Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

INTERVIEW Greg Albertyn By' Davey Life In America has been hard for South African Greg Albertyn • at least on the U.S. Supercross ci rcuit. Coombs fter three straight years as World Motocross Champion in Europe, So uth Africa's Greg Albertyn decided to try the Jean-Michel Bayle Experiment: Go to Ame rica to beat the Yanks on their own tu rf. The JMB experiment is no t yet wo rking for Albee . In a year and a half he 's yet to wi n a race and he's had more injuries tha n he can cou nt. But Greg Albertyn says that he's happy in Ame rica, and he' s staying. Let's start with an easy on e. Greg, what th e h ell we nt wrong? Wh at wen t w ro ng? What we n t wrong with wh at ? Since the d ay you got h ere, w hat ha s gone wrong with this whole Ame rican exp erie nce? Well, it' s been a long, hard road. A'Io t of different th in gs ha ve gon e w ron g, but mainly injuri es due to the fact that these are a ll n ew tr acks - very d em andin g, very tech nical, and unforgi vin g . After ridin g m o tocr os s for fiv e years in Europe like I did and th en s tart ing su percross h as been a tough th in g for me. In o u td oor Am e rican m oto cro ss you ha ve the pace, but you' re never h ealthy after all th e supercross races. Right, and that's a big factor because if yo u're not 100 per cent healthy you have a hard tim e training . Your fitness gets there slowly.but you are never 100 percen t fit. That was definitely the problem o u tdoors last yea r - I was getti ng spanked because I wasn' t 100 percent fit. Jeremy (M cGrath), on th e other hand, has four or five years of perfect fitn ess a-nd health, his confidence is up and ev erythi ng is w orking. But things are coming right for me now and I can see lig h t a t the end of the tu nnel. My s u perc ross h a s b ee n im prov ing a ltho ugh the results haven' t been, an d I'm still enjoyi ng what I'm doing. I like raci ng here in the States, I'm h aving a lot of fun and I'm enjoying the challen ge of it. Your sp eed is righ t on in the outdoors b u t s upe rcross is s till a prob lem. Is supercross in America harder than you exp ected? Oh yes, much harder than what I antici pa ted. It' s ha rd to p u t your fin ger on exactly what it is tha t m akes it so diffi cult; ma ybe just that it is so unforgivin g. On e littl e mistake and you have a big cras h, and if yo u' re not fit en ough, you start getting t ire d , and that le ads to m ore m ista kes . Pretty soon you ge t inj u re d a nd you can't train; but you come back to racing and yo u're not fit enough, and it happens all over again. It ' s a vicious ci rcle and you h a ve t o break ou t of .it somehow . Maybe you jumped into it too fas t. I mean, you ha ve those few international su p ercrosses each yea r that y ou were raised on and that's it. And when you got here you didn't do the 125cc cla ss for a couple of years like everyone else - you went right into th e big leagues. Even Bayle took it easy his first year and only did four or five supercrosses. You couldn 't ha ve known what y ou were gelting into becau se Europe supercros s doesn't even compare to what it is here, does it? No, not at all. The tracks in Europe are way, way sma ller and far less techni cal. They're fun to race an d they're spectacular, but the tracks over here are amazing. You see d ifferent gu ys from France or wherever come over he re and they have quite the battle jus t to qu alify for a main eve nt. I'm p ro ud to say that I've quali fied for every main event in every race I've entered, but it's still incredibly A difficu lt . Th e guys here are on the gas fro m the mo ment the gate drops until the checke red flag . There's no such thi ng as pacing yourself or just going fast for 10 laps and coasting the rest of the way. It's wide-open racing. I've learned an incredible amount in the year and a bit that I' ve been here, bu t I' ve still go t a lo t to learn . Last year I was an absolute freshman, not knowing any of the tracks, a different city every week, n o t knowing anything about where I was going . It was quite a bit to handle, but I think I've progressed alo ng w ay. I' m rea lly , rea lly go ing to work hard for the Nationals. Isn't it iro n ic how every tim e we (Tea m USA) lo se the Motocro ss des Nations we hav e the b uilt-in excuses of th e differe nt food, the time changes, th e different tracks. The sh oe s hould fit on th e other foot but it do esn 't, so when you or James Dobb or Mick ael Pichon come over h ere you d on ' t get to u se tho se excu ses. I mean, Los Angeles is whole lot more in timidati ng than Luxembourg. Absolutely. Nobody seems to realize how tou gh it is for someone to go live in another country and compete, let alone go to the othe r side of the world. Whe n I first went to Eur op