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RACE WATCH
Muzzy, Kawasaki split
In a shock move, Kawasaki has decided not to renew its contract with supertuner Rob Muzzy. This calls for some explanation, because Muzzy is Mr. Superbike, the architect of many AMA Superbike titles and countless wins for Kawasaki. What’s going on?
According to Muzzy, “They were the ones who terminated the arrangement. I was told by the current president, Masatoshi Tsurutani, who came in last year, that he felt the (racing) program ought to be managed inhouse. To my knowledge, no thinking or planning as to just how this would be accomplished had been done.”
As for what lies ahead for his organization, Muzzy said, “It’ll probably be good for my business, because racing was not a profitable venture-except that it was an advertisement for us. I don’t know if we’ll be involved in (racing) or not. We’d like to be.”
In this area, we have only rumor, suggesting a possible future connection between Muzzy and Aprilia, which is eager to establish itself in the U.S. There are other obvious possibilities.
What will Kawasaki do now? A press release identified the new racing manager as Michael Preston, who has managed Kawasaki’s personal watercraft racing effort since 1995.
Muzzy expounded, “There’s a new R&D manager from Japan-a man I worked with before, in ’93 and ’94. He has some knowledge of racing. But I don’t know where he’ll get key people. They don’t even have machines-everything belongs to us. They get nothing back.”
Bob Moffit, Kawasaki’s vice president of marketing and product management for motorcycles at Kawasaki’s Irvine, California, headquarters, explained his company’s decision. “From an R&D standpoint, they (the Japanese R&D people) need and want to be close to the (racing) process,” he said.
This is understandable, because it’s well-known that the Japanese always want more information from racing operations, and tighter control over them. While it can be very effective and economical to use outside management and staff, engineers would really prefer to have full and direct control over all informationeven at the cost of good results. Muzzy acknowledged this tendency.
“My time with Kawasaki has been a love/hate relationship,” he said. “Management loves me when the bikes win races; R&D hates me. I’ve always known that the day they don’t believe I’m an asset to the program, that’s the day they’d get rid of me.” Said Moffit, “We honor Rob and will continue our other relationships with him. This matter was actually being considered before the last contract was written.”
Muzzy’s number-one rider, veteran Doug Chandler, expressed surprise at this decision, wondering where the change of plans had come from, who would take over and what’s going to happen. He was at Laguna Seca on the Friday of World Superbike weekend, talking to various race-team managers about next season. “I’m sure something will come up,” he said laconically.
Kawasaki’s press release said that Preston “is charged with building an entire new organization and will be hiring technical, administrative and supervisory staff in the weeks ahead.” These are brave words, but it is a tall order to duplicate the facilities, personnel and expertise of an established team. Muzzy noted that in Japan, “They lack the staff to get all this done.” In the continuing strained state of the Japanese economy, top personnel are in short supply, and understaffed race and R&D departments are scrambling to honor existing commitments.
Preston is quoted in the press release as saying, “We will be moving quickly to acquire the necessary staff and prepare aggressively for the 2000 season.” Good luck to all. -Kevin Cameron
Lord of the Flys
Travis Pastrana made a big splashboth literally and figuratively-in the inaugural Freestyle Moto-X portion of the 1999 ESPN “X Games.”
The 15-year-old from “Navy Town USA”-Annapolis, Maryland-took control of the event from the first moment he rolled onto the treacherous dirt circuit laid out atop Pier 30 of San Francisco’s Embarcadero.
For Pastrana, however, the event was much more than an opportunity to perform in front of large live and television audiences. Last October, the youngster crashed while attempting a 120-foot jump in Lake Havasu
City, Arizona, and landed himself not only in a wheelchair, but in medical history. Upon impact, he dislocated both sacroiliac joints-basically tearing the connection between the upper and lower halves of his body.
“The sacroiliac joints attach the pelvis to the spine, and there’s only been about three recorded cases of this type of injury,” explained physical therapist Mark Chaput. “Travis showed me a videotape of the accident, and it was quite a traumatic fall. He hit the ground short of the landing and just collapsed. I could hear his mother, who was holding the video camera, gasp, ‘Oh my gosh!’ Then the video went black...”
