Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

week he called me and said, "Let's do something." When was your first ride on the factory XR628? The fir t ride was the Nevada 500, 1992. I rode with (Dan) Ashcraft and Donatoni and we won. Had you ridden a four-stroke before that? [ had ridden four-strokes but never raced one. How did the XR compare to the twostrokes you'd ridden? I think the XR is definitely better because the smoother power delivery doesn't get you as fatigued in long events. The weight helps with traction, but al 0 isn't as good in the tight stuff because iou get tired easier - pushing around a lot more weight. But overall, I do beJieve the bike is a better off-road bike than a two-stroke. How long did it take you to adapt to it? Well, it took me over a year to really start to go fast on it. I had difficulties the first year, just because I didn't know how to ride it. I'd try to ride it like a two-stroke and it just doesn't work, so it took me about a year before I started to get fast to where I could win races. What was your background before you started racing SCORE? Grand prix-type motocross events. Then I started racing some Mexican Grands Prix, which were a little bit longer - high speeds. Rosarito Beach, a lot of Baja Promotion ones. I won some of them. Then that developed into SCORE, and I started racing SCORE five years ago and got kind of hooked on the high-speed type of stuff. I graduall y got away from Grands Prix (and) into District 37 desert racing. What do you think the future is for Baja and motorcycles? I have to be optimistic about it. With the recent injuries to Charles Halcomb and the recent fatality of Danny Hamel, and it seems like a lot less bike entries and higher entry fees, it's like every year I think maybe they're going to get rid of the bikes beca use they're not drawing enough money from them. But then again, they've had bikes in it since the beginning, and I can't see them getting rid of them. How do rallies compare to the races you do the rest of the year? The rally is longer. It's the same speeds as Baja, but it's more difficult because you have to pay attention and navigate, rather than just follow the course that you've pre-run, or follow ribbon. So the navigation is the biggest key. The races have nothing like it. I don't think it's better or worse, I just think it's different and I think (the navigation) makes it more exciting. The fact that it's different just makes it more exciting, because it cuts out &om just the same old boring following ribbon. Last year, what made you decide to ride the Nevada Rally? Actually, Bruce built some rental bikes, and he was just going to have Chuck (Miller) and Charles (Halcomb) do it and three magazine guys - yourself included. And nobody rented two extra bikes, and (Acerbis Adventure's) Bill Berroth offered him some cheaper entries, so Bruce decided just to put me and Jeff Capt in the rally, just to learn how to do the rally. What did you think of the event? It was a really foreign experience, and a real eye opener as far as just racing against world-class European rally racers and seeing how they ride, how they react to certain situations. I rode a lot with Alain Olivier last year, following him and kind of trying to figure out what he was thinking and when. Did that experience help you this time around? I do believed I learned a lot last year. But I think our recent practices (helped more). Me, Davide, Chuck, Bruce and Jimmy Lewis made our own rallies and went out and practiced, road book and everything, just out in the desert. I think that was the key to our success, because J knew I had the speed. Practicing the navigation was the key. How big of an advantage is it being a member of Team Honda in a race like this? I think it's a big advantage because we put the biggest support out, we have the best bikes and we have the best pit crews. Bruce Ogilvie is the king of organization. I mean, there's nobody better at organization than him, and I think that's the other key. It's definitely impressive, especially to a privateer. How did Honda's effort this year compare to that of last year? I think it was in a way similar, but it was a li ttle bit easier, being that there were a couple less guys riding and we had larger trucks to just carry more parts. Bikesetu pwise we got better suspension &om FMF, we refined a couple things, just like jetting. We put the computers in a different place that works better. Just minor details on the bike. As fat as the whole program in general, we learned that we needed more space for a machine shop, a bigger truck and we learned to pay attention a lot more at the riders' meetings - take better notes and more navigation. How did this race compare to last year's? The course was much more technical (with) a lot more overgrown bushes on the trails. Last year was a lot higher speeds. This year the route sheets were 68, 70 pages - last year they'were only 45. There was