ntry," he said. " You can look at his record and just see that thi s guy knows what he's doing. He 's been a big influence on me. He's a sma rt gu y, and he knows wh at he's doing. He puts 180 percent into it. He knows how to set th e bike up, he knows wh en you get to a track what to do becaus e he 's been go ing there since he was a kid . He knows what the dirt is going to do that night or that day. He's just got that experience. "The first year we hooked up he did it out of his basement. That's wh en the team was run out of house and not directly in the Harley factory . But that shows how dedicated this guy is to what he's doing. He would go to work for eigh t hour s a da y a t the factory,

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