Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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VOL. 54 ISSUE 17 MAY 2, 2017 P133 as a racer with the goal of winning races and ulti- mately championships. "That took priority over everything," Roberts recalls. "At the same time it was amazing how sim- plified life was. It was get up and train, ride a bike, do your press conferences and try to get out of as much of B.S. stuff as you can. Now you look back and I drove my own motorhome here, I was set- ting up a bunch of stuff and you think, 'Man, that's a lot of work!' Trying to get Wayne [Rainey], Kevin [Schwantz], my dad and myself up on a stage all at the same time at one of these events…man! I look back and we were always trying to get out of those kinds of things and now I'm the one setting them up and it's like, 'No, I need you there!' You finally see all the stuff, the hospitality and that kind of thing, that goes into making one of these events happen. All the behind the scenes stuff I appreciate it more now than I ever did when I was racing." Roberts began his professional road racing career at 17 in 1991 riding the WERA Pro Formula Two class (the main support class for Formula USA) for Wayne Rainey's Otsuka Electronics Yamaha team. He then moved on to the AMA 250 Grand Prix class in 1992 before heading off to Europe to start his Grand Prix career. He raced for his dad's Marlboro-backed squads with Yamaha and then Modenas before moving over to Suzuki in 1999. With Suzuki, Roberts found immediate success. He won his debut race with the team in Malaysia and followed that up with a second-straight victory in Japan. The Japanese victory in Motegi was especially memorable, since he beat Mick Doohan on the powerful Repsol Honda team straight up. The '99 season overall was a remarkable year for Roberts. From 1993 to 1998 Roberts had never even scored a podium in either the 250cc or 500cc classes. Then suddenly with Suzuki he scored eight rostrum finishes, including four victories en route to finishing second in the world championship to Àlex Crivillé. The 2000 season was one of the most wide open in the history of the series. Eight different riders won, including a rookie named Valentino Rossi, but it was Roberts who took a series- leading four wins and clinched the championship with two races remaining on the calendar. Roberts said he knew halfway through the season that if he were going to win the world championship he was going to have to get it done in 2000. He saw Rossi (who finished run- ner up to Roberts in his rookie premier class season) was coming up fast. "We had a wet race in Donington, where Val- entino won his first race," Roberts recalled. "My dad and I talked and it's like, 'Hey this may be the only shot, because Valentino is going to start running the table with this bike and this team.'" Roberts could see the writing on the wall with Rossi being a very strong rider on the best team. "It's very hard to find a weakness in that." Their predictions on Rossi proved correct and Roberts, as they say, got while the gettin' was good. Surprisingly, when Roberts hung up his hel- met after retiring in 2007, he really hung it up. "I did not put a helmet on to ride again, even casu- ally, until 2013, and I did not ride in an airplane from 2007 to 2013, even in America. That part I don't miss—the airline travel and the jetlag." Roberts has been away from the sport long enough, it's been suggested that now maybe the time is right for him to return in some capacity, perhaps as owner of a team. "It just seems like when we hit places like this and we're around my dad and his friends and our friends, a lot traveling, we're always meeting in fun environments," Roberts says. "So if I can keep it fun and it's with MotoGP or with Mo- toAmerica, I'm open to anything." CN Subscribe to nearly 50 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives