The Official Blog of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2010 in “Tornado Warning.” It’s the third consecutive season in which Edwards will offer this exclusive insight for www.indianapolismotorspeedway.com.

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 36, is in his eighth year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Monster Yamaha Tech 3. Edwards and the rest of the MotoGP riders will continue the season Sunday, Aug. 29 at the Red Bull Indianapolis GP at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (3 p.m. ET, Aug. 29, SPEED).

The colorful Edwards will compete in the third annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 27-29 at IMS along with fellow American MotoGP stars Nicky Hayden and Ben Spies, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Casey Stoner, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

[More]

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2010 in “Tornado Warning.” It’s the third consecutive season in which Edwards will offer this exclusive insight for www.indianapolismotorspeedway.com.

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 36, is in his eighth year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Monster Yamaha Tech 3. Edwards and the rest of the MotoGP riders will continue the season July 4 at the Grand Prix of Catalunya (8 a.m. ET, July 4, SPEED).

The colorful Edwards will compete in the third annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 27-29 at IMS along with fellow American MotoGP stars Nicky Hayden and Ben Spies, and MotoGP superstars Casey Stoner, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

It seems like you were happier with the bike at Assen, but the results didn’t show it. Is that accurate?

Yeah, that’s pretty accurate. Assen is always a bit of a strange track. You’ve got guys who have got it going on, guys who don’t have it going on. You get spread out. It’s not one of those tracks where you’ve got a whole lot of battling going on the entire race. I was faster than I was last year, by about two seconds. They changed the track a little bit. But overall, I was faster based on what the leaders were doing. I was closer to the leaders. But instead of being fourth, I was eighth. So I just had a couple more Hondas and a Ducati and stuff up in front of me. I don’t know. I was riding my ass off. I was smelling Nicky’s farts the whole time. I could just kind of hang on with everything I had.

In auto racing, you have a spotter in your ear telling you lap times. You don’t have that in motorcycle racing. How do you know when you’re a bit quicker or slower in a lap? Do you just feel it?

It’s weird, you know. You just have a feel for it. You know, Turn 4, you might have spun up a little bit too much, or Turn 7, you might have got the apex absolutely correct. But generally, you can come off the last corner and pretty much know to the tenth of what lap time you think you’re about to do. You’ll come off that chicane (at Assen), and a lot times be in helmet, and I’ll be like, “OK, that’s probably about a 35.8.” You come across 35.8. Then the next lap you might have a little mistake here, a mistake there, “Ah, it’s a 36.0, I think.” 36.0. You don’t have anybody telling you that, but generally you know what you’re doing.

Does that ability come with experience, or did you have that sense for time when you were 18?

No, it’s just because I’m so damn smart (laughter). No, honestly, it’s something that you develop. When you’re 18, you don’t know. You’re just frickin’ flying by the seat of your pants, trying to make up every half-tenth, tenth or whatever you can make up. I think the older you get, the more experienced you get. And you know, in general. I think the older you get, the more experienced you get. In Malaysia, it’s over a two-minute lap time. But you can pretty much hit it on the head every lap. You know about what you’re going to do.

What’s the next step for the bike? What are going to work on going into Barcelona?

The main thing I want to be able to do is I want to be able to let go. I want to be able to let go of the front brake. That’s generally, in years’ past, from way back, it just seems like the earlier you can let off the brake and roll through the corner with lots of momentum, the faster your lap time is going to be. I just feel like I have to hold on. I’m holding onto the front brake to keep it loaded, to keep it so it will turn in. I feel like that if I let off the front brake, it’s going to pop up and run a bit wide. So that’s the main thing we’ve got to work on and get worked out here at Barcelona.

Barcelona has two long straights. Does that put even more pressure on you guys to fix this turning problem due to the issues you have with power?

We are going to be the slowest bikes. That’s pretty much a given on that front straightaway speed trap. There’s nothing we can do about that. That’s my conversation with Herve (Poncharal) and the big bosses here. I can’t change, after the corner until the entrance to the next corner, I can’t change that speed. It is always going to be the same. The only way I can possibly make up any lap time is being faster in the corners and generating more corner speed. And the more corner speed you try and generate, then the harder you’re asking the chassis to work, and a lot more things are starting to happening. So we’re just trying to figure all that out.

Do you finally feel like you’re in a rhythm this season with this European road trip?

Yeah, I guess. I guess you do. This being the third week in a row we’re coming up on, it definitely feels like we’re in back into the swing of things. With the results that I’ve been having as of lately, it’s so hard to be upset because I feel like I’m riding so good. Results aren’t showing it. But Ben’s doing an absolutely phenomenal job, to get on the podium at Silverstone and even this last weekend, he finished fourth. He’s riding great. Generally when the results get better, then you feel like the season has started. I’m waiting it out at the moment.

