My thought is I Hope JH is still around in some type of ambassador role or doing one off events for Yamaha.
Thank you. JH will never be out of racing and will always be involved in some way or another. One of my best personal memories was hanging with JH in the pits at TGPR in 200o or so when he raced endurance with AOD. He's one of the most down to earth coolest dudes you will ever meet, but when the shield goes down he will destroy you on the track.
I have to admit that weekend at Tally I was half tempted to make a grocery store run to get some eggs. For some strange reason I couldn't stop thinking about the Beastie Boys song Eggman, and the line where they sing "The eggs did crack on Hayes's back!" But he was such a cool dude I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I'm sure he would have had a good laugh, but we just hung out and talked instead.
I wonder if there will be a way for Mr. Hayes to do some World Endurance riding on an R1. That would be pretty cool too. We will see if the new young gun has what it takes to go after Elias by the end of the season. I suspect at the start of the year the learning curve will prevent that with the limited testing allowed.
Happy for Gerloff for sure. But it bums me out at the same time. Hayes has always been one of my fav dudes and I just have this feeling that a lot was left on the table. I feel had things went his way, he would be in the same conversations as people like Sykes and Davies. He was that good. He was taken care of here. He earned a good check, had a great team, and won a lot. So at the end of the day, he did ultimately “live the dream”. But part of me also feels like he was almost “hung out to dry” in America. Part of me also feels like we could be saying the same thing about Cam if something doesn’t happen in the next couple/few years.
PLEASE tell me this includes a WorldSBK wildcard at Laguna Seca on a Monster Energy/Graves backed R1. Pretty please??
finally. young amazing riders need spots to move up. Hayes was still amazing, but i suspect that Gerloff is going to be better.
I hope it is not true, but I heard somewhere, Graves may only run one 600 rider. Not sure if the person was guessing or had actual info.?
I think the kid will be fine but a modern superbike ain't a 600 super sport machine. We'll see how well he adapts.