Road Racerhead v.2 #2
January 13, 2006
By CJ
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John Hopkins and Desiree Crossman were in the house at A-1. CJ photo

While we in the road race world are still in the deepest depths of the off-season, last weekend saw our motocross brethren kick off their 2006 racing with the Anaheim 1 round of the Amp’d Mobile AMA Supercross Series. If you like, you can head over to www.racerxill.com to catch up on how it all went down, but if you’re like many in the road race world, you were probably there. I was, and I snapped photos of those knee-draggers with whom I happened to cross paths (I’m sprinkling them throughout today’s Road Racerhead). There were plenty of others on hand who escaped my camera.

Among those that I did see was Suzuki MotoGP rider John Hopkins, who will also be at tomorrow’s supercross round in Phoenix. On Sunday, he’s going to have the opportunity to do something pretty cool. I’ll tell you all about it next week. Also, keep an eye out for Hopper’s beautiful girlfriend Desiree Crossman in an upcoming issue of Maxim.

In the asphalt world, meanwhile, news this week wasn’t limited to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s sidecar crash (with no motorcycle license) last Sunday. In fact, most of the road race talk centered around the growing Tobaccogate issue, prompted by a press release issued on Monday, confirming the suspicions posted here one week (and three weeks) ago that Yamaha’s MotoGP team would be Camel-sponsored this season. Actually, the suspicions were confirmed over the weekend, when someone at Yamaha accidentally posted the words “Camel Yamaha Team” on the MotoGP portion of their official website. That was quickly taken down, but by then, the cat was out of the bag, and Monday’s official press release wasn’t exactly a shocker.

Randy Mamola and wife Barbara had to drive up to Northern California right after Anaheim’s main event. CJ photo

“Yamaha is very excited to enter into this new partnership with JTI [JT International, a subsidiary of Japan Tobacco Inc., which owns Camel],” said Managing Director of Yamaha Motor Racing Lin Jarvis in the release. “JTI has been involved in motorsport at the highest level for many years and has been an active sponsor at the top level in the MotoGP class for the past three seasons. We look forward to working with JTI to enhance the respective images of our brands and to challenge together for victory, as Yamaha enters its ‘next 50 years’ and aims to retain its MotoGP titles in 2006.”

In other words, Camel is replacing Gauloises as a tobacco brand sponsoring Team Yamaha MotoGP riders Valentino Rossi and Colin Edwards for the 2006 racing season. (The rift between Yamaha and Gauloises has already been thoroughly documented, but the short version is that Rossi allegedly stipulated when negotiating with Yamaha for ’06 that he not be sponsored by Gauloises, and Yamaha—despite apparently having a contract in place with Gauloises to sponsor their factory team—agreed.)

I ran into Yamaha Team Manager Davide Brivio at Anaheim 1, but I knew he couldn’t comment on this situation, as the announcement hadn’t been made yet. I did speak with Edwards by phone in Texas the day after it was official, however, and he said he had gotten the word (via a text message from Brivio) only shortly before the press release was sent out. (Edwards, who was driving home from a doctor visit with new son Hayes, also mentioned that he is unfortunate enough to live in one of the television markets where local CBS affiliates preempted Sunday’s television coverage of Anaheim 1.)

At Anaheim, James Dobb accompanied Yamaha manager Davide Brivio, who was keeping track of who his MotoGP team’s sponsor was. CJ photo

Throughout this past week, Yamaha and Altadis (owner of Gauloises) have engaged in a very public (and very ugly) war of vitriolic press releases. The very same day as Yamaha’s announcement, Altadis responded with a press release stating that they had “initiated arbitration proceedings, seeking substantial compensation from Yamaha for the damages arising out of what Altadis considers to be a material breach by Yamaha of the two companies' two-year sponsorship agreement.” Furthermore, Altadis said they had “requested an urgent decision in this regard, in the nature of an interim order obligating Yamaha to refrain from collaborating with any sponsor whose products compete directly with Altadis products for the coming season.”

Yamaha responded on Tuesday, denying Altadis’ “wrongful statements” and seeking to clarify that it no longer has any sponsorship with Altadis, that it never breached its sponsorship agreement with Altadis, and that “there exists no legal obligation preventing Yamaha from contracting with a tobacco sponsor or any other sponsor for the 2006 season.”

Right on schedule, Altadis responded on Wednesday: “Contrary to the information provided by Yamaha in its January 10th press release,” their release stated, “Altadis' decision to initiate arbitration proceedings was taken—as Yamaha well knows—after many months of negotiations during which Altadis sought ways to release Yamaha from its obligations to Altadis.”

Yesterday was refreshingly devoid of any further public bickering between the two parties, but it’s quite doubtful that we’ve heard the last of this matter, which constitutes a black eye for road racing in general and MotoGP in particular.