I read an interview at Road Racer X about a ranch that you’re building. Tell me about that.

I’ve always wanted to somehow give back, to kids’ schools, to somehow try to teach kids what I know or what I’ve learned. Try to pass on words of wisdom, or whatever that might be. I’ve got some land near where I live. Pretty much just put a whole package thing together. And instead of going corporate and deciding to do it that route, I’m just going to build it all on my own. We’re basically covering a football field with a roof, 30 feet high, a big metal structure, metal roof. I can’t have a bunch of Europeans come over and say, “Sorry, man. We’re rained out. Come back next week.” That’s kind of where our catch-all is. But we’ve got other tracks, too. We’ve got, I don’t know, probably four or five tracks on the property. We’ve got 5 acres of paintball in the back. We’ve got a 500-yard shooting range on the left side. It’s not just going to be kids. It’s going to be adults. We’re going to have all kinds of camps. Adults, under 21s, over 40, military camps for military guys. We’re going to do kids’ camps during the summer. We might even do an all-girls’ camp if they don’t want to come hang out with a bunch of smelly men. I don’t know. We’re open to all kinds of stuff.

When will this be ready?

It’s under construction at the moment. I’d like to do a couple of dry runs, let’s say, October, November, with some local guys, local bike shops and stuff, just to get some feedback. But basically we’re building it out by the shop. It’s going to sleep about 30 people. Our plan is to pick everybody up from the airport. You don’t do the rental car. You don’t do the hotel. You don’t need to worry about food. It’s an all-inclusive package. You sign up, come out to the ranch, and we take care of you. Food, barbecue, campfire stories. You can’t ride motorcycles for three days straight, so we’ve got kind of all these other activities we’ve got planned, as well. Keep it fun.

I know who the chief storyteller is going to be, right?

Oh, yeah. Right. I’ve got a story or two up my sleeve. At the same time, I’m planning on actually three or four good instructors that are down South. Some good guys that I’ve had my eye on that are also good riders, good road racers at the same time. Our camp is basically going to be dirt bikes with slick tires on the back. Kind of what Kenny Roberts kind of come up with years ago. Without that experience, I wouldn’t be where I’m at. I learned a lot of my fundamentals doing just that, learning bike control and feel. And that’s what we’re shooting for.

Friday, November 13, 2009

---

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” has offered candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, recently finished his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Monster Yamaha Tech 3. He finished fifth in the season standings, the top satellite (non-factory) rider in the championship.

The colorful Edwards finished fifth in the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at IMS, racing along with fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

Strong finish to the season at Valencia, finishing fourth. What changed on the bike or with you from the bad race at Malaysia?

How much shorter was the bike than what you were accustomed to riding?

It isn’t a lot. We say short bike, and we say long bike. But in reality, it isn’t even a half an inch, I don’t think.

But is it the shortest bike you’ve ridden this year or ever?

This is the shortest bike I’ve probably ever ridden. Whenever I say shortest bike, we’re probably talking about purely swingarm length, countershaft to axle. That’s the length we always play around with, trying to get a bit more traction or more stability or whatever we need.

But a half inch feels like a foot when you first get on it, right?

Oh, man. I could sit here and talk about it all day, and nobody would ever understand. You could change it a millimeter or 2 millimeters, and you can feel it, which sounds completely retarded. But in all honesty, and it makes a difference. That’s the thing. You think, “How moving 1 or 2, 3 millimeters going to make a difference?” But it does. It’s all about riding style and what you’re asking of the bike and how it’s reacting. That’s how what you tune it for.

What were your thoughts when you rode to the grid after the warm-up lap at Valencia and saw Casey Stoner wasn’t there due to his crash on the warm-up lap?

Man, I rolled up, and I didn’t even know he crashed, obviously. I looked at the guy on the grid, and the guy started walking away. I kept waiting for Casey to pull up, pull up. And he didn’t pull up. And I thought, “Ah, dude.” The guy walked away, and there was another couple of points I could get. To get five points on somebody when the podium is taken more or less, with the top three or four guys, it was going to be tough to get five points on (Andrea) Dovizioso, that’s for sure. Yeah, I was just like: “Woo-hoo! All right. We have that much more of a chance.”

Beating Dovizioso for fifth in the championship must have been very satisifying. When we talked after Malaysia, you sounded like it was going to be a tough task.

Oh, yeah. It was going to be difficult. I didn’t have any grand illusions that it was going to be a piece of cake. But that was the goal. We just had to try to do all we could do.