twice as much navigation, and it was like 500 miles longer. Were you disappointed that Olivier didn't race? A little bit. Yeah, I wanted to beat him and show him that I'm better than him, but I'm not too bummed, because it could have been me with a broken leg (and people still) saying I don't know how to navigate and I'm a nobody. There was plenty of talent. I do believe last year we had a few more guys that could have overal1ed the event, but I think this year it was (an even more difficult) event, because Davide and Stephane Peterhansel were very good. (Peterhansel) was off the pace, but he's the best. Davide was just extremely competitive this year. Just super fast. We were on the edge the last two days. We worked as a team for four days to get ahead and pull time on Peterhansel, and it worked. We pulled an hour on him. What do you mean by working as a team? Well, just helping each other find the way. And if the other guy got lost, helping each other navigate. That's basically what I mean by helping, 'cause we wanted us to go one and two at the finish, and we wanted Honda to win. It sounds kind of like a bicycle team in the Tour de France or something. Right, right. You know, sometimes I'd be going slow in a section, Davide would catch up and I'd.wave him by because he was going faster than I was. In another section I was going faster so I'd catch him and he'd let me by, and we'd just leapfrog like that the whole event - just work together because it pulled both of us along, and that's what pulled us ahead. And then on Day Four we had such a big lead (for) the last two days. I was in the lead, and then Davide started getting serious about winning. (At that point we were) not so much a team, because we had already gotten away from the pack, and we both know that. On Day Five, Davide knew that the terrain was in the mountains. He's very accustomed to riding in mountainous terrain from his home country (Italy), and it was a lot more to his advantage than me because I never ride in the mountains - you know, maybe once a year. He knew he'd be good in that section. I took off first that day, and I blew one direction and he got the lead and that's all it t.ook - I had to chase him down all day. Going into the last day I had a two-minute lead and it was intense. I was starting second and we were still in the mountains. I knew we were going to go in the desert, but we were still in the mountains and Davide was very fast. So going into the last day' I only had a two-minute lead. Basically all I wanted to do was stay with him, and if he made a mistake I'd pass him, and that's exactly what happened. Did you see his mistake? I didn't see his crash. I rode in his dust and was exactly one minute behind him the whole first half. He got to this one section and got kind of confu ed and turned around and started coming back on th.e course. I pointed to the right trail and he got it before me. I was just going to still follow him because he was going fast. We went up another 10th of a mile and there was another direction and he took the wrong road. I stayed there a little bit just to make sure I was right. I continued on the right path and took off. When he finally got turned around on the right road, he was probably going like a madman to catch back up and he hit a ditch that I (had) barely missed. It sounds like last year's experience paid off in that you trusted your road book and didn't follow the rally veteran. Last year I would have followed Olivier down the wrong trail, just like I did on TV. This year I gained respect for the route sheet and I stuck to my heart to figure out that it was the right trail. Now that you've got this win, would you like to try some European rallies? A lot of people have been asking me this - would I like to try other rallies? I've never had any interest in going over to • Africa or doing European rallies or whatever. I've never been interested, just because I just don't know about them. I have no idea how they pertain (to the evada Rally) or anything. But now that everybody keeps asking me things, I'm getting curious about these different rallies like Tunisia, Atlas, Dakar. So we'll have to see what happens after this event, as far as getting offers to go over and ride. I think it would be a great experience. I don't know if I would even be in contention for winning over there, but it would be a good experience. Did you do much physical training for the rally? No, I didn't do too much physical preparation, just because I was riding a lot this year, and I didn't have time to do it, because I recently got hired at American Honda to build Baja bikes, build 'rally bikes. This year I put together all our bikes &om the &ame up. I was extremely busy the last month, just working &om 6 o'clock in the morning all the way to midnight. No time to train. Wow, I bet Peterhansel didn't have that same work schedule. I don't think so. Cl'

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