Mini-Mamolas Dakota and Taylor stopped by the Red Bull Energy Station at A-1 on their American vacation. CJ photo

It’s certainly a perplexing situation, and Camel’s partnering with Yamaha only adds to the confusion. There has still been no good explanation for why Yamaha is not okay with Gauloises but is fine with Camel. Or, if Yamaha’s reason for the switch is that Rossi mandated it, then why does The Doctor have issues with the former but not the latter? Few believe anymore that he has an aversion to tobacco money, but now the more logical motivation—that he didn’t want a sponsor that competed with Ferrari backer Marlboro—has been effectively blown out of the water. We may never know the full story, but the spat certainly seems to have gotten personal.

I’ve talked in this space about Carlos Checa’s predicament now that Sito Pons is putting his satellite team on the sidelines for this season (due to Camel’s first backing out as a sponsor when Max Biaggi was given the boot by Honda, then shopping around for a non-Honda ride for the Italian, then finally giving up and signing with Yamaha.... Man, this is convoluted). Judging by Checa’s quotes yesterday on www.motogp.com, there’s still a chance he’ll be in the MotoGP paddock in ‘06: “Yamaha, Michelin and [Tech3 boss] Hervé Poncharal have given refuge to my hopes of continuing in MotoGP,” Checa said. “They have been interested in me and it is something for which I thank them a lot. It is a vote of confidence, although I know that it is very complicated to achieve a secure project. Right now there are two big enemies; one is time, which is really on top of us, and the other is filling in the budget.”

Roger Lee Hayden and Jeremy Malott had elusive passes to the Knothole Club at Anaheim. CJ photo

If Checa does indeed stay in the series and doesn’t go to World Superbike, he’ll be one of very few MotoGP vets not to do so. The same website revealed yesterday that yet another old-ish MotoGP rider will be leaving the series and finding refuge in World SBK: Italian Franco Battaini will ride Kawasakis for Team Bertocchi, joining Troy Bayliss, Rubén Xaus, Roberto Rolfo, Alex Barros, and (probably) Max Biaggi in what journalist Dennis Noyes is aptly calling a Diaspora from international road racing’s prototype series to its production-based circuit. (Speaking of Noyes, check out part 4 of his excellent “Idiot’s Guide to MotoGP” right here.)

Ah yes, Biaggi: Yesterday, Italian websites were all a-flutter, reporting breathlessly that the announcement that Biaggi is going World Superbike racing with Alstare Suzuki this year would come “within 24 hours.” That means today. Then again, back on December 28, they were reporting that the very same announcement was expected “tomorrow,” and that one certainly didn’t pan out. At any rate, with La Gazzetta dello Sport (Italy’s daily sports newspaper) reporting the move as fact yesterday, it now seems certain that the announcement will come at some time or another.

After all, the preliminary 2006 World Superbike entry list (released this week by FGSport) included no fewer than four slots for Alstare Suzuki Corona riders—one for defending champ Troy Corser, one for Frenchman Fabien Foret, one for Japanese racer Yukio Kagayama, and one TBA (there was also a TBA for Kawasaki Corse and another one for Klaffi Honda). Presumably, the Suzuki TBA is for Max.

Nicky Hayden’s A-1 posse included (left to right) Red Bull’s Steve Pegram, sister Jenny, and mother Rose. CJ photo

So, does this mean Alstare will field four riders this year? Well, they surely want to retain their crown, especially since Corona is also the title sponsor of the series. Still, they should be careful of the “strength in numbers” approach, as it can lead to your own riders stealing points from one another (for an example, just look to Honda riders in MotoGP the past couple seasons). Actually, it’s doubtful that they’d campaign the series with such a large team; Kagayama, is rumored to be headed back to British Superbike.

Anyway, Biaggi (who spent the holidays in California and attended the Anaheim SX), confirmed on his personal website (www.maxbiaggi.com) this week that he at least won’t be racing MotoGP this season, calling it “a terrible position that [he’s] been put in by Honda.” Biaggi promised more details in his soon-to-be-released autobiography. As for World SBK, Max said “you have to know guys that I have always appreciated this category, I also have few friends in there and they have all my respect. So I am considering this opportunity as a very good one.”

AMA Pro Racing honchos Scott Hollingsworth, Kerry Graeber, and John Farris took in some SX action. CJ photo

Though he rightfully poked fun at all the rumors surrounding his future, Max couldn’t help stoking the flames a bit by signing off with the following: “Certainly if we add two more wheels, we could risk to do something totally different and maybe interesting... is not a bad idea isn’t it??!”