What about Ben Spies’ weekend? Finished seventh, passed Dovizioso to help you get fifth in the standings. You know Ben’s talent. Were you surprised at all about how well he rode at Valencia?

I don’t really know about surprised. He lived up to or exceeded what those who know him and those who know his abilities, I think he lived up to or exceeded the expectation. I think all of the general folks like, “Just wait ’til he comes to Grand Prix, just wait ’til he comes to Grand Prix.” I think everybody had a bit of that kind of thought. But he went good. He went really well. For jumping on the bike the first time, he went really good. He obviously went really good in the test. I was sick that day, and he did all my testing, as well. I had a few tire compounds and some wheel stuff that I had to test, but I was out unconscious, and he did all my testing, as well.

You know as well as anybody: What’s the biggest adjustment you have to make jumping from a Superbike to a Grand Prix bike?

One of the biggest things is just the load. The bike is so heavy on a Superbike. When you roll into a corner and just before that point of crashing, you know what that load feels like, that G-force load pushing you down on the bike or pushing you sideways, whichever that is. But the problem is, when you jump on a much lighter bike, well then obviously you can go that much faster to create that same amount of load, if that makes any sense. But getting your body accustomed to that, being able to hold that much load, it just seems ridiculous after you’ve been on a Superbike for so long. That is one of the main things you’ve got to get your head around. That’s one of the good things about the 250 (cc) guys. Those guys carry so much corner speed and so much load on such a lighter bike that once they come over to a heavier bike, it seems pretty natural for them.

What is the difference in weight between a Superbike and a MotoGP bike?

I think it’s about 20 kilos, which is 44-45 pounds. Something like that, off the top of my head.

That’s a pretty big number considering a MotoGP bike only weighs about 300 pounds.

Yeah, I don’t know what it is in pounds. I think it’s about 140 or 142 kilos (309-313 pounds). They might have moved it up. Something like that. It’s light. The thing is light and agile and nimble. You’ve just got to get accustomed to all of that stuff.

Ben rode for Yamaha Racing last weekend, not Tech 3. You weren’t teammates at the race, but did you exchange information like you were teammates to prepare for next season?

There was really not that much communication. I think Yamaha, really, they had told me in the beginning of the weekend they really wanted him just to – actually they told me in Malaysia – they wanted him to just ride on our standard setting, more or less what we started the year with, which kind of what we come back to. We kind of done this big around-the-horn thing. And just go, get used to it, and instead of jacking around and getting lost. They wanted him just to go ride and ride and ride. And he did. And he got pretty comfortable with it. Obviously, if he was to play around with the collars a bit or the steering angle, he could probably squeeze out a little bit more and get a little more comfortable. But that will come in testing; that will come in time.

You tested on Monday, right?

Yeah, I tested on Monday.

You didn’t get the entire bike, did you? You were just testing parts and pieces?

What did I test on Monday? I can’t even remember. Oh, yeah, we just tested some little bits on the existing bike. It wasn’t anything new. We tested a couple of things. We obviously went back longer on the swingarm just to see what it was like, play around with the front a little bit. Just some new little bits and get some backup, yes or no, compared to what the factory guys were thinking.

How did it feel?

It felt all right. I think some of the things we were going in the right direction, and probably some of the year we’ve kind of been handcuffed a little bit. It’s always easy in hindsight, isn’t it?

What happened on Tuesday of the test? I saw the team press release, and it said you woke up and were sick as hell.

Oh, God, man. One of my friends I play golf with, his wife, she’s had breast cancer forever. She’s just kind of got tired doing chemo; obviously it was just killing her. She said, “Screw it; I’m done with it.” And she’s only like 58 or 59. So she just said: “Screw it. I’m done. I don’t want any more chemo.” So obviously, she’s days away from just being 6 feet under. But that kind of, let’s say, thinking, “Screw it; I don’t want to do this anymore,” honestly, that’s what I felt like. I was laying up in bed, and I had both ends on full auto. And everything was just … it didn’t matter what I did. Hell, I’d drink a sip of water, and within a minute and a half, it was coming out the bottom end. I was like, “What is going on around here?” I was dehydrated as hell. Sore, all my joints. Everything was. I couldn’t even get out of my bed. The doctor was literally 100 yards out of my motor home. But I couldn’t even get out of bed to get to him to go get an IV in. I was like: “You’re going to have to come over here, man. I can’t move.” So, anyways, they plugged me full of IV’s. They took my blood pressure: It was 90 over 65, which is pretty damn low. Once he took my blood pressure, he was like: “Holy moly! Let’s get some fluids in you quickly.” I don’t know. I feel a little stopped up nasally, but I don’t think it was the flu. I think it was just some food poisoning. We went to have a little Chinese barbecue thing on Monday night. But man, it was gnarly. Seriously, I was like: “There is no way I can fly home tomorrow. There is no way I can possibly feel better.” And sure enough, I woke up Wednesday morning, and I thought, “Damn, I feel pretty good.” I don’t know, man. Some 24-hour, knock your ding-dong in the dirt, something bad, virus or food poisoning or whatever it was.

