P22
IN
THE
WIND
countless number of friends, especially with the members of the
National Guard, and we're really
proud of that."
Robinson is quick to not throw
AMA Pro Racing under the bus,
but he also points out the obvious.
"We're at the end of October
and there's not a schedule to
speak of," he said. "We don't get
physical counts [on attendance]
from the AMA or track promoters,
but visually it does not seem to
be looking very well. As well as
television ratings. We're not seeing a high level of television ratings where companies can take
those numbers and justify the expenditure. I truly hope - because
we love motorcycle racing here in
the United States - that AMA Pro
can fix that situation. We really,
really do. But at the meantime we
cannot extend our resources to
continue to do this. We just can't
do it."
For 2014, the team's involvement internationally may just be
as a wild card entry here and
there, Robinson said. There's
lots of work to be done and there
may not be time for more than
that. But they're going to give
maximum effort.
"Ideally it would be 2014," Robinson said. "Again, it goes back to
our sponsor commitments now.
We have certain commitments
that have limited us to the end of
October. There weren't ways that
we could move forward. We fully
expected for National Guard to
return in 2014. Really at the last
minute, and I don't want to sound
like this is the National Guard's
fault, but it really came down to
the last minute that they were
not able to renew. It really came
down to the last minute and they
were not able to do it."
Paul Carruthers
Pol Espargaro tried his hand in a racecar last week in Spain.
ESPAGARO GETS A DRIVE!
O
n June 16 Pol Espargaro
used all 600cc 120 horsepower of his Tuenti HP40 Kalex
motorcycle to cross the finish
line stripe and win the Catalunyan Grand Prix by .081 of a sec-
ond. Five months later – and
now the newly crowned 2013
Moto2 World Champion – Espargaro returned to the 16-turn,
2.892-mile Circuit de Catalunya, albeit this time to perform
a much different task.
This weekend, the 22 yearold Spaniard showed up at the
Barcelona circuit to climb into
the carbon fiber monocoque
cockpit of a Formula Renault
continued on page 24