With the World SBK season just over six weeks away, some of that series’ teams and riders were already testing this week in Valencia, but Ruben Xaus was not among them. Unfortunately, the gravity-challenged Spaniard broke his ankle while riding his Supermoto bike on New Year's Eve, but he says he still hopes to be on the start grid on February 25.

AMA Superbike was also on the track this week, with Team Honda, Erion Honda, and Team Kawasaki spending Wednesday and Thursday spinning laps at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca. Actually, there wasn’t much lap-spinning happening on Wednesday, as precipitation meant the day was pretty much a wash. According to Brian J. Nelson, who was on-site shooting photos of the action, yesterday was much nicer.

Azza Gobert and his new Honda wait out the bad weather at Laguna. Dave Natividad photo

Speaking of Laguna, have you seen the new official logo for the 2006 Red Bull USGP? Pretty cool! Word from the test was that heavy machinery is in place to begin tearing down the hillside in order to create more runoff area outside of turn 1. For ticket information on the race, go to www.laguna-seca.com.

Another track with machinery working is Utah’s still-not-quite-finished Miller Motorsports Park, whose owner Larry Miller was in the news this week when a Salt Lake City movie theater he owns refused to screen Brokeback Mountain. The track will host this year’s Racing 2 Save Lives charity event, which was temporarily without a home when Pikes Peak International Raceway shut down. The event, which raises money for children’s charities and is a great excuse to spend all day on a track, takes place on April 13-16. For more information, log on to www.racing2savelives.org.

Check out the new logo for the Red Bull USGP.

RRX reader and Suomy employee Everett Dittman gave me a heads-up about some comments recently made by Northern California DJ Woody on radio station Live 105, at 105.3 FM. Woody was talking about pet peeves, and the subject of motorcycles lane-splitting came up. When done safely, lane-splitting is legal in California, as it saves gas, relieves congestion, and protects motorcyclists, yet Woody suggested listeners open their car doors to cause lane-splitting riders to crash. Nor Cal forum B.A.R.F. ( www.bayarearidersforum.com) picked up on it and has rallied the troops to contact the station with complaints, prompting a somewhat lame semi-apology email from Woody. The audio was posted at www.live105.com but has since been removed. Click here to voice your opinion (I suggest using a civil tone, rather than sinking down to Woody’s level). You also might want to let Bay Area Yamaha (an advertiser on the station) know what you think right here.

For some modem-busting old-school Valentino Rossi video footage, go here.

Tommy Hayden was hanging in the ‘Hole with (from left) International Racers manager Steve Dicterow, mom Rose, and sister Jenny. CJ photo

E-Boz hijacked Parts Unlimited’s Mule to negotiate the Anaheim pits. CJ photo

The new (February) issue of Outside magazine contains a feature story called “Cool Millions” about Steve Astephan, founder of The Familie athlete-management company. These guys (agents include Randy Mamola and former motocross champions Bob Moore and James Dobb) are the ones who represent John Hopkins and Jake Zemke. Although the article talks more about The Familie’s motocross clients (including Travis Pastrana, Chad Reed, and Carey Hart), the point is that action sports can be huge money-makers that rival stick-and-ball sports, and that’s true of road racing.

Have you seen the website www.roadracerpodcast.com? If not, it’s worth checking out, as they’re posting rider interviews that can be downloaded to MP3 players or streamed over the internet. The current interview (episode four) is with female racer Jessica Zalusky, and the folks at the site are looking for amateur road racers and privateers to feature as interview subjects. “The AMA guys get most of the news/media, and the privateers really need an outlet to talk about their struggle and experiences,” wrote site owner John Bunce in an email to me this week. Bunce plans to post shows every two weeks, so if you think you’d make a good interview subject, email him here.

(Incidentally, if you’re a candidate for such an interview, you’re probably also prime fodder for a Road Racer X/ www.sponsorhouse.com Privateer Profile. Go here to learn more.)

This Podcasting technology seems to be catching on as www.motogpod.com is still going strong, with episode 37 having gone up this week. It includes site owner Bob Hayes’ thoughts on Sito Pons’ exit from MotoGP, the Cape Breton Festival of Speed, ESPN Taiwan’s dropping of MotoGP, a mini-email-interview with Nicky Hayden, and a tech segment on brakes.

Okay, that’s about it for this week’s edition of Road Racerhead, except to let Miriam Deitcher give you the latest on what’s happening in dirt track:

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It’s Friday the 13th, which made me a little hesitant to get out of bed this morning—but here I am. I caught up with teenage hotshot Jared Mees the other day. Jared’s been keeping busy ice racing and searching for a house to buy in close proximity to girlfriend Nichole Cheza hometown of Clio, Michigan. Although it sounds to me like things are heating up between the super-fast teenage couple, Mees swears he’s buying the house for investment reasons only.