What are your thoughts about this season? Obviously, you must be pretty happy. You finished fifth, with four aliens in front of you.

I think any time you’re on a satellite team … You’re not going to be out there racing if you don’t want to win the World Championship. That’s the No. 1 goal. As you get into the season, you start realizing the reality of what is possible. And I think the reality of what was possible, we did it. We executed what we had to do to do that. Fairly happy. I can’t say I’m disappointed at all. There’s a couple of races where I lost some points or got taken out. But this is racing. This is what happens. It was a fairly good year. A consistent year.

What was your best race of the year?

The last race was good. I enjoyed that, knowing that you’re riding for something. The ultimatum is here: This is now or never.

That was better than the podium at Donington?

Well, Donington, like I said, it was just a bull(crap). That was 45 minutes of bull(crap). I don’t wish that on my worst enemy, that kind of race. I think the result was good, yes. The fact that I stayed on the bike? Yeah, there was a lot of luck involved with that. Did I ride good? Yeah, I rode good, but I was lucky at the same time. You can’t look at a race like that and say: “All right, I’m the best. I finished second.” Or Dovizioso won the race. Hell, he hasn’t done (crap) all year. It was one of those races. It was the best result, for sure. Best race? I don’t know. Qatar. Let’s say the first race and the last race. Those are the two that kind of stand out.

What is the race you’d like to forget?

I don’t know. Probably the hardest race of the year was Brno. We got the new, improved slow engine with the new rule that came in. I couldn’t pass a gnat flying next to me with that thing. That was hard. That was just hard to accept. You could draft some guys. You could out-brake some guys. You could get close enough to pass them. And then that race, riding your ass off just to watch them pull you five or six bike lengths on every short chute. That was bull(crap). I didn’t like that. That was probably the worst feeling because at that point it was like: “Oh, man, we’ve got to do this for the rest of the year. That sucks.”

Is there a trip to a race or a road trip that you recall being the best? The most fun race experience?

England is always fun. I just bring my family, and we have friends there. The result. Obviously, not the race itself, but the result was good. I got to share that with the family. That was probably my favorite memorable one.

Looking forward to 2010, it’s obvious you’re going to face more of a challenge from Ben Spies than you did with James Toseland this year. But it’s also obvious from what I saw and read from Valencia that you’re cool with that, you’re having a great time with Ben. Accurate?

That’s totally accurate. Ben and I, there’s never been any animosity. We’ve gone out camping together. Not two-gether. We had other friends, so we didn’t wake up with anything strange going on. We’ve hung out and rode bikes, motocross, stuff like that together. We’ve know each other for a while. He’s a good kid. I look forward to him continuing his career, as well. If I can help him out, great. If I’m the guy there to push him, great. If he beats me, I beat him, whichever. There’s still the four aliens that you’ve got to beat. Ben’s not the one, I don’t think, that’s on anybody’s list of “I got to beat that guy” at the moment. It’s the top four first.

You said after Valencia that you’d buy Ben anything he wanted because he beat Dovizioso, which helped you get fifth in the standings. Has he put in his order yet?

I kind of told him Sunday afternoon after everything kind of calmed down that there was a little bit of bonus money, obviously, and some other things involved in finishing fifth in the championship. So I kind of just hinted around that he had made me a bit of cash, and he was like, “All right! Well, (crap), beer for life.” I was like, “You got it. Whichever. I’m down with that.” That’s easy. I’ll send you a case a week for life.

What are your plans for the next few months? What do you have going for the offseason?

When we get off this phone, I’m going to go pick up my kid and we’re headed out. We’re going with my father-in-law. We’re going to do a little male bonding adventure. And then hang out. We’re just about to move into our new house. We did, actually, last night. Got off the plane, and then I was moving boxes, and then we slept in the new house. We’re kind of moved in over there. So yeah, that’s going to be pretty much the next part of our two months. We’ve got anniversary, wedding anniversary, kids’ birthdays, my wife’s birthday: Everything is all in this two months. Christmas. We’ve got everything. It doesn’t really stop in the offseason.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

---

Tornado Warning Archive

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, is in his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Monster Yamaha Tech 3. He is sixth in the season standings after 16 races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the season-ending Grand Prix of Valencia on Nov. 6-8 at Valencia, Spain.

The colorful Edwards finished fifth in the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at IMS, racing along with fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

A tough weekend at Sepang, from the time you rolled off the truck to the time you packed up and left. What happened?

Dude, it was just (crap). The whole weekend. You do all the testing in the winter, in February and March. And after you run around after six days or whatever and get the bike sorted out, throughout the year you make developments. You find a front-end setting that seems to be different, better feel or whichever. As it happened, after Australia, which I had some front-end issues, feeling issues, it was just like, “OK, go back to what we ran at Malaysia (preseason test), the setting we ended off.” I had a pretty good race simulation there in February. Let’s go back to that setting, which is not exactly what I’ve been running all year. But let’s just go there, and when we get to the times we want to get to, then we can make changes. And we pretty much did that. We did make small changes. Kind of came back to where we are now. But man, I got behind Pedrosa, and he pulled 15 bike lengths on me down the straight. So it wasn’t that much fun.

Are you guys out of engines? Have you run through your five sealed engines since Brno, and you’re just running what you have? Is it a horsepower issue?

There was a major, major horsepower issue going on. This has been an ongoing thing since Brno, since we had this engine thing. And if you look at my results, they haven’t been really worth a (crap) since Brno. Before that, everything was pretty even, I would say. I could actually pass somebody if I wanted to. Now with these new regulations, they’ve obviously throttle back a little bit. But Malaysia, with the stops and starts and the way that track is. Gearing, as well. Whenever we tested there for gearing, we were using a lot of torque coming out of the corners. Now we don’t have any torque. So we had to gear it a lot shorter. This just kind of screwed the whole process up.

Will the team be able to plan better next year for these engine regulations? Will they be in place all year next year? Sounds like this new rule at Brno caught people off guard.

I think it’s horse(crap). The whole thing is, we’re at the pinnacle of the sport. We’re at the cutting edge of motorcycle racing and electronics and engines, with technology. And then they want to limit us on engines, which everybody agreed to, which I don’t understand. Everybody agreed to it, all the manufacturers, and now we’re suffering. And I think we were caught a little bit off guard. I don’t know what Yamaha calls it, cross-plane firing order or whatever the hell it is. It’s a lot of stress on components. To get it to go three races like next year, they’ve got their work cut out for them.

Valencia is a lot different than Sepang. Tight, twisty, not a lot of long straights into hairpins. That should help you, right?

Yeah, it should be good. Who knows what engine? I don’t know what we’ve got left or what we’re going to run. We show up every weekend, and we’re always kind of running a little bit different or trying to conserve an engine. We’re at the last race, so whatever we have, it seems like we should just run it until it blows up, in my opinion. We’ll see what we come out with. We don’t have any more races after this, so maybe we can get something a little bit different. I don’t’ know.

Just as long as it doesn’t catch on fire like the Aprilia. (Edwards’ Aprilia caught on fire at speed in an infamous incident in his rookie season in 2003.)

Yeah, as long as it doesn’t catch on fire, man, we’re golden.

What are the special characteristics of Valencia?

First things first is you’ve just got to be real careful with the right side of the tire. It’s very easy to roll here and just think everything is good. But that right side, because it’s not until you really get to the fourth corner where you’ve got a right-hander. But you don’t generate a lot of heat on the right side here. From my knowledge, I think we’re using pretty much the same rubber across the whole tire here. I don’t know. That takes a little bit of time. After that, you’ve got a couple start-stops, a little back straightaway, you’ve got a pretty tight corner onto the front straightaway. But for the most part, the little infield section is just about flowing, carrying momentum.”

Are you counting points in your effort to catch Andrea Dovizioso in fifth? Do you do the math in advance, or do you just go with the flow?

Of course, you’ve got to do the math. This is the whole motivation factor that keeps you rolling. I’d like to get five more points than him and get fifth place. That would be fantastic. At the end of the day, we just have to buckle down and frickin’ ride our ass off.

How do you feel at the end of this season compared to your other six seasons in MotoGP?

I’m getting older, so I’d say I’m getting more tired. The season as a whole, even though there was only podium this year, in years past I’ve had two, three or however many podiums, but it wasn’t a bad year. I felt we were consistent. We were consistently up there. After Brno, we’ve had a big struggle going. But we’ve got one more race to turn it around. On a whole, this year, I don’t know about a success, but it was probably as good as we could do, being the top satellite bike. I’m pretty happy with it.

If you could finish the season at one circuit, where would it be?

Valencia, Spain. It is what it is. I’ve never thought about that. It’s just as good a place as any. It’s a good track. The fans here are awesome. Obviously, the racing over here is in everybody’s heart. So it’s a good place to finish it.

