Nicky From Behind the Notepad

NICKY FROM BEHIND THE NOTEPAD

RACE WATCH

NICKY HAYDEN

Larry Lawrence

The first time I saw Nicky was at a WERA club roadrace at Indianapolis Raceway Park, possibly 1992. That would have made him 10 years old. He and his older brother Tommy were racing 125cc Honda GP bikes and showing most of the older and more experienced riders the fast way around the track.

To supplement the lessthan-meager earnings of a motorcycle racing reporter, my wife Jackie and I would set up a little booth at the club races and sell photos. Earl and the kids came over afterward. Roger was there too, even though he was too little to roadrace at the time. We chatted with Earl as the kids thumbed through the photos. From then on wheneverwe went to a race the Haydens attended, we always enjoyed seeing Earl and the kids.

A couple of years later I was in Owensboro, doing a feature on the kids for Cycle News. Their Catholic school was good enough to allow me into the classroom to take photos of Nicky and Tommy during classes. It had to be a bit embarrassingforthem, but they handled it like little pros.

I was always nervous about watching kids race. To this day I have mixed feelings about it, but the Haydens were always smooth and rarely crashed-so as safe as possible in a dangerous sport.

I remember watching Nicky’s first AMA Pro Road Race standing next to Earl atop an infield building at Pikes Peak International Raceway in 1997. As we followed Nicky’s progress through the very deep and talented Supersport field,

Earl said to me, “This makes me nervous. That one [Nicky] does not like being behind people!”

I watched and wrote about Nicky’s rapid rise to become the youngest-ever AMA Superbike champion.

I was so fortunate to be among the throng at Laguna Seca in 2005, who watched Nicky win his first MotoCP race. It was especially memorable in that it was probably the first motorcycle race I’d attended in 20 years where I wasn’t working. Jackie and I were on vacation and we both were able to take in the collective happiness the crowd felt that day as an emotional Nicky rode around with his dad on the back and the giant American flag waving at his side.

I had a little pocket camera with me and I hit the button to record a video. I watched the video today and am surprised to hear the emotion in both Jackie’s and my voice. Nicky’s win meant a lot to us.

Hearingthe cheers of those around us on the outside of the main straight at Laguna that day, then 12 years later seeing hundreds, if not thousands, of Owensboro residents waving American flags as Nicky was carried past one last time in his funeral procession, I could tell Nicky meant a lot to all of us.