    |
 |
|
|
|
Monday, 07-February-2005 we reported that Bad Brad's Coming:
When Brad Lackey was in Taupo last year NZ's top motocross scribe made the pilgrimage to talk to the legend. It is timely that the story is re-told so here are the words and one of the pics that Andy: got in Taupo:
By ANDY McGECHAN
It's not every day you meet one of the greatest American sporting heroes, the first rider from the land of the Stars and Stripes to be crowned motocross world champion. So when news reached the writer that “Bad” Brad Lackey was coming to New Zealand, I sat up and took notice, a few calls were made and I was on my way … to Taupo for round four of the Kiwi Vintage Motocross series.
Lackey was the original foreigner in Europe. After years of persistence, in 1982 he finally reached his goal as a teenager, to become the 500cc motocross champion of the world. After winning his first American national motocross championship in 1972, the AMA 500cc national title, the then 18-year-old Californian set his sights on the European Grand Prix circuit.
Brad boldly transplanted his motocross career from Northern California to Europe, where he battled the super stars of 500cc GP motocross, including reigning world champions Belgium’s Roger DeCoster and Andre Malherbe, Finnish ace Heikki Mikkola, and British hard charger Graham Noyce.
Often controversial, Lackey revelled in the nickname ‘Bad Brad’ and rode for a succession of factories including Kawasaki, Honda and Husqvarna after starting his career on a Czech-manufactured CZ. In 1981 Lackey moved to Suzuki, finishing in sixth position that year. In 1982, the then 28-year-old armed with the latest model Suzuki, Lackey again entered the European fray in his quest to become world champion.
The preparation that Lackey undertook prior to the 1982 season paid off because, on August 8 that year, as he crossed the finish line in the Luxembourg GP, he became America’s first world motocross champion. His victory, wearing his trademark “Pernod flames” helmet and the one-off “Good As Gold” pants, was the culmination of a decade of hard graft.
It also marked a new era of US domination in world GP motocross. Just two weeks later, fellow American Danny LaPorte, a newcomer to 250cc GP racing, followed suit to become the second American to win a world title.
Now aged 51, Lackey is still highly active in motorcycle racing and has even dabbled recently in the booming tight circuit action of SuperMoto.
However, motocross is still Brad’s passion -- particularly the vintage motocross events conducted by the 5,000 member-strong AHRMA (American Historic Racing Motorcycle Association) in which he often races CZs built and prepared by San Francisco-based Tillman racing.
Longtime residents of California’s Berkeley district, the birthplace of American motocross, Lackey and wife Lori now operate motorcycle schools known as “Brad Lackey's Motocross Safety Clinics” and market a range of motocross-related products.
Last year Brad and Lori visited the Classic Dirt 3 vintage motocross event in Australia, before making their first visit to New Zealand to compete at round four of the Kiwi Vintage Motocross Mr Vintage Motocross Series, at Taupo on March 21.
“Basically, when I’m not out in places like New Zealand, having fun with my new mates, I live in Southern California, not far from Berkeley. “I took some time off after I quit riding GPs. I was away from bikes for about 18 years until I got back into it with vintage motocross in 2000 and I’ve been doing it since then. It’s also given me a few more opportunities to go back to Europe and now New Zealand. “Actually, it’s not the first time I’ve been to New Zealand. I stopped here for gas one time. I was in a 747 and sat on the runway for five minutes, but that was it.”
This time around, Lackey was in New Zealand for not much longer but his week-long visit did give him some memories to cherish. “It’s a beautiful country. I haven’t got to see anywhere near as much as I wanted to see but we have had some opportunities to look around Taupo and go fishing, go down on the river and check out the jet-boat ride … look at the (Huka) Falls. It’s like northern California a bit but probably a little bit more wild and untamed. “We don’t often get to ride on virgin grass tracks like this back home. This is nice.”
It wouldn’t be a Brad Lackey interview if we didn’t dig back into the archives a bit. And when we started to roll back the clock, Lackey was more than happy to reminisce.
When Lackey and La Porte won their world titles in 1982, they were the American pioneers, the men who started what soon snowballed into an era of American domination. Some would say that world domination continues until today.
“At the time I won the world title (in 1982), lots of Europeans had been coming over to the United States. They’d been coming over for three or four years and spanking us pretty badly. I went to Europe for the first time in 1970 to do some training camps in Czechoslovakia and I realised after I won the US championship relatively easily in ’72, that I needed to go to Europe to get better. “It was a huge culture shock at the time. It was very different going from California to behind the Iron Curtain. But that was all part of the learning experience.
“My contract with Suzuki was for two years, for 1981 and 1982. That year they won the 125cc world championships (with Belgian Eric Geboers on board), they had won the 500cc class (with Lackey) after being out of it for five years with Honda dominating it. They got first and second in the class, won the manufacturers championship and rubbed Honda’s nose in it a little bit and so the smart guys at Suzuki quit right there while they were on top and so they didn’t renew anybody’s contract. It was more a corporate decision than anything to do with the riders.
“I wasn’t bitter at the time. I understood what they were doing. But it was also a time when the economy wasn’t really sharp. Kawasaki had one rider, Yamaha had one rider and Honda had three or four of the top riders. There were really no other Japanese companies available. I thought that if I went back to a European brand at that time, I wouldn’t have as good a chance. That was the best time for me to quit really.”