I saw pictures last week of Ben Spies dressed as a pimp for Halloween. He went to party with Jamie and Rachel Hacking. What did you dress as for Halloween this year?

Dude, Halloween is all about the kids. And if you don’t have kids, then you obviously do whatever, go to Halloween parties, which we’ve obviously done in years past. Had some great costumes over the years. But this year I was simply, I don’t know what I was. I was like a frickin’ covered ghoul-monster with red, lit-up eyes. Kids had a haunted house. One of my friends built a haunted house. All we did was just roll around the corner and scare the (crap) out of kids. It was quite entertaining.

Friday, October 23, 2009

---

Tornado Warning Archive

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, is in his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Monster Yamaha Tech 3. He is sixth in the season standings after 15 races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the Grand Prix of Malaysia on Oct. 23-25 at Sepang.

The colorful Edwards finished fifth in the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at IMS, racing along with fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

Another solid finish at Phillip Island, fifth. But something makes me think you left there thinking you wanted a lot more. Correct?

Did I read correctly that you asked Jorge Lorenzo at Phillip Island what setting he was using last weekend, and he told you it was the one you developed in preseason testing?

Well, the reality of it is from what I know of the Malaysia test, we had a setting on the back that I think was more of what we started with. I kind of think it’s what everybody started with. But I don’t know that for a fact. Valentino was using it, as well, in the Malaysia (preseason) test. And we got away from it. We had a traction problem in Qatar, so we kind of moved away from that particular setting. We never made it fully back to it. It’s just a front-end setting. And we never quite made it back to there. Then we’ve got Malaysia coming up this weekend, and last weekend at Phillip Island, I thought, “Well, why don’t we just try it?” And we put it in the bike, and it didn’t work. (Laughter) We tried it on the Friday, and I was having some major issues with it. So we kind of came back to what we knew. It’s just a head-pipe collar position and some angles with the front head pipe. Once we got back to kind of what I know, then actually I felt better.

Did you play at all with the handlebar position? You did that at Portugal and were pretty sore during and after the race.

No, we pretty much stayed with what we had at Portugal. Phillip Island is fast, but it’s not the most physically demanding track out there. That’s the one thing about fast tracks: You have a bit of time here and there to kind of catch a breath. Once you get settled into a corner, it pretty much takes its course. You don’t have to hold on so damn tight.

How do you mentally adjust to a mistake at the start? It’s not a last-lap incident. You still have the whole race to go. How do you calm down, avoid the “red mist” and avoid more mistakes when you’re mad at the start?

That’s a good question. Once I actually got going at the start, I think it was pretty good. I only came out ninth or something, which, it’s pretty easy. If you qualified fifth, you might be fourth, you might be seventh in the first corner. You never know. Just to be ninth, I saw the guys in front of me, and I felt pretty confident that my pace was stronger than theirs. And Australia is typically a track that if you’ve got more pace than somebody, you can get around them at a couple of different places. I think I passed all of them in just about a lap, or half a lap. In reality, my fastest lap on those race tires I think was (1:)31.6 or 31.5. Hell, the first few laps we were doing 31.5′s. And I thought: “Jesus, man! These guys hadn’t done that kind of pace that are in front of me.” I’m thinking, “I’m riding good, and they’re still in front of me, not hindering my lap times.” I got Dovizioso I think in the second- or third-to-last corner, and then Kallio made a little mistake coming on to the front straight. I came into Turn 1 and was kind of beside him. Not many people crash into Turn 1, so I just thought, “Well, just let off the brake and see what happens,” and just went up under both of them. And then I got Elias half a lap later. And then I put my head down. I think 31.2 or 31.3 was the fastest I had gone. I just tried to string some laps together. I saw de Angelis up there, and I felt like our pace was very similar. He had gained me so much in the first few laps that it was hard to make up that five seconds.

Still, you got points on Dovizioso, who’s in fifth in the standings. So he’s within reach with two races to go. That must be encouraging.

Yeah, it scheduled out I needed three points a race for the last three races to beat him, and I just got one. We need to get up into the top three, top four. He needs to finish a sixth or a seventh, and then we’ll be back on level terms. We’ve got some work to do. It’s not going to be easy. But we’ve got to get a few points on him.

Looking at the front, the battle at Phillip Island between Casey Stoner and Valentino Rossi. Some commentators speculated that Valentino went into points mode when he learned Lorenzo had crashed and never was going to make a bold attempt to pass Casey. Knowing how Valentino loves to win, do you believe that?

