FEATURE
MOTOAMERICA
P102
long roadracers when it came to taming beastly
500cc two-stroke fours, bikes that produced im-
mense and peaky horsepower that outstripped the
chassis and tire technology of the day.
The U.S. had readymade superstars who could
exploit this fact and their superior throttle control eas-
ily overcame the long list of disadvantages that they
faced—unfamiliar equipment, tracks, locales, etc.
However, over time chassis and tire develop-
ments dulled that advantage, and modern electron-
ics finally rendered it completely obsolete.
"TODAY, THE BEST PATH TO SUCCESS IS MORE
SIMILAR TO BASEBALL. THE MOST PROMISING
TALENTS ARE FREQUENTLY SNAPPED UP DIRECTLY
BY MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL TEAMS AND REROUTED
TO THEIR MINOR LEAGUE SYSTEMS WHILE NCAA
BASEBALL LARGELY SUFFERS AS A RESULT."
ing, both on television and in person.
While a damn good start, that alone won't guar-
antee success. The 2011 AMA Pro Road Racing
season provided perhaps the best racing the series
has ever seen, but that fact did practically nothing to
stave off the series' plummeting fortunes.
DEVELOPING FUTURE WORLD CHAMPIONS
Along with raising the profile of road racing in North
America, the other explicit goal of MotoAmerica is
to produce riders capable of competing interna-
tionally.
Rainey himself was a multi-time 500GP champ
and one of the greatest in a long-line of American
Grand Prix stars who owned the World Champion-
ship for a near-two decade run from the late-'70s
to the mid-'90s.
It's a noble and necessary objective. The cur-
rent state of Americans in MotoGP is dire indeed.
Prior to the 2014 season, there had been at least
one (and generally far more than one) American
with a factory ride in the premier class dating back
to the pre-Roberts days in the mid-'70s. Now it's
far easier to imagine the grid being completely de-
void of Americans than it is to imagine one with an
American on works equipment.
But simply improving the health of the racing in
the United States is unlikely to be enough to pro-
duce another MotoGP World Champion.
The era of Roberts, Lawson, Rainey, and
Schwantz is not simply gone, it is not replicable.
That was a perfect storm. A veritable fluke of tal-
ent, training, technology, and timing. In an odd
confluence of factors, riders raised riding side-
ways in the dirt held a distinct advantage over life-