The sport’s grown in recent years and its popularity is almost back to those glory days of the 70s and 80s, but still there’s been no mass migration to Europe of riders from the United States.
“There’s a lot of reasons why our guys stay in America to race, because there’s a lot of money for them there. So unless you have a bunch of crazy goals like I did, as a young kid, they get comfortable at home and don’t really look much further than that.
“Some of the Americans came over a rode and few Grand Prix events and stuff, to see how they’d do I think, and there were some Americans like Trampas Parker and Donny Schmidt who got committed and stayed and had good championship runs.”
Parker won the 125cc world title in 1989 and 250cc crown in 1991, while Schmidt won the 125cc title in 1990 and the 250cc title in 1992. The only other American to win in Europe was Bobby Moore (125cc crown in 1994). “But for every rider who wants the tough stuff, there’ll be dozens who want to take the easy road.”
And, by saying “easy road”, Lackey’s not suggesting the racing is any easier in the United States, especially these days, but the lifestyle is certainly more comfortable at home for an American than living out of a suitcase in Eastern Europe.
“It might be easier now to do the Europe thing. There’s a McDonald’s on every corner and everyone speaks English. But those were different times. It’s like the time before me. They were doing two 45-minute motos on big twins, on the same tracks that we were riding two-strokes. In recent years it’s come down to one 20-minute moto … that’s not really motocross any longer.”
In 2004 it was back up to two 40-minute motos and Lackey sees that as a change for the better.
“In the United States, motocross is huge right now. We’re getting a lot of television coverage and supercross sells out every stadium. The outdoor races attract around 20,000 people and that’s okay by today’s standards -- perhaps not as big as at the peak in the 1970s but still big.
“I still think the GP races are too short. The whole point of motocross is being in shape and being conditioned. If you eliminate the long races it means the guy who trains really hard has no advantage. So nobody trains. You got a bunch of fat guys instead of a bunch of athletes, so that’s got to change. I think it’s got to go back to at least two 45-minute races.”
Lackey was remembered as being a tough, no-nonsense campaigner and the “Bad Brad” moniker still echoes today.
“Oh, I think that just came about because of journalists like you. When they come around and I wasn’t real happy and, you know, didn’t give the right interview or something … they gotta make up some name. Everybody had a nickname. It added to the persona for the racetrack. I got into a few beefs along the years but, you know, 10 years of GP racing, not everything’s going to go perfect along the way.”
Lackey has no regrets about his career and has plenty of fond memories of his time at the top. But, we jus had to ask, what ever happened to those iconic “Good As Gold” nylon pants? “Actually I have a replica pair. I was in Europe some time after the championships. I had left all that stuff behind with my fans and I had picked it up when I was going to a vintage race but somebody broke into my car and stole everything, except for my helmet, so I do still have that.
“The helmet I wear today is a replica of the original one. The real one’s too old to wear now. This one I have now is an older one too but the paint-job is pretty damn close to the original.”
It was fascinating to learn also that Lackey’s claim to fame, extends beyond the motocross track.
He was a Hollywood stuntman for several blockbuster films.
“I worked in quite a few movies. Some of it involved motorcycles but a lot of it was just stunts where you jump out of a trolley car going down the street at 30 miles an hour or something. There were lots of car races and car crashes.”
He was stuntman in Terminator II (“just one of the police in a shoot-out scene”); Escape from L.A, with Kurt Russell; The Game, with Michael Douglas and Sean Penn (“the scene in the taxi, that’s me doubling for Douglas”); and many more. But it means Lackey has worked with some pretty big names in Hollywood, actors like Christopher Reeve and Eddie Murphy.
“Yeah, I mixed with some of the glitterati but I was a little man on the totem pole in that business.”
To make ends meet these days, he’s “in the tee-shirt business”.
“I go to lots of motorcycle events, like Harley rallys, all summer long, selling tee-shirts for that event. There might be 50 or 60,000 people at these rallys and I might five, six or seven booths with 25 people selling. That’s kind of my business now.
“I cash in a tiny bit on the name I made for myself. We go to the vintage stuff and have a few tee-shirts or a book or a few posters. So there’s a little bit of stuff there. I still do a few training courses. I did one in Australia and one in New Zealand because, when I travel away, I don’t get to some places very often so there might be a few people interested in taking it.
“The riding techniques from back in the 80s are pretty much the same today, especially with vintage bike it is. We don’t do into the big jumps and all that crazy stuff. We just stay with old basics.”
Lackey’s done a lot with motocross over the years and suffered a lot of ups and down along the way.
“I quit while I was on top, which is something nobody’s ever done in this sport. I’m still walking and talking … I’m not injured. I can almost even dance, so I’m a happy camper and coming to old meetings and seeing guys. We go to vintage motocross meetings in the United States and it’s just a big party. The racing just gets in the way.
“I don’t know how big vintage motocross is in New Zealand but in the States there would be 600 riders and 600 old bikes and that’s just pre-75.”
Lackey’s New Zealand visit was made possible by the hard work and generosity of SsangYong NZ: (Russell Burling), Craig Coleman Motors and Coleman Suzuki (Auckland) in association with Kiwi Vintage Motocross and the Livewire VMX: web site.