I think you have to look at every aspect of the situation. Even if Valentino was to go all out trying to win the race, Valentino knows Casey is going to frickin’ risk life and limb to win his home Grand Prix. That’s one aspect you’ve got to look at. The other one being, yeah, Jorge is out. I’d much rather get the championship bonus than a race win bonus. I’d much rather say I won the World Championship instead of saying I won the Australian Grand Prix. There’s a lot of different things in there. And once it comes down to the last two or three races, it’s definitely just championship mode. Valentino, he’s won eight of them, or nine or 20 of them – however many he’s won – for a reason. He’s a thinking man when he’s out there.

How much of the preseason testing that you did seven months ago in Sepang is relevant now? Have the bikes developed so much since then that any data from that test is pretty meaningless?

Generally … That’s funny: You spend all winter trying to find the setting. Generally, yeah, you’ll come here (for the race), and that setting you might have used (in testing) is probably not worth a damn anymore. But we have a bike, I’ll start out on Friday with the exact bike pretty that I ended testing here. I had a good test here. I had good pace going. So our thinking is to come back to what that is. Once we get that working, we can try to improve on that, knowing what we know about other things. So I’m going to go and start straight out with what we finished the test with.

When F1 runs at Barcelona, sometimes the race can be pretty straightforward and processional because the teams do so much preseason testing there that there’s no mystery about the place. Is that the same in F1 at places like Sepang or Qatar, where you do preseason testing?

Yeah, definitely everybody feels like they have a slight advantage when they come back. But the reality of it is that it’s been eight months, or seven months, since we’ve been here. There’s been a lot of laps run from the test to here. So you’ve still got to back in the swing of it. Qatar, hell, you test and then a couple of weeks later you go race. That’s completely different. It’s half-and-half (at Sepang). You feel like you should go out there and just kill it right off the first lap, but you’ve still got to get into Malaysia mode.

Any unique characteristics of Sepang?

It’s hotter than hell. (Laughter). That’s one characteristic. It’s a momentum place, as well. You’re stop and start, hairpin stuff. But the majority of it after that, is all just keeping your momentum up. It’s almost two tracks in one.

Tickets go on sale for the 2010 Red Bull Indianapolis GP next Wednesday, Oct. 28. Why should someone buy their tickets that day for next year’s race?

The earlier you get it, the earlier you can plan it and get the party started!

Thursday, October 15, 2009

---

Tornado Warning Archive

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, is in his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Monster Yamaha Tech 3. He is sixth in the season standings after 14 races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the Grand Prix of Australia on Oct. 16-18 at Phillip Island.

The colorful Edwards finished fifth in the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at IMS, racing along with fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

Estoril seemed like a solid weekend pretty much right off the truck and through to the finish for you. Correct assessment?

Was there anything in which you could have done anything better, or did you get everything you could out of the bike?

We tried some different handlebars to relocate my position, pull back a little bit. And I don’t know, just my position it feels like I’m way up sitting over the handlebars. That angle is obviously what I’m not accustomed to. I was so sore after the race. I normally don’t get sore after riding that bike. Just that angle and that pressure being a little bit different angle, I don’t know. After 15 laps of the race, I looked up and still had 13 laps to go, and: “You’ve got to be kidding me. I’m dying here.” We might have to go back to what we know. We struggled with rear traction. We struggled a lot. We tried a harder rear spring for qualifying, and it seemed to work. But it works when you have grip. As soon as we put race trim back on, it didn’t work that well.

You mentioned how good Jorge Lorenzo was last weekend. Did he almost remind you of the guy on the other side of the Fiat Yamaha garage, Valentino? He took the whole race in his grip and ran away.

You know, very, very Rossi-esque, let’s say. He hauled ass last year, Jorge, and won the race. But I think his fastest lap from the race (in 2008) was (1:) 37.4, and those guys are out there doing 36.9′s, which is pretty impressive. He broke the lap record lap after lap after lap. 37.0, 37.1, 36.9. I got back and looked at his chart, and that’s just insanity. When I watched the race over, it looked easy. It’s hard to understand. You watch him, he was 30 seconds or something in front of me, but it just looked easy.

The other thing that was striking to me was that as well as Casey rode, that Ducati was dancing all over under him. I know that’s normal, but the Yamaha looked so smooth under Jorge.

That’s Casey, anyways, and that’s that bike. You have to ride it like that to extract everything out of it. As far as Jorge is concerned, man, it just looked like he was out for a cruise. Not out of shape. Everything precise. Yeah, ran away with it. That was a good race for him.

What dimension does Casey bring now to the title race? Before it was the three aliens and pretty much Valentino vs. Jorge. But now it looks like Casey is in the mix. Do you think Jorge might be the happiest guy in the paddock to see Casey back?

