Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/127653
Kenny Roberts By Dean Adams Photo by HennyRay Abrams n an industry tha t sometimes seems . filled with people of the glad-handing, PR-spewing, don't-quote-me-tril-lcheck-with-my-bo ss mindset, there is a savior - Kenny Roberts. Nothing could be simpler than finding Roberts' true opinion of the latest hot topic in the road racing world - just ask him! No need to phrase your question like a d en tist gripping a tooth before extraction. A word of warning, however - after you ask, stand back, because the answer will be in no uncertain terms and could possibly be quite graphic. Roberts is a really relentless visionary, his thoughts far exceeding the usual ideas of money /happ iness / satisfaction of the normal human. He concerns himself with fairl y thankless jobs, such as stop ping greedy old men, who have never swung a leg over a racing motorcycle, from exploiting racers, and the future of Grand Prix racing in America. Never afraid to put his m oney where his mou th is, Rob erts couldn't find anyone d aring enough to put on the U5. GP in the fashion he felt it deserved. Consequently, like Apple's Steve Wozinack who orchestrated the US festivals in the 19805, Roberts simply withdrew $3 mil lion from his .bank accoun t and did it himself. . At the end o f this interview, when asked if there was an ything he'd like to add , Roberts thought for a moment before summing up his th ou ghts: "I wis h the (American) motorcycle industry would get their shit together," he said . His honesty and candor is a refreshing change. Where is the next great American rider going to come from ? At the m omen t, there really doesn' t seem to be an upand-coming ri d er who is setting the world on fire, like Wayne Rainey, Kevin Schwantz, John Kocinski a nd Doug Chandler once did . Are we see ing the end of a dynasty, or just the lull in a cycle? Well, it's not like a factory, where you just put some material in and wait for it to • come out at the other end. You're going to ha ve years where you have two or three riders come up and you'll have years where nobody com es up . It's never going to be a permanent sit" uation. I don' t totally agree with the sanctioning body here and the way that they run the races, but I don 't think they could goof it up enough to put a permanent stop on all the talent coming up in America. I wouldn' t blame the bikes. Maybe too many classes in one day just seems to hinder the amount of constructive track time tha t you can get on decent equipment. I think having more classes out there on an amateur level certainly breeds more racers coming up. On a professional basis, I wo uld say that we 're probably getting . into too many (classes). That's why I took Kenny Jr. to Sp ain, and that's why my other son (Kurtis) is going to Spain. It's more controlled, to be an environment that would pro mote the movement of the talent much quicker. Scott Russell became the World Superbike Champion despite not having any dirt track racing in his background. Is this signaling th e end of the dirt track ridi ng style as a prerequi site to being a world-class racer? I don't know anything about superbikes and what they need. I don't keep a close enough eye on it to comment on whether the rider needs dirt track to become a World Superbike Champion or not. I do know you have to have a lot going for you to be World Champion. You're not going to be an everyday Joe and end up World Champion. You've got to have the talent, and you've got to have the training and the conviction, long before you ever get to be World Champion. People are going to see that and they're going to see the dirt track talent and the y are going to see a mo torcycle talent. It doesn 't matter so much tha t you have d irt track talen t as long as you have a talent to race a motorcycle.' . Erv Kanemoto may have to sit out 1994. What are your thoughts on this? Number on e, Grand Prix racing at Erv Kanemoto's level, at the level he wan ts to participate at in the 250 category, is very, very hard to do - almost impossible from my standpoin t. Th e price of the equipment from Honda is outrageous, to get a works bike. If you don't get a works bike you don't a ttract the sponsors, so it' s a vicious circle you get into with 250 racing. It's not the world's television premier that SOOs are, and therefore the sponsorship money is less, but it costs virtually th e same to run the team (as it does a 500 team), except for rider's costs. So it's not a lull in the sport; there's always going to be good years and bad years where sponsors come and go. Peps i has jumped in on a 500 and that makes the void of Rothmans virtually nil, because there are now virtually the same number of 500s running. There are going to be slack times, just like with riders. The world does not go up, up and up. It just doesn 't work that way, and neither does GP racing. Your leam has been based almos t exclusively around American riders since its inception in 1986. You will have an Italian and an Australian riding SIlOs for you in 1994. Is this distressing? . We run a s ucces sfu l GP te am and it does not exist solely for American rid-