AMERICAN FLAT-TRACK
UP FRONT
EDITOR'S LETTER
INDIAN COMES IN BIG. WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
It’s hard to argue with Indian’s Scout FTR750 flat-tracker launch program: rational design, as much testing as could be fit in, and a concept turned into metal in less than one year.
Well, not just turned into metal but into a true racebike that transferred right to the main and won the Dash for Cash in the hands of 47-year-old Joe Kopp at its Santa Rosa Mile Grand National debut. Kopp then finished the weekend by leading the first lap of the main and finishing seventh. Stellar results that border on unbelievable. Indian will presumably spend the off-season testing and refining the bike and...tooling up to manufacture FTR75OS for sale-price, and number of units produced, yet to be determined. I overheard one experienced tuner say he’d like to buy several! How many Indians will line up alongside the three fullfactory Wrecking Crew bikes of Brad Baker, Bryan Smith, and Jared Mees? And did you read that last sentence? If the scratch-built bike didn’t show commitment enough, hiring the three most talented and successful riders in the pit (who filled the podium at Santa Rosa in that order) ought to send chills through H-D’s racing department—and anybody else planning to line up in the 17-round American Flat Track (rebranded such by AMA Pro Racing) series planned for 2017.
What will Harley-Davidson do? We were excited early this year to hear that H-D was finally going to begin campaigning the XG750R Street-based flat-tracker, but we have been puzzled somewhat by the apparent lack of commitment. Even the “secret” launch at the Austin round in conjunction with MotoGP was odd. Like, why would you race the XG750R but then park it in a closed tent and not talk about it? At the only race in the US where the entire world’s most influential motorcycle racing journalists would be assembled, and which was running alongside a race series with the likes of Valentino Rossi and Marc Marquez, the two
most famous and successful racers in the world who also happen to use American dirt track for training?
I do understand why Harley-Davidson would choose the XG750 production bike as a basis for its new racebike. Because why wouldn’t you want to lavish the historic dirt-track racing glow of the XR-750 on your liquid-cooled, 60-degree V-twin streetbike of the same displacement?
The XG racer does look good. But what I’d always dreamed of was an XR-750 2.0. Maintain 45-degree vee, go short pushrod or DOHC four-valve heads with perfect ports, liquid-cooling, plain-bearing bottom end, maintain overall look, flywheel placement, and inertia and be Harley-Davidson. The Street is neat, but it’s not the company’s core identity, and unless Harley-Davidson seriously fast-tracks development, 2017 is going to be challenging.
Indian Motorcycle, at (I’m estimating) less than a tenth of the overall motorcycle sales volume, has shown too times the commitment to this great American sport that only still exists in its national level form because of Harley-Davidson’s ongoing investment in the series.
I wrote a Race Watch story for the February 2000 issue that was all about “SuperTrackers,” production i,ooocc-based dirttrack racebikes “ruled” into existence that was an attempt to revitalize the series. At the Del Mar Mile in late 1999,1 stood with Willie G. Davidson, who said, “To me, this is the best racing in the world. A dirt mile... There’s nothing more exciting.”
It was true then and it’s true now. And shorttracks and half-miles and TTs too. The rest of the world is finally noticing. Let’s hope Harley-Davidson comes back big in 2017. We know it can do it. Will it? Some of the best racing in the world will only be the better for it.
MARK HOYER
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
THIS MONTH’S STATS
3 GNC CHAMPIONS HIRED BY INDIAN TO RACE FLAT-TRACK IN 2017
zero RECORD RUNS ATTHE BONNEVILLE SALT FLATS
46,000 MILES DRIVEN IN 201G BY CW’S HAYDEN GILLIM, MAN IN AVAN WITH A PLAN RACER
