Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/650535
VOL. 53 ISSUE 9 MARCH 8, 2016 P101 "Road racing could have really been a career for me," Pearson says. "I won every road race that year expect for Riverside, where I finished third." In March of 1977 Pearson was a rookie expert and found himself at Daytona, a factory Harley-Davidson rider teaming with then 250 Grand Prix World Cham- pion Walter Villa, future World champ Franco Uncini and Jay Springsteen riding the Aermacchi-built factory Harley RR-250. It was heady stuff for a rookie expert and unfortunately for Pearson, what could have been an eye-opening debut for the road racing world to see, ended with Pearson's Harley seizing going into the chicane and pitching him off in practice. "It broke my right wrist badly," Pearson said. "I had a bone graft and was in a cast for a year and it never healed. It was the navicular and they didn't have the technology to get blood flow to the bone in those days. It was an injury that ended many guys' careers back then." He tried to road race again, but his right wrist didn't have the strength to do it. With a bum wrist Pearson found his hopes for a road racing career out the window, fortunately for him, flat track racing, without pressure of front braking, was still possible. "It didn't bother me near as much," Pearson said. "All I had to do was twist the throttle. The TTs were difficult, but I could manage. I had a brute strength left hand." Pearson did more than manage. He became a five-time race winner in the AMA Grand National Championship. And he did that while battling through a series of injuries that often kept him out for long stretches. Not only did Pearson win but he won prestigious races, like the Peoria TT (twice) and the Ascot Park Half-Mile. Perhaps his most famous win came on the cushion of the Louisville Half-Mile in 1982. It was a historic win. Honda had won national road races, short tracks and TTs, but Pearson's Louisville victory marked Honda's first win on a big track in AMA Grand Na- tional competition. And Pearson did it on the under- dog Honda NS750, the flat-track machine based on the water-cooled Honda CX500 production ma- chine. It was a highly unlikely victory on a machine that no one had been able to make work. Backing up for a moment to Peoria, Pearson might have been a winner of three straight, but he smiles at the memory of the 1979 TT. "I led the thing for 20 laps," he said. "And Jay (Springsteen) hounded me the whole way and end- ed up getting by me and winning it. I told myself that next year I wasn't going to let that happen again." Pearson ranks the 1980 Peoria TT Grand Na- tional as his most memorable victory. Not only was it his first national win, but the fact he did it with a small privateer effort made it even sweeter. "I won that on a privateer Yamaha 750 that Harry Lillie built in his little shop in Redwood City," Pearson said. "In practice and qualifying my main engine was going sour and Harry and Shell Thuet changed the motor before the main and I went out and did my thing and won it." Pearson's win on the underdog Honda was a major boost to factory Honda's effort. The NS750 was a stepping stool for Honda on the way to later developing the championship-winning RS750, but the CX500-based machine was a handful for every rider who tried it. Finally, Pearson, who was a mid- season replacement rider for Honda, caught fire and won at Louisville. "Louisville had a real wide straightaway, so everybody got a front row," Pearson said. "We lined up for the start and I looked and for whatever reason nobody took the lowest line, and I thought 'Oh perfect!' It was all cushiony and still wet down there and lots of traction. I got the holeshot and I rode my race and did a little blocking along the way and pulled it off." Pearson raced until the late 1980s when he de- cided to hand up his leathers, prompted by a bad crash at San Jose and the deaths of a couple of his racing buddies. For a guy who had a bum wrist his entire career, he managed to accomplish some very memorable wins. The wrist kept him from fol- lowing in the footsteps of Kenny Roberts to road racing, but Pearson's Honda victory at Louisville was one that will forever be a milestone. CN Subscribe to nearly 50 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives