Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

I What do you think that you bring to thb team? I don't know. l'm sure dlat between me and them we're going to leam still, but I don't kno\,\r', lvly goal is to win the championship and to make Harley-Davidson happy. Do you think drat this deal could be the fnal flece of the puzy'e to net )rou a champiomhip? I think so. I'm really excited. They have a lot of knolvl- edge. They know more than me about setup, I'm srre. I think this is de,initely what I needed. r/Vho will be your mechanic? It's going to be a whole deal where CraiS [Lager] and Ryan [Cross] are going to take care of Rich and me. Nobody has been arsigned to any one rider? No, TherE s no priority given to one rider over the other? No. Whoever needs help, they'll help- Okay then, let nE pr€sent you thk scenarior You and Rich King take each other out while racing for poei- tion in the main event, Who has priority then? [,aughs] I have no clue. ln that case, hopefully I'm first! Seriously, I'm sure there will be plenty of hands in there. You won two Half Miles last year, and you have obvi- ously b€come a yery strcng Half Milea Are you look- ing foia\rard to riding the factory bike on the Mile5? Yeah, but mostly I just want to ride them. l'm anxiols to see how much better drcy are than what I was riding. My stuff was pretrT good, but l'm sure their engines are \May stronger than what I had. So either way, Miles or Half Miles. Lrt's back up to that a tit You're not with the KTM factory team anymore. Weren't you Planning to leaYe KTM reSardleis ofwheher or not you got dle Harley deal? Rigtt. lt was iust time to move on. We're still friends, and I left on good terms. KTM did a lot for me. and I +pre- ciate what they did for me. Typicdly speaking, the Harley factory guys are expected to b€ spokesman for tfte company. Are you prepared for ttrat role, because I think it's fair to say that you'rc not the most outspoken rider on the cir- cuit' You're right. l'm not lthe most outspoken], and actu- alb/ we're working on that. I have to go back there and take a couple classes on public speaking. Hopefully we can work that out and they'll be happy with me, l'm excited about that. l'm excited about everything that has to do with this season. This is a salaried po,sition, base pay and perform- an€e bonqsei. Yes, tt $ould be eary to focus on cainirg. Yeah, There are only four Singles races, and ttu's the only sruff tlm's b6ed out oI my home. And there's not much to do on the Hondr besides charEing ttle oil and changing the tires. I spent a lot of time working on motor- cydes these past couple years, and I fiink it hurt me with rry training program plus focus, too. \Mll you be flying to more races? Yes, To the faraway one6, I will. rrvhat if there werc three champions? What if there were a Singtes Champbn, lirins Champion and an overall Grand National Charnpioo? What do you think of that scenario? That's cool, and I've heard that they are talking about it. Then it would be kind of the sarne as last year. I don't real- ly have much to say about it. I Suess that I'll iust have to see what happens this year and then base my opinion for next year on that. Right now the possibility exists that you could win the Singles title on a Honda and the Twins title on a Harley-Davidson. And then Harley-Davidson could advertise you as a champion and Honda could adyer- tise you as a champion. That would be good. I don't know ifyour bo6ses at Harl€y would thihk so. [Laughs] Yeah, RFn and I were talking about that, actu- alty. I dont realty understand why Harley doesn't want to run a Singles program. I ran it past them that I would do it, but fley iust want to conceitrate on the Twins stuff You actually used to be pretty strong on a Rotax, which the Harley.Dayidson XR500R basically is. Yeah. I would ride them. but I think that at 450cc the Hondas and the KTI'4s would have an advantage over them. It secrrs like we haw seen it time ard time a8ain ln fat track dlat it can be really ditrcuh to maintain or get better after you have switched frorn qre team to anofien Do you think tou can avdd that pithll, and what - if anything - will rnJ

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