Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

GINTERVIEW Road racer Raymond Roche I Oil the verge of atitle 0') By Bruce Newton Photos by J ohan Vandekeckhove aymond Roche and the factory Ducati tower over the 1990 World Superbike Championship like a booming, blood-red giant. The rest have simply been forced to sta nd in thei r shadow. In ph ysical terms, neither Ducati nor Roche are giants. Really, this small Italian company and thi s small old Frenchman shouldn't be able to inflict such a humbling defeat upon the japanese. After all, the orientals were' responsible for th e horsepower explosion and the multiplication of cylinders tha t originally coined th e word superbike. But rarely ha s th e duo's triumphal march faltered, only on ce has Roche surrendered the championsh ip po ints lead and then onl y for on e round. After the 10th round of th e championship at Mon za he was some 63 points ahea d of his nearest rival Stephane Mertens. The japanese have fine machinery to race in the World Superbike Series - H onda 's all -co nq uer in g RC30 , Yamaha 's rev-head OWOI and Kawasaki the fast ZXR750. They have the riders , too , double World Champion Fr ed Merkel , Belgian hard-man Mertens, pocket rocket Italian Fabrizio Pirovano, another former G P star in Rob McElnea and Australian superbike hero Rob Phillis. Bu t none have been abl e to stick with the Frenchl Ita lian alliance. T here are a co u p le of reasons. Firstly, the bike - the fuel-injected 88&c V-twin is not only as powerful as the japanese and in deed superior in the mid-range, it is also, thanks to the way the class is structured, some 45 pounds ligh ter than the japanese machines. Then there is Roche hi mself. He' is a muscly little brick of a man, grey whisps now in vading his black hair. He was born 33 years ago in the south of Fran ce, one of six ch ildren (two boys and fou r girls). He still lives on th e Mediterranean in the town of Sanary, where he indulges in his passion for tuna fishing and owns a pleasure boa t bu sin ess, which his brother ru ns. R 'H prefer 500, because for me it is the best catagory for pilots." 6 He has enorm ous racing experience. A former factory and privateer 500cc GP rid er on a Honda (1983 - lOth, 1984 - th ird , 1986- eigh th), Yamaha (1980 -23rd , 1985 - seven th) , Suzuki (1982 -28th) and Cagiva (1987 - 13th , 1988 - 20th ), a form er privateer 250cc GP rider (11th in the championship in 1978 on a Yamaha) and World Endurance Champion in 1981. He was also the winner of more races than an yone else in the 1989 superbike champions hip, but only third in the po ints thanks to electrical glitches with th e bik e. Roch e is an interesting man to o bserve or talk to , self- p ossessed, co n fide nt , sin gle- mi nded, a t times tempermental a nd turbulent. On other occasions open, friendl y and accommodating. And tha t is at a superbike race which, off the track anyway, goes nowhere near matching the intensity of 500cc G P racing. It is easy to imagine him being difficult to deal with when he wants to be, ask the marshall he kicked at Brainerd this year, the security guard he drove at in Canada in 1989 or the journali sts who try to talk to him after a bad race. But wh en Roche is happy a n d satisfied he is a delight, and with eigh t wins in 20 starts this year it's not hard to gu ess wh at his predominant mood has been. Roche approaches superbike raci ng in tradesman-like fashion. He believes he ha s the best bike, he is equal to or better than any other rider out there, so he shou ld win . And lik e a tradesman - as opposed to an artisan - h is job does not fire his sou l. Superbike raci ng is a job he enjoys, bu t nevertheless a job, Grand Prix racing is his passion. Roch e wants to win th e Wor ld Championship thi s yea r - w h o wouldn't - but he says he wants to do it for Ducati first, him self second. If he was 10 years you nger then may be it would be for himself first, becaus e then he'd have the chance of a 500cc GP ride. " I prefer 500, because for me it is the best catagory for pilots, " he explains in hi s typically-French, softand-rounded English. " Nice bikes, very much power, difficult to set, more possibilities for settings. With superbikes, after tire and suspension , that's it. " But his love for 500s is tinged - as with many riders who have swapped from a GP to superbike with realism: "It is better to have a good bike in superb ike than a slow on e in th e Grands Prix . . . It (superbike) is a good challenge because you have' this and you make a good time with this and sometimes it is good ." Roche appreciates the positives of su perbike racing, describing it as a "good show," but he thinks there are ways to improve it , included in his criticisms are the standard comments regarding poorly written technical rules and a disjointed calendar. But he has some original thoughts too . One way he suggests to improve the show would be to pay a higher points reward for a win . " If you have five or six points between first and second, then I want to win ," he said. " Now I Can finish just behind Mertens and ii's a lright, I am World Champion. He finishes third, I finish fourth - okay , two points. If he win s and I finish second, three points." Even more interestin gly, Roch e would like to see the two-race format scrapped and each ro un d turned into one longer even t. " Good for television, good for rider, for bikes, for tires because many go 100 kilometers (60 mil es), but 150(93 miles) , maybe not." He'd also like a couple of 200-mile even ts, like Da yt ona o r th e late lamented Im ola race incorporated into the calendar, although not necessarily as part of the cha mpionship. "There is problem for privateer riders to change wheels and refuel. But maybe 200 mil e race one or two times a year. It would be nice with superbike, you cannot organize with 500, but you cou ld organize a nice race with 500 GP rider and superbike riders with superbike motorcycles." Last year, his first after shifting from GP to superbike, Roche was not the happiest of men - " n ice" races were being separated by plenty of nasty on es. " When I ride the Ducati (for the first time) I say 'okay with this bike, easy to win.' Okay, norm all y easy to wi n, but I broke six times, not easy. Last year I win many races, many lap records , many times pole positions, the best, but I am third in the World Championship. Bad. "T he bike sto pped, the n 10 minutes later it would come back. The problems we have last year were just stupid, electric. I say 'okay, if we work on this problem it 's right.' " Plenty of work went into the Weberl Marelli electronic fuel injection and so far this year the problems have not resurfaced. Also, the long wheel base Ducati has become a much better bike on tighter circuits - once again as the result of a lot of hard work: " After I won at Vallelunga last year (in an Italian championship race) we realized it was possible to win on small circuits and a lot of work was done on suspension. Also, the tires are m uch better." And what about Roche himself? He admits to being a " bit" more mo tivated than in 1989, but the people who race with h im think it's someth ing of an understatement. Mertens knows better than anyone else just how comm itted Roche has been this year: "Last year he was not 100 percent concen trate - he didn' t push 100 percent. He th ought 'I put in 95 percent because with my bike it 's enough.' Bu t it was wrong because last year he lose some points wit h that and he had some trouble with the bikes. This year he has big motivation, he want to be World Champion and he is doing everything. He's performing much better this year and he is fast rider. " There's no doubt that the Belgia n is reaso nably close to the mark. Roche has put in some truly outstanding efforts this year. For him, winning a race at the Hungaroring and q ual ifyFrenchman Ra ymond Roche is close to wrapping up the World Superbike Championship , ending the reign of American Fred Merkel. It will be both he and Duca ti's first world titl e.

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