He retired at the age of 33 after winning four world titles in 500. the most-titled American rider of all time, with 31 Grand Prix wins, 2 AMA Superbike Championships, 2 AMA 250 Championships, 2 Daytona 200 victories and a win at the prestigious Suzuka 8 Hours.
A champion, a true ace on two wheels: Eddie Lawson. After his retirement, which came about after his last, historic victory with the Cagiva 500 in Hungary in 1992, which he celebrated at the entrance to the press room with classic modesty full of irony “but what am I still doing here?” Eddie “Awesome” Lawson fell off the international radar. He continued to race, a little bit in cars, in superkarts, but just for fun. We never heard him say anything, comment, talk about this or that. “Steady Eddie” just disappeared.
Eddie was one of those guys who just didn’t race motorcycles… he was a racer. The right aggression, zero interest in the surrounding world.
We caught up with him again at Laguna Seca, the year he was preparing one of his superkarts with a Yamaha 250 engine for a demo run with Wayne Rainey and Kenny Roberts. He had the slowest smile in the whole circus, which disappeared the quickest. A man of few words, but well thought out. Lawson has always had a great fascination for the true enthusiast, but he was not fully understood by mere fans.
These days we came across a recent interview with him that appeared on MotoStarr’s YouTube channel. 84 subscribers. And it was like finding a dusty diamond on the floor. It was enough to pick it up to see it shine.
We report a few parts of it. The first question he was asked concerned merit. And immediately his irony surfaced…
Lawson: We haven’t done anything compared to the boys, but it’s all relative
“It’s funny because Kel (Carruthers Ed.) said in my time we didn’t do anything compared to what you guys are doing now. Now I look back and we’re saying exactly the same thing, we didn’t do anything compared to the guys now but it’s all relative, I mean we got good money for what we did then but now it’s a erratic one change to what they do today.
Passionate about engines and sports, Lawson has a hard time pinning down what he does.
Lawson: I always watch MotoGP but we never had any investigations or track restrictions like today, races are races
“It’s funny because I’m working flat out on something all day, but if you were to ask me what I did … I’d probably tell you I have no idea. I always watch MotoGP, it’s a good show, I enjoy it. Today they kind of follow Formula 1, which is a shame, they have too many investigations, if someone hits someone, if someone exceeds the track limits, we never had anything like that. It’s called running, and sometimes people would run into each other and knock someone down, but that’s the way it is. I wish there were fewer of these, but the show is good.”
We often hear drivers comment on the different eras, whether the Grands Prix were better then or now or not.
Lawson: I don’t think I would have liked to race in the ’70s. Now people are saying, “Wow, those 500s must have been a handful
“I’m really happy when I was able to race back then. The 500s were just a fun time, a unique time because everything before that sounded great with the MVs, but I don’t think I want to ride that time. Now with all the electronics, traction control and all the different things that they have, I’m really glad I did. People come up to me and say “wow” those 500s must have been a handful to ride and they were, it was a 3000rpm powerband. It was just you and your mechanic, no telemetry, just you the driver.”
Today even the small teams have more than twenty technicians.
Lawson: You walked in and it was just you and your mechanic, no telemetry, just you the driver.
“Yeah, crazy money, you just have a whole electronics crew. The driver comes in, they open a laptop and put in how much horsepower, how much they take away, how much wheelspin, wheelie control. It’s just like that, that’s how they fix the bike. It was very different in my day, I don’t know if it was better or worse, but it takes a lot of money and manpower now.”
Still, as Eddie said, the show is good. All drivers are very close.
Lawson: I don’t care if you were Schwantz, Rainey, Gardner or Doohan, it took us all literally a year to learn how to drive a 500.
“Right, back then it was really difficult to go from a superbike or a 250cc to a 500cc. Riding a 500 was difficult, a few guys did it but most didn’t. Today I think you could come from Moto3 to ride a MotoGP bike. I think you could come from anywhere and be close, but the cream always rises to the top. These few fast guys are always there. It’s easy to get close…but it was tough in my day! It took a while year to learn how to drive a 500, I don’t care if you were Kevin Schwantz, Wayne Rainey, Gardner or Doohan, we all literally took a year to learn how to drive a 500 . Today I think you could do it in one practice session”.
(Sequel follows)