Wayne Hosaka at work on one of his paintings. Photo courtesy of Miriam Deitcher

Mees and team will also be sporting new quarters at the races this season. “We have a full rig for next year,” reported Mees. “I get to put my ugly mug on the side.” Mees will once again be riding for Johnny Goad and sponsored by Saddleman.

Maybe Friday the 13th isn’t so bad after all. It’s the only day I have a built-in excuse for all the things I screw up. One man who doesn’t use the word “excuse” is Wayne Hosaka, the man behind flat track’s version of MotoTalk, www.flattrack.com. More on Wayne, whose artwork is interspersed throughout this week’s column, in a bit.

Without any fanfare, AMA Pro Racing added another race to the 2006 schedule—Bridgeport Speedway in Bridgeport, New Jersey, on August 26. Bridgeport is a half-mile track, which means the schedule now has 13 Twins class races, but still only four Singles races.

Riders I’ve talked to recently remain very concerned about the number of races currently in the Singles class. “To have a title championship run for four races is just kind of silly,” said one top rider. “There’s manufacturers I’m talking to who don’t even want to be involved in a four-race series, and you can’t blame them.”

To beef up the Singles schedule, AMA Pro could add Singles-class races to half-mile venues (like Lima and Hagerstown) that are already on the schedule. Why hasn’t this seemingly no-brainer solution to the lack-of-Singles-races problem been implemented? Money. Existing half-mile promoters are already coughing up $40k in purse for their Twins race. Adding a second race with another $40k purse likely won’t increase the fan base enough to make economic sense.

Painting by Wayne Hosaka

What about decreasing the Singles purse for races that are run in conjunction with half-mile races? In 2005, if a rider won a short track on a Suzuki, he’d walk away with $9,900 ($4,900 purse plus $5,000 in contingency from Suzuki). Under the decreased-purse scenario, the same rider would perhaps walk away with $6,300 ($1,300 in purse, the same $5,000 in contingency)—less money, yes. But the teams are already at the track anyhow, so the incremental cost of racing another class is minimal.

If such a race were added to the schedule at a track like Lima, would the riders race, or would they watch from the sidelines? One top rider I posed this question to said he’d race, hoping it would help give the Singles series the jump-start it needs. Would others race as well? I don’t know for sure, but I’ll bet most would. (Folks, don’t kill the messenger please. I know how little money flat track racers make, so don’t think I’m advocating decreased purses. I’m just sharing an idea that’s out there.)

Speaking of Singles bikes, the indoor short track/ice-race season continues to run in full force. John Raun Wood beat out Kenny Coolbeth and others at round 1 of the five-race Middletown, New York, indoor series Saturday night. On the same night in Greensboro, North Carolina, Johnny Murphree edged out Shaun Russell on the ice. Racing continues this Saturday at Middletown, while the ice series heads to the Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Bridgeport will take place on the weekend that’s traditionally hosted Sedalia, Missouri. Sedalia, where Will Davis perished in 2001 and the site of a scary crash-fest in 2005, is conspicuously absent from the 2006 schedule.

Painting by Wayne Hosaka

What does Mees, who sports Davis’ #21 on his bike and who won Sedalia last year, think of the removal of Sedalia? “Sedalia was a rough track. I’m pretty comfortable with it being off the schedule,” said Mees, “due to how many riders were hurt there and fell down and also due to the fact that Will Davis was killed there. Even though to this day I think he was on the back of that motorcycle with me, I’m sure he doesn’t want me to go back to that racetrack. If it’s for safety issue and good causes, then I’m all for it.” I’m not sure why the race was removed, but after we lost Will there, I’ve never enjoyed going back. I won’t miss that race at all.

Okay, back to www.flattrack.com, which was created by Hosaka, a former competitive flat track racer who was paralyzed in a racing accident at Ascot Park in 1971. Although I’ve never met Hosaka, I can tell he’s a man with an incredible spirit. Not only does Wayne put his heart and soul into the sport of flat track, he’s a gifted artist. Ever since his accident, Wayne has painted by using both a mouth stick and his left arm to do broad strokes. Recently, Wayne has been using the mouth stick exclusively—s ince over the years he has experienced less mobility and control in his arms.

Hosaka started www.flattrack.com, which contains the popular Flat Track Forum, back in 1996. Recently, Hosaka redesigned the site, adding functionality and a professional-looking design. It’s a site that I visit several times a day to learn what’s happening in the world of flat track. In fact, you can find a hot-off-the-press interview of me on Hos’s newly designed website right here.

Wayne, you are an inspiration to us all.

Finally, it is with great sadness I report that Darren "Birdy" Wiles, brother of two-time Peoria TT winner Henry Wiles, lost his long battle with leukemia yesterday. Birdy was 16 years old.

Godspeed, Birdy. Photo courtesy of Miriam Deitcher