VOL. 50 ISSUE 27 JULY 9, 2013
might be able to do the wild-card
entry, Rispoli talked to his people
and his personal sponsor, Monster Energy, stepped on board.
"Things started coming together and within the last week everything went from just talk to 'yeah,
we're doing it," "Rispoli said. "It's
going to be sweet. We're going to
ride the Tech 3 bike, we're gonna
get a little bit more support from
Tech 3 and Herve [Poncharal]
over there. We're going to have
a good opportunity with Monster
stepping on board."
Rispoli also has a good support network, including his longtime coach Jason Pridmore and
his friend Bradley Smith, who
raced in Moto2 for Tech 3 before
his move to the MotoGP class
this year, to call on for advice.
"Oh, yeah," Rispoli said. "I've
been on the phone with them;
pretty much everyone even beforehand. Even before I made my
decision I was on the phone talking to a lot of people. Kind of going to my circle, my network and
making sure that it was a good
move and this and that and we all
seemed to agree that it was going to be a great experience."
The young American is not a
complete stranger to racing in
foreign championships as he had
the opportunity to race in the last
round of the British Supertock
600 Series for the Swan Yamaha
team last season. Stepping into a
championship for a one-off race
is always a difficult task. Add in
P27
the fact that Rispoli hasn't ridden
at Indy or even sat on a Moto2
bike before and it becomes a bit
to ask. But fortunately he will get
the chance to test the bike twice,
at a still-to-be-determined track
here in the U.S. and at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the
wild-card test.
"We're going in with the mentality the same way we went in
over in BSB," Rispoli said. "Just
an open mind knowing it's going
to be extremely tough. It's going
to be hard to get close to those
boys, but we're going to just take
every session step by step and
just keep moving, moving forward and keep improving as the
weekend keeps going on."
Andrea Wilson
L
ike a match made in heaven,
Ricky Carmichael University
(RCU) made a stop at RedBud
on Wednesday, July 3, prior to
the AMA Pro National. And, as
with every RCU event so far, all
100 spots that were offered were
filled.
Ricky Carmichael taught alongside former champs Jeff Stanton,
Jeff Emig, Grant Langston and
Ivan Tedesco, with each racer
taking his own "section" and alternating groups throughout the
day. Then, at the end of the day,
all of the students got to ride with
the instructors – sans Emig, who
is recovering from a riding injury
– and RCH's Carey Hart on the
legendary RedBud circuit.
PHOTOGRAPHY BY STEVE COX
SCHOOL'S IN SESSION
Ricky Carmichael spreads his motocross knowledge
during the RCU class at RedBud.
The RCU travels to Europe
this following week where it will
set foot in the U.K. at the sandy
Fatcat Circuit. Former AMA 250
Motocross Champion Dean Wil-
son will be one of the featured
instructors, joining former World
Champion James Dobb and current GP racer Tommy Searle.
Steve Cox
