VOL. 51 ISSUE 40 OCTOBER 7, 2014 P75
easier, physically, just the inten-
sity is what was really missing.
But it seemed to come back fairly
quick."
>>OUTDOORS
By the time the outdoors rolled
around, Canard was back into
racing form. The former 250cc
National champ came out swing-
ing, landing third overall at Glen
Helen. And he was consistent
throughout the beginning of the
season, but even though he was
near the front, he was a long,
long way behind the leaders
much of the time.
"It's not an easy thing, to get
beat, ever," Canard said. "I mean,
I got beat in Tennessee by like a
minute-20 or something. That's
not ever a good thing, and I still
got fourth place! It's not easy for
sure. And I'd been searching a
lot, as far as bike setup and ev-
erything like that. It's for sure dif-
ficult. For one, to believe that you
can even win, and then two, you
start to doubt a lot of things as far
as bike setup; everything, really.
So you start to overturn all the
stones and try to figure out what
can be better. It's definitely a dif-
ficult thing."
Despite the struggle, former
teammate (and current fellow fac-
tory Honda pilot) Eli Tomac came
back to racing for round five out-
doors, and immediately he and
Canard were battling. And Tomac
was beating Canard. Canard in-
sists that didn't really bother him.
"The first couple, we were
close," Canard said. "Especially
like RedBud and Budds Creek.
We battled at both of those
races. I was right there, so that
wasn't difficult. He was really on
at Millville and then Washougal, I
was a bit of a brain case. I was
more happy for him as a racer,
but it never feels good to get
spanked."
>>OUTLOOK
And that's where Canard's posi-
tive outlook comes in. Most suc-
cessful racers are always search-
ing for what they don't have or
looking with envy at what other
racers have. Canard, as a habit,
tries not to do that.
For example, Ricky Carmichael
always said that the motivation
for training during the week was
always the fear of losing instead
Some questioned Canard's return
to racing from an injury the last few
rounds of Supercross.
