Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

~ INTERVIEW Doug Chandler ! Taking the next step ...... By Henny Ray Abrams o ug Ch andler said he co u ldn' t reme m ber ever being as nervous as he was a t th e sta rt of his first Grand Prix , a nd for good reason . H e was o n a fir st-rate ma chine, he was backed with all th e su p port of Kenny D Roberts' team, and he'd ac hieved his goal o f racing against th e best mot orcycle race rs in th e wo rld. "T h is is wha t I wanted to do ," he said. " T h is is th e next step." But as soon as th e Mar ch 24 j apanese Grand Prix got underwa y, he began to sett le do wn . " Every lap go t better ," he said. " I was just kind of sett ling down . Starting to hold m y lines. Carry my co rne r speed and hit th e exits. Each lap I got closer and closer. I felt so good a t th e end. I really enjoyed m yself. I expected it to be hard physically. I didn 't swea t that much." If he was intimidated by th e notion of raci ng against th e world's best on the best machinerv in . th e world he did n 't show it , but th at ca me as no surprise to Rob erts, th e man resp onsible for Ch andler 's entry into G rand ' Pr ix ra cing. Rob erts co m m itted to Chandler last yea r, hoping to make him th e lead rid er o n a new team formed by former World C ha m pion a nd longtime Rob erts' friend Franco Unci n i. But ba cking for th e Unci ni team fell th rough a nd Robert, had no choice but to put his fell ow northern Californian on what's co m m o n l y ca lled his " B" team, th ough th er e's ' nothing second-rate ab out it. If, as is hoped, sponsorship does mat eri a lize, Uncini will tak e over the team. Until then , Robert s is responsible for keeping Chandler on th e circu it. " He 's not intimidated by th e power. H e's a di rt track racer ," Rob erts said. " He liked the wa y it slid aro und. H e liked th e way you g ive it power. " " He 's probably more adva nced th an I th ought," Rob erts co nt in ued. "I th ou ght he would be very smooth, very stud ied. H e cha nged a lot at fir st. Once he learns so me th ing, he just ge ts fast er. H e hasn 't mad e a dent O il wha t he's gon na do." Chan dl er re me m be rs hi s fir st impression of th e mi ghty po wer o f th e Yamaha YZR500, power he first tas ted riding Wa yn e Rainey's a n d Eddi e Lawson 's 1990 ma chines at a test in Au strali a. "These bik es hav e so much feel it's incredible," he said du ring a break in th e qualifying at th e japanese GP. " With the o ld three-cylinder yo u didn 't kn ow it was sliding until it was halfway around." The "old three-cylinder" Chandler was referring to was the Honda RS5oo, a ma chine Chand ler campaigned for Honda in the U.S, in the la te '80s. Last year he won the U .S . Superbike Championnship on a Kawasaki and he . was asked to compare that machine to th e 500 Yamaha. " It accelerates so much quicker than a superbike and stops so much better. It 's tough to get used to because yo u run it into a corner so much faster and th en you brake so much better. That's been a little trouble to me because I'm braking a little too early a nd I'm still working o n that. And th e weight of th ese bikes make it so much easier to ni ck it th at , at first , wh en I was trying to put some good laps together I turned it early because it co mes back across so quick." But with sop histica tion comes complexity and Ch andler quickly discovered th at the cha nges he made weren't always improvements, " We took two turns off th e rid e height because we were having some tro u ble with th e back end co m ing around. And we were thinking thi s would give us more grip. But it really didn 't g ive us more rear end grip, but it sta rted to push th e front. And I ca me back in and we put it in between where we had it and what it was a t the first time out. " We had troub le with a ll the testing because you never get th e sa me tir e twi ce. We didn 't mess with the settings too much ; it 's more gett ing a good tire . That wa s part o f th e trouble we had at first because we were a lways putting different stuff on the back and we couldn 't c ha n ge too many things because we didn 't know what it was going to do, regardless." As he did las t year , Chandler will be using Dunlops, and he was gratefu l for th e co nsistency. " I don't think th e tir es give you that much different feel," he said , " O n the superbike we'd go through th e corn ers as good or better than th e Mich elins. Our troubl e, as far as tires , was acce lera tio n grip. At th e lean angle we us ed co mi ng o ff the co rner you co u ld n' t turn it on as fast as you cou ld th e Mi ch elin s. On th e 500cc, it's brought into th e corner farther becau se you're doing everyth ing sooner to get th e bik e upright quicker , so you notice you r problem s more in the middle o f the corners than co m ing off. "T hese bikes ar e not as crucial to keep th e co rner speed up as on a 250 or superbike. You enter as fast, or faster , but you 're slower through the corner j ust because you're getting turned early and you 're uprigh t and acce lerat e harder out of the corners. " A benefit of riding with Roberts is that he likes to test extensively, an inva luable asset for a G P novice. The winter p rogra m this year consisted of sessio ns at two tracks in Austra lia Phillip Island and Eastern Creek, Jerez in so u thern Spain, and Laguna Seca. It was at Laguna Seca that Chandler had the most difficu lty, 'though his ·times weren't as far off of Ra iney's as at so me of the other tracks. " j erez is pretty easy. It's no t that fast. There's only one corner where you go all the way from sixth to second or first ," said Chandler. Though his times were well off the pace, there was a reason, Roberts explained: "The trouble at J erez was a lack of tire. O ur team was short. It was a matter of the right tire, the right shock, at the right time. Weonly had two sessions or three sessio ns, It wasn 't like a whole day ," he said. Jerez was also wh ere Chandler took deliv ery o f his o wn bik es which he was able to set to hi s own speci fica tions. " I was nev er really co mfortable with th e settings I had on th e front end. I was never full y'con fiden t that it was going to stay underneath me. That kind o f held me back ,' he said. At Laguna, " it was a little bit bett er, but I still didn 't like it. " But th e bigger problem was the circuit. " T he toughest tra ck is Laguna," Chandler said . " It's unbelievable. There's neve r a time you have a break. Going up the hill , the 500 wants to get the fro nt end up. Going over the sta rt -fin ish you're trying to get it over to th e left. It had a real fin e film from rain. Before that it had dust on it. I th ink Wa yne did low 27s, 27 nat. john (Kocinski) did mid 27s. I did low 29s.

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