Foggy!
FOGGY!
"I hate Daytona. I hate Americans. That's why I'll win." -World Superbike Champ Carl Fogarty on the 1995 Daytona 200
RACE WATCH
MICHAEL SCOTT
LET'S GET ONE THING CLEAR. World Superbike Champion Carl Fogarty doesn't hate Americans. Rephrase that: Carl Fogarty doesn’t hate Americans any more than he hates anybody else.
“Sure, I want to kick their asses at Daytona. I want to beat anybody anytime I race anywhere," he explains. "It's not that I hate Americans. Just that there'll be a lot of Americans there."
There is certainly a strong streak of practical logic in that, a streak that runs through all Fogarty’s outspoken comments, of which there are many in a typical conversation. But there is also a hidden agenda too, a simmering anger that while British riders of his generation were bypassed for GP glory, Americans seemed to find an easy path. Fogarty, who last year > added the World Superbike title to three previous backwater world titles in his trophy cupboard, resents that. And as a plain-talking man with a streak of acid to his comments, he doesn’t mind who knows it.
This goes well with his appearance. He’s gaunt and rangy, with a tightdrawn face illuminated by that incredible gimlet stare. He uses that stare to transfix on-track competitors. He uses it to similar effect when you meet him face to face. Driven by nervous energy that means, “I can eat like a horse and never put on a pound,” there always seems to be an edge to his communication even when he’s only saying hello. And of course he is always ready with a blazing comment.
Recent gems include the assertion that he is a better racer than Barry Sheene ever was. Now, Sheene was Britain’s last 500cc grand prix world champion, and great was the chorus in response when the quote appeared in the mass-circulation weekly Motor Cycle News. Well, responded Foggy, before winning Superbikes he’d won the TT F-l title twice and the World Endurance title once, and three Isle of Man TTs. “Sheenie never won there because he didn’t have the balls to race there,” Fogarty explains.
Start analyzing this and you soon run into deep waters. Fogarty is one of the TT’s real heroes-indeed, his 123.61-mph outright lap record still stands, three years after it was set. But by the time he did that, he had long since declared that he was no fan of the unforgiving 37.75-mile publicroads track, with its notorious fickle weather, stone walls and ridiculously high speeds. “I went back because I needed the money to pay for my Superbike season,” he admits.
Which leads directly to the next important fact about Fogarty: In spite of doing everything anyone might need to do to prove that he was Britain’s top rider (including telling anyone who would listen), he never was picked up for the next step, a works 5()0cc grand prix saddle. Instead, he went from Novice in 1983 via national racing into mainly British TT-F1 racing from 1988, riding up until 1990 for Honda Britain. He now regrets staying too long racing at home rather than taking a risk and going abroad. He finally did that in 1991, paying his way in Superbikes until taking the Ducati works spot in 1993. There were a couple of stand-in rides on a Honda in 1990, in which he went well enough to score points in each of three finishes. But he was visibly wrestling with the feisty VFour. “I had to argue to get them to make it fit me just to sit on,” he said. “It was never anywhere near set up so I could race it.”
Foggy did seize one moment of glory in three home GP wild card rides since then. He probably would have been third in 1993 on the works Cagiva, but he ran out of fuel on the sprint to the line. “I should have won that race,” he says now, another typical Foggyism. But in 1994, riding the tricky, fuel-injected C agi va, he crashed in practice and went home early to save his strength for the World Superbike title.
As we have seen, this was a wise decision. Though 1994 wasn’t a vintage year of tight racing, the title was hard-fought all the way to the last round in Australia. While Fogarty had days when he was unbeatable, defender Scott Russell had his moments too, even though his Muzzy Kawasaki was forced to work harder and harder to stay with the ever-improving Ducati 916. Fogarty ended up with 10 wins to Russell’s nine, and was crowned champion after a rollercoaster ride through injury and misfortune.
Fogarty, now 28, is a staunch defender of Superbike racing, though he admits to regrets about missing the grand prix showboat. “There’s nothing easier about racing a Superbike than a GP bike. The standard of riding (back in the pack) may not be so high, but that’s also true in the GPs. And Scott (Russell) is as good a rider as Schwantz or any of the others. I’d still love to ride a good works 500. 1 think that in 10 years time 1 might really regret not having a good chance on one. Just to prove to everybodyand to myself-that I could win races there too. Which 1 know 1 could.”
He adds, “The most important thing is to have the bike set up for your style. Then if you're good enough you can race any type of bike. GP bikes arc more sensitive and harder to set up than Superbikes, but they're no harder to race once you get them right.”
