Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

• •tT out of the race, and stood shaking his fist at the d isappearing Yama ha rider. j It wa s plainly Bia ggi 's error, but Doohan firmly and publicly slated Cra far, blastin g at "riders who try and win the race in the first comer." Crafar was mu ch taken aback. Dooh an was a friend ' - they trai ne d toget he r o n th e Go ld Coast. He went to Dooha n's motorhome afte r the race w ith the videotape to try and reaso n with h im. Dooh an flatl y refused eve n to look at it. , There we re likely two ma in reasons for thi s . Firstl y, b ecause Doohan is relu ctant to ge t in to a public wa r of words with a rid er of Biaggi's st atus a mong oth er thing s, the calcu lating and articula te Biagg i wou ld surely o u tdo him in a public debate, while th e pair were sharin g an aircraft back to Monaco tog ether after the ra ce. An d secondly be cause Doohan was making his own ad jus tme nt to treating Crafar as a serious rival. . "I don't want to ge t into a war with . ~ick," Crafar sa id . '1 was quite upset at fir s t . I re all y resp ec t M ick , a n d h e wo uld n' t even listen to me. Then, when I.thou ght abou t it afterwards, I came to a similar conclusion. " All th is begs the questio n: Is Crafar just too nice to be a real hard motorcycle ra cer? He smiles, th e essence of niceness. "I th ink th at about a nyon e w h o d oesn't stand in my wa y," Crafar said. "Bu t I found ou t last year that I d o have plenty of aggression. I' ve qu ite a ternp'er. (His eye s meet th ose of his wife, a nd th e y sh are a s m ile.) I h a ve th e aggression. There' s a m ean bastard inside. But I definitely don't want to be an asshoIe. Kirsty says that riders are so ,use d to getting the ir own way , and we 've seen that riders can be spoiled. I try to remember you have to go home at the end of the da y" His determination to be level-headed has served him well in racing so far . "I think I'm lucky not to have been a star at 15 - not to have had a factory ride at 19," he said . "I served my apprenticeship as a mechanic. I worked for a living. I pa id rent and so on." He was, in short, able to grow up in a wa y denied to riders who were on the fast track to the top when barely ou t of school. Crafar is, according to his chief engine er, Hamish Jamieson, expe rie n ced and highly skilled also in the complicated matter of mot orcycle.setup. The pai r each had to mak e adjustments. "I' rn used to comin g in to the p its and tellin g the engineers what to do , in terms of wh at to adjust and so on," Crafar sa id . "I' vehad to tak e a ste p back from th at direct invol vement, and tell Hamish · how the bike feels a nd how I ~a n,t it t.o feel. He h~s the wh ole picture m his mind , and he 15 m charge of exactly what ad jus tme nt to ma ke to achieve the feeling I'm looking for. "Technica lly, thou gh , I can give the mechan ics feedback abo u t th e bik e. I think th at ' s w hy I' ve been able to go fa st er o n a 500 compared w it h o ther superbike riders." (He means Tro y Corser, a s w ell a s Anthon y Go be rt.) "It's nothing mechanical. It's all to d o with feel. I'v e seen som e brilliant riders who ha ven't got a clue . You ca n ge t away with it on a su perbike.' Far fro m the rumor ed radical stee ring angles and unstable bike, Jamieson says Crafar like s it "exactly as it came ou t of the box" - the most neutral vari ation. Crafar's opinion concurs. . " I' ~ very fussy ab out se tt ings," he sa id . I want to ge t the bike to '10 the work, so it d oes it for me. Most o the r rid ers lik e m y se tti ngs . Th at's how I kn ow I am good at it." At the same tim e, he's had to rai se h i ~ g a m~, whil e p~ov in g (as Wa yne Ramey did before him) that superbikes ar en't a bad tra ining ground for 500s, thou gh there is still plenty to learn. "At fir st I got on a GP bike and thought, 'This isn't so bad:" he sa id . " Bu t t ~ g o fast - th at is really h ard . Superbikes ar e so user-friendly. Th ey react slower, and give you more feel. A 500 is so sensitiv e, and if it ' s not set right, it feels like it wants to chuck you." Crafar is consciously working on his ~tyle, which is at present planted firml y m the saddle and leaning with the bike reminiscent of an earlier era , and specifically not unlike that of the last New Zealand GP star, Graeme Crosby. "I noti ce that you ha ve to use you r w eight mor e on a 500," he said . " It can affect the bike mor e." as Th e n a g a in, impressed obs e r ve r Ra ine y p ointed out : "He 's bigger, so he ha s m ore leverag e. He d o esn 't have to jump a rou n d like th e littl e guys." H e views hi s o wn str ong po ints as twofold , "I never giv e up: ' he sai d. "A nd I'm re all y consiste nt. .Wh en ever I go to a new tea m, they al wa ys say , 'Check thi s o ut! ' Th ere' s so littl e v ariat ion la p for la p . Ev en if th e ti re s a re w orn , I ca n k eep th e spee d up." H e w arm s · to hi s theme, talking about the con cept rather than himself. "Cons is tency co mes ?,om mental strengt h, The natural thing IS to want to slow d own wh en the tires , get warm or you get tired ." Crafar is an ana lytical rid er wh o has bee n a n im por ta nt part of Du n lo p's quick catching up. "A t Assen, wh en I took the lead for a ~ap, I ~ew I could n' t stay there - I was Just tr ymg to rai se th e pa ce because I cou ld see that (Alex) Barros was catc hin g up: ' h e explains . "Mick (Doohan ) and Max (Biaggi) cou ld blow by me on the straig ht an ytime. But it wasn't just .on hor sepower . It was also a bac k-tire th in g. Dunlop ca me up w it h a good fro nt ~t Mugello, and the next d evelop~ent IS for the bac k. We hav e a goo d tire now, but we need more cho ice." He enj oys th e Yama ha, a n d w hi le he'd be "reasonably comfortable" to get on anothe r mak e of 500, he says, "I'd be mor e than happy to stay on a Yamaha. Red ~ull have ~n option for next year." At th is sta ge, It seems th ey would be crazy not to take it up, Cra far reckons he has hit his peak at a good age . "I' m 29, and a lot of rid ers have their best results when th ey a re abo u t tha t age, " he said . "I feel that I fou nd ano ther level of rid in g from halfwa y through last year. It's the same for all rid ers. You a lways tr y you r hardest , then all of a su? d en J;ou s ta rt goi ng fas te r. Eve ry th ing cl icks . yo u s ta r t g ivi ng yo u r mechanics better feed back, etc. "That was wh en I stopped wo rryi ng abou t my age. I think [ have fou r or five yea rs left to go as a rider. [ feel on the bri nk of it." Betw een races, he and Kirsten repair to the mountain principality of Ando rra, a tax haven in the Pyrenees, the mountains that d ivide France from Spai n. He consid ered Mon aco, the more popular choice, but, he savs, "I' m from the bush in New Zealand: and it wasn' t for me. Andorra is much more unspoiled . I like to go fishing, ' and there's no restrictions on dirt biking." . He also sp~nds time each yea r with h is parents 10 Au ckl and , an d with Kirsten' s parents in Qu eens land, Au stralia , where he also ha s a house north of Surfers' Parad ise. Cra far's victory in Britain moved him one step further into the limeli ght, and one step beyond the simple naivete that has sustained him this far. But it was his own streng th of mind that provided the driv ing fo rce , a n d it h as so fa r been unwavering. . Has a n ew cha ll enger to Doohan com e out of th e blue? It' s too early to te ll. But certainly Cra far is more of a 0 dark horse than a red bu ll. 29

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