e, I ba ttled my bu tt off for tw o years, most of the time thinking, 'What the heck am I doing this for? Is th is worth the sacrifice, going to a. stra nge country and leaving all of m y friends behind?' There's differ ent food, rul es, everything. It' s d ifficu lt to push on so m etim es, but when you sta rt to succeed yo u sta r t to fo rget abou t all tho se hard times. Americans to come to Europe an d race for one week - big deal. Try it for a year. It's really tough for our guys to go ov er there and win the world ch a m p ionship, too. Donny Schmit might be the exception, having won h is first year, but think of how hard it wa s for Brae Glover, Bob Moore, Mike Healey and those guys. You h av e to h a ve a rea lly o ne -track mind to succeed in a situa tion like that. That's why Donny was so su ccessful. He d idn ' t re a ll y ca re a bou t th e o u tsi d e world. He was there to do a job and that job wa s to win races . That' s why he was a so successful. A lot of those other guys were lo ok in g a t ano the r picture a ll toge ther. I n ee d to b e a li ttle more focuse d like Donny w as, bu t at the same time , there is m uch more to life tha n jus t racing. I'm enjoying myself, I've made a lot of friends over here, the way of life is cool. and I' m enjoyi ng the work and the racing . How did Donny Schmit' s de ath affe ct you? I w as heartbroken, espec ially for Carrie and his fam ily. Donny and I sha red a lo t of good mem ories toge ther and we had a lot of fun in the past. I was devastated whe n I heard th e new s because it was . just s uch a shoc k . Don n y w a s a n absolute health freak. It was jus t health foods the whole time - he woul dn't ea t sala d with dressing on it. It jus t goes to sho w tha t wh en it's your time, it's yo ur time , and tha t' s it. What ar e your livin g arrangements like he re in th e States? I rent a four -bedroom house in Cor on a (Californ ia) an d m y mechanic Ian and his w ife Penny stay w ith me, which is great. We all get alon g fan tastically. She looks after us, d oes all the cooki ng and clea n ing a n d wh at e ver, so w he n we come back at the end of the day we see a nice, clean house, fres h laun dry and a good ineal on the table. Does James Dobb hang out at y ou r house a lot now that he's single? (Laughs) . No, not too m uch. We in vite h im over for d inn er now and then, but he's down at Mim i's Restaurant ru nni ng u p a bi g tab there fo r breakf ast every morning. It's a little cafe down the road and he and Goat (Breker) go ther e every day. Who do you hang out with? With Ian an d Penny, of cou rse, and I han g out w ith Jam es and Mickael, too . Some times we go play go lf or just hang o u t t ogether. Jame s h a s a Br iti sh mech anic nam ed Tom that we han g ou t ~i th, to o, an d th e n there's some surfers I know p retty well. Surprisingly, there's a lot of South Africans in L.A. that I've known from racing in the past that live here now. I'm pretty well settled in here now. Do you get on w ell wi th th e American riders ? . Absolutely no p roblems there. Most of the guys are really good guys and I ge t on we ll wi th them. Are th e top Am erican gu ys, as a wh ole, more fr iend ly w ith on e another th an the top guys in Europ e? Well. It's hard to say because in Europe you have the language barrier where a lo t 'If th e top guys can' t really spe a k together and get a real bond going. Just one thing that I' ve not iced is that when yo u have a real friend in Europ e, a deep d own friend, he's a real genu ine friend. Here you have a lot of friends which are just skin-dee p. You say, ' Hey, how are yo u d oing?' bu t there's no real mean ing to it. I had a lot of friends hi ps in Europe wi th m y to p co m pe t itors th at were meaningfu l relationships . I cou ld coun t on those guys in a time of need or someth ing . I find here th a t the g uys are frien d ly with one a nothe r but there' s really not much dep th to it. Is that because 'th ere's too much money invol ved or is it just the American way? Well, ther e is a lot of money involved, so that cou ld be a facto r right there. But ma ybe it's jus t a California way, not the American way. The difference between California and the rest of America is about as b ig as the difference between Paris and the rest of Europe. Exactly. What if (team manager) Jan de Groot showed up at one of the la st races th is year and said, " G reg, let's go back to '93 when you were going after the 250cc World Championship. I'll pay you just as much to ride in Europe in '97 as they are paying you in America." Would you go back? No. Double what you're making now? No. This is where I am now. This is part of God 's p lan for m y life. I had three great years in Eur ope, very successful,'

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