Knocked unconscious, Pastrana was rushed to a nearby hospital, where doctors took several days to discover his rare injury. He was then flown to Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles, where specialist Dr. Joel Matta inserted a pair of screws to realign Pastrana’s lower back.
That was just the beginning; what followed was months of rehabilitation and self-discipline. When his doctor finally gave him the okay to get out of his wheelchair and onto his feet in December, Pastrana was so stiff he couldn’t stand straight. He finally got the go-ahead to ride again in February.
Just nine months after his lifethreatening accident, Pastrana was stoked to be performing at the “X Games.” Riding a Suzuki RM 125, he attacked the course, pulling out everything from his bag of tricks: the La-Z-Boy, the Superman, the Cliffhanger, Heel Clickers, No-Handed Landers, No-Footed Can-Cans, the Coffin and a bizarre but hugely impressive trick called the Indian Air.
But he saved the best for last. After being declared the winner, Pastrana idled onto the course wrearing what appeared to be a large chest protector beneath his jersey. He rode to the far end of the pier, roosted around a corner, then machine-gunned through the gears and launched off a 4-foot-high bowl turn, 20 feet in the air and into San Francisco Bay! As Pastrana and the bike splashed into the water, the 30,000strong crowd exploded in a collective roar. Floating safely in his life vest and waving to the crowd, Pastrana instantly became the darling of the “X Games.”
Unfortunately, the stunt sparked a legal firestorm that resulted in ESPN officials stripping Pastrana of his $10,000 prize, allegedly due to the fact that he’d put himself and others in harm’s way. Pastrana was, however, allowed to keep his gold medal. The money reportedly was used to hire a salvage crew to pull the bike from the bay, where it was found sitting atop a sunken tugboat!
As for Pastrana, with his 16th birthday now in sight, he’s looking forward to earning a living not as a stunt jumper, but as a professional motocross racer. Wins in all four 125 and 250cc amateur motos at the recent Hi-Point MX National proved that he can do more than jump. We’ll find out how good he really is when he makes his Pro racing debut at this fall’s U.S. Open of Supercross.
-Eric Johnson with reporting by Jolynn Tumolo
Learning to moto in Chinese
What would Chairman Mao think? Is there a word for “roost” in Chinese? If there isn’t, there will be soon. And Mao? Who cares? The dude’s croaked, and Fleshgear never made a Mao jacket and riding pants anyway. But the Chinese are learning to moto-talk about human-rights progress!
American John Light, 29, a roadrace team manager in the Championship Cup Series’ Mid-Atlantic Region, recently visited the world’s most populous country to participate in a round of the Chinese National Championship.
Light got his first taste of Chinese MX a year and a half ago, when he visited an exchange student his family had hosted previously. “I went to a couple of tracks in Shanghai and Hang Zhou, and they were pretty primitive,” he says. “There were no double-jumps or whoop sections, and I figured that I could handle it without too much trouble.”
During that visit, Light met the Shanghai team mechanic (who wanted him to send parts from the U.S.) and kept in touch via e-mail. He finally arranged a rental ride with Lang De Long, senior coach and director of the Shanghai Motorcycle Training Center, part of the city’s Automobile and Motor Sports Association. A rental fee of 2500 yuan ($300 including fuel and insurance) bought Light the use of a 1999 Yamaha YZ125 for a few days of practice and a couple of 30-minute motos in round one of the four-round series. He was initially offered an older YZ250, but quickly learned that only Chinese riders are allowed to ride 250s.
Upon his return to China this past May, Light found that the sport had advanced considerably. “When I arrived at the track in Shen Zhen (near Hong Kong), I discovered that they had come a long way,” he says. “There were a dozen double-jumps with short approaches and two whoop sections.” Light finished ninth in the race, earning about $100 (the winner received $600, while the championship is worth $6000) after competing against racers he says would be Aor B-level amateurs at his local track. And he was surprised to find how serious the Chinese had become since his initial visit. “If you’re a motocrosser in China, that’s what you do,” he says. “They don’t have other jobs. It’s not like you’re a high school student and an MX racer. They’re much more serious about it.”
Aside from having track food that was even worse than what you’d find Stateside, Chinese MX isn’t that different, says Light. Overall, he says he was warmly received, particularly at the post-race awards banquet, where the competitors attempted to drink each other under the table. Boasts Light, “I won that race!”
-Mark Hoyer
