Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

believe the organization should be looking at the places they're making us race. It's like the place at Mid-Oluo where Jamie James broke his leg - there's just no need for it. There's a wall there and I don't care if you hit an air bag at 70-80 mph, even in the rain, it's not going to help that much - your foot can go under it or whatever. That's the way it is and I'll always have something to say about it. '1n Australia, for instance, if we have a race track that's bad, then all the team managers get together and do something about it. It happens there and it happens in Europe - there's a rider's organization or whatever. A lot of the guys here have been racing at these places so long they don't see it anymore. And they also don't see that even if somebody's not getting hurt in the Superbike class, they're getting hurt in the other classes. "What some people don't understand is that after racing you've got another 50 years of life. When I finish racing, or maybe while I'm racing, I want to have a family. After racing, I want to have a good life. That's why I race. I race because I enjoy it and because I want to be able to live a comfortable.life afterward. You have to think about that stuff. I don't want to be all crippled up at 35 years old because I hit a wall that didn't need to be there. "It comes back to the Sears Point thing - I couldn't bring myself to push as hard there as I wanted to. I had another two-tenths of a second, no problem, up there. I just couldn't do it. When Aaron (Yates) went past, there was nowhere I could pass him that was relatively safe that didn't put us both in danger." Although' it didn't result in one of his three second-place finishes, Mladin ranks his fourth-place ride as his best performance of the year. "I tlunk I rode really well at Brainerd," he said. "That thing was down on speed big time. In the last half of that race - we still had our old suspension bits - I had to push really hard to stay up with those guys. I really enjoyed that race at Brainerd. I enjoy all my races, but that race at Brainerd I really had to push hard or those guys would have gotten away from me. I was sliding the front and sliding the back and both of my tires were shredded when I got in. It's all a learning experience and I en joy doing that. If I get on a motorcycle that's already very competitive and I do the same thing, I think I'll be right there." This season, Mladin lived with his girlfriend, his mechanic and his mechanic's wife in a two-bedroom apartment in Anaheim, California. He was fairly close to the Yoshimura Suzuki shop in Brea and he plans on being equally as close to Ferracci's shop in Philadelphia. "Don't get me wrong, the experiences at the race track were also very good, but away from the race track we had fun," MIadin said. "When I come to the races, you rarely see my girlfriend because she's only been to a couple of races here. I'm the kind of person who needs my space at the race. I need to be able to concentrate. It's hard for me to entertain somebody when I'm trying to concentrate on what I'm doing. I find it easier to be at the race track by myself. So it worked out good. "My mechanic and me went to the races and his wife and my girlfriend stayed at home. It worked. out good and it made it easier on me. I hope next year we can do the same thing. I'll go and live back there (on the East Coast) with the boys. I'm looking forward to it. California was good, but I got a little sick of the weather all the time being hot. Over there we'll get a lot of change - snow, cool, humidity, whatever. It should be good and I'm looking forward to it." As for his off-season, Mladin has big plans. First there will be a little spectating at the Phillip Island round of the World Superbike Series, then a fairly substantial training program in an effort to shed a little weight. "I want to go home and have a bit of time off and do my training," Mladin said. "I need to lose a little bit more weight. I don't really carry much body fat, but I'm bigger than most of the guys as far as weight goes. I probably weigh 175 and that's a little bit too heavy. I need to lose about 10 pounds, so I'm going to work real hard on that. This year I probably did a little bit too much in the weight room and built up a little bit tQo much muscle. But in the next couple of months I should be able to get that off. I just bought myself a new bicycle so I'll take that home. I can't run anymore because of my foot. I know I can lose 10 pounds. I don't want to have an extra 10 pounds sitting on the bike. I can get the weight off and still be strong." Although the goal is to eventually get back to Europe for the World Superbike wars, Mladin realizes life in Europe isn't easy. "It's another step up when you go back over there," he said. "There's a lot ot pressure and lot of different stuff that doesn't go on here. There's a lot of stuff that even the riders who race here don't realize. I've been there and I see what happens. Guys like Doug (Chandler) and Miguel (DuHamel) know because they've been there. You've got to step it up anotller notch. I'm probably ready to go back there now with the right team. But I think another year here will cap it off and I can gain some more experience. "If everything works out well here and I can get on with the bike straight up then maybe we can get over there. I've raced with Troy (Corser) and (Anthony) Gobert before and we always had good races. But I'm not going to jump in the deep end again like I did last tiine. I'm going to make sure I'm ready to.go this time and then I'Il'go over." In the meantime, the AMA series should provide the competition to see if he's read y. If he is, he could end up with a National Championship from a foreign country. "If I can race with those guys (DuHamel and Chandler) all the time next year and get up and beat them every now and again, that's the plan for next year," MIadin said. "I've been close a number of times this year and next year we want to win some races. I also want to stay consistent. There are some race tracks where I won't be quite as quiCk because of how I feel about the race track, so I'll have a little in reserve. Hopefully, we can do well enough at the other places that I don't have to be stupid at the dangerous ones. I know I'm as good as these guys and I just want to go out and have a good year." One thing is certain: Mladin wouldn't mind beating DuHamel. When the defending National Champion had words to say about Mladin's riding style, the Australian retaliated. "It's unfortunate tha t Miguel had a few things to say about me," Mladin said. "I've never, ever ran into that guy and I've never run him off the race track. And I've never done any stupid things around him. He just sees what's going on from behind and fortunately fot Miguel he's on a race bike tha t' s proven to be fairly good. It's got three years of development and it's obviously a good motorbike now. We've had to ride our rings off to get these things competitive and we've done that." CN

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