Ever the iconoclast, Fogarty re serves a special drop of spleen for Kenny Roberts, who earlier criticized his riding style as being ultimately unsuited to GP racing. "What pisses me off is that he talks so much shit. Like the only way to ride a GP bike is how Schwantz and Doohan do it, sliding the rear. Then Cadalora comes in, rides for him, and does it his own way. He wins races, and was second in the world championship. It's all bullshit. You're either good enough to ride a GP bike or you're not. My style is like Cadalora's, carrying high cor ner speed. though you still have to be able to slide it. I'm sure I could win GPs once I got the bike to suit me."
Fogarty has ridden all sorts of bikes during a career spanning II yearsfrom 250 GP bikes to the 1000cc four-cylinder TT-F1 monsters of the late I 980s. He prefers the big ones. Indeed, a career hiatus in 1986-87 followed a badly broken leg. He broke it twice in 12 months, and says it was only when he got aboard a big four-stroke for the first time `~that I really felt comfortable again."
Fogarty's riding style is well suited to his factory Ducati. with its torquey engine and faithful handling. Consis tent handling was achieved last year only after lengthening both the swingarm and the steering offset to slow the 916's cornering responses. Fogarty will race his title-winning 916 at Daytona, and will meet the 1995 Ducati Superbike for first tests only in April, a month before the start of the World Superbike season. At this stage, he is not worried about a comparative lack of testing.
“It’s going to be much the same as last year’s bike, but the engine is bigger, up to 995cc from 955, so I’ve read. In fact, I didn’t ask the factory for anything more from the engine, and we had the chassis well sorted by the end of last season.” This carefree attitude may prove temporary, depending largely on what Kawasaki and Honda turn up with.
Fogarty says, “Last year’s Kawasaki seemed at the end of developmentyou could hear how it was screaming trying to keep up at the end of the year. I expected the Honda to be better, and I don’t think it was as bad as it was made out to be.” This is a little jab at rider Aaron Slight, third overall without winning a race, and a man Fogarty does not much admire. But he didn’t think the Honda good enough to switch camps for. “They made me a good offer, but Ducati matched it and I decided to stay,” he confirmed.
There aren’t many riders he does look up to, in fact, but he responded with typical unorthodoxy when asked how he viewed the recently announced possibility that John Kocinski, bad boy of GP racing, might be a works Ducati teammate in 1995.
“Great,” he responded, “I think he’s the best rider in the world. I know what the Cagiva was like to ride against the Japanese bikes, and he was third overall, only a few points down on Cadalora. If I put him up against Doohan, I’d say he has slightly more ability. And if I’m racing the best rider in the world and he’s on the same bike as I am and I beat himwell, that’s fine.”
Fogarty spent the winter enjoying his title: “If you asked me what was the best and the worst thing about being champion I’d give you the same answer-it’s that people know who I am. It still feels good coming out of a newsstand in England or an airport in Italy and somebody asks for my autograph.”
He insists that the main difference between GP racing and Superbikes is the amount of money the top riders get paid, but he’s done alright all the same. From a reasonably prosperous background any way-father George is a successful builder as well as a former national and TT racer of some notehe’s moved out of grimy industrial Blackburn into the rural hills above the town, to a centuries-old stone farmhouse freshly and fully restored.
His family is composed of himself, blonde wife Michaela, and two daughters, aged 3 and four months. Outside he keeps horses, some poultry and a pair of pet pot-bellied pigs; in the garage, alongside his motorhome, is his M3 BMW and a roadgoing 916 Ducati. He admits to driving the car hard and fast (“There’s seldom a day goes by that 1 don’t have an argument on the road,”) and says it is the best car he has ever owned. It was stolen recently, whereupon he finally paid up the fee on the built-in tracking system. It was promptly traced and recovered. The bike, however, doesn’t get much exercise. “I ride too fast on the road and I frighten myself,” he explains.
Two-wheel activity is confined to motocrossing, which he has been doing at least once a week, often with GP50()-riding youngster Neil Hodgson. That and running and working out-both activities he’s never done before. He explains, “I suppose when you get older you can’t take (fitness) for granted so much. Actually, I’m really enjoying it.”
Fogarty expects to keep racing through 1997, when he’ll be 31. What happens after that depends on what comes along, and even more on how well he is doing.
“I’m not one of those who wants to carry on forever, going from international level back to nationals. I go racing to win,” he says, eyes blazing with pale fire. And when he looks at you like that, you tend to believe him. Ê3