Yeah, I would think so. Anyways, Jorge can win the next three races and if Valentino finishes second, Valentino still wins the championship. So I think Jorge is liking the fact that Stoner is back in the mix. Stoner is going to good next race in Australia. He’s going to go good in Malaysia and obviously Valencia. I think it’s going to be some exciting racing here in the next few races.

It was a big week for you at Estoril, as your 2010 deal was announced. I know you’re always chilled about contract talks, but was there ever a point this summer where you thought you might not have a MotoGP ride next year?

Honestly, I had a meeting with (Yamaha boss Masao) Furusawa and (Yamaha Racing boss Lin) Jarvis and (Tech 3 boss) Herve Poncharal, two of the Yamaha kingpins and Herve, in Donington. And (they said): “No matter what, doesn’t matter what happens, we want to to take care of you for somehow, some way. Go back to the factory team if Jorge leaves or stay here or go to (World) Superbike. We want you to continue with Yamaha. So really, after that point, I was like: “OK, they want me to do something with them. They’re going to take care of me.” I kind of had that feeling for a long time. And it wasn’t really until let’s say Indy that I had a meeting, and tey were like: “Psyche. We were just blowing smoke up your ass. We didn’t want you to worry about it.” So they more or less left it up to Herve. They wanted me to stay with Herve, and they were pushing for me to stay with Herve. But yet, financially, that’s where we were having some trouble. But anyways, we got it all sorted out. Pretty much we got it all sorted at Indy on the Sunday, and Misano, it was pretty much done.

Ben Spies also was announced that week as your teammate for 2010. Team Texas. That must be the dream setup you wanted.

Yep, it is. I think the world of Ben. I think the kid has lots of talent. So I’m looking forward to spending a year with him. The main thing is that it’s a dream team for the right sponsor. Problem is, in the times that we’re at, it’s just finding that sponsor. Of course, we’ve got Monster, but we could always use somebody with lots of cheese.

Is Phillip Island pretty much the classic MotoGP track now that Assen has been changed? If you could point one track to someone and say, “This is the best track,” would that be Phillip Island?

I think it’s the fastest track on the schedule, if I’m not mistaken. I think overall speed it’s the fastest. It is the perfect motorcycle track. You’ve got first-gear corners, the fifth-gear corners, camber, off-camber, elevation. You’ve got everything. It’s all in nine turns. The scenery is awesome. The real estate around there is just incredible. The ocean, the food, the people: Everything about it is just perfect. It’s definitely the best Grand Prix to go to, if you ask me.

Phillip Island seems to be the one track on the current schedule that everyone raves about. You never read or hear a bad word about it.

It’s awesome, and I don’t think you will hear a bad thing said about it. It’s like a little vacation town. Everybody goes down to see the penguins. They cater to us. It’s fantastic.

I know it’s a trip that you look forward to, but is it also one of the busiest weekends of the year for you because your dad was born in Australia and you have so many friends and family there? Are there a few headaches involved there, too?

Yeah, but you know, everybody is pretty calm about it. They know that I’m doing a job and that I’ve got things I’ve got to do. Commitments for Yamaha or Monster, whatever it might be. They understand. I try to swing by and eat some food with them if I can. But it might be only 30 minutes; it might be an hour. But we always hang out, anyways. They understand.

You were born in Texas, but you definitely have a sense of the Australian mindset because of your dad. Why are Australian riders so good, and what about the Aussie culture breeds such good riders like Mick Doohan, Wayne Gardner and Casey Stoner? It’s a world away from the European hotbed of the sport.

I think probably the only way I can say is you look at the guys who have been great that have come out of Australia, and there’s just a determination, there’s a no-bullshit clause. I would say determination. I think you grow up there, you know you’re coming from the land Down Under where you know the coastline is populated, and the rest of the place is a ghost town. So it’s not a huge market, really, for any motorcycle or any industry whatsoever. And I think that makes them work twice as hard. It’s definitely a mindset. All the guys who have come out of there and been great, they definitely have the right mindset.

No drama queens from Australia, huh?

You can’t get away with it there. You can be a little cocky and you can be a little blatant or you can speak your mind from there, and it’s all good. No worries, as they say.

And you can swear your head off down there and get away with it.

Oh, absolutely. That’s the one good thing I like about it. (Laughter)

Thursday, September 3, 2009

---

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, is in his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Monster Yamaha Tech 3. He is fifth in the season standings after 12 races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the Grand Prix of San Marino on Sept. 4-6 at Brno.

The colorful Edwards finished fifth in the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at IMS, racing along with fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

Indy. Judging by your look after the race and comments I read after the race, you didn’t look or sound very happy with that fifth-place result. It didn’t go the way you wanted, did it?

No, it didn’t. It looked like we were sitting kind of fourth, fifth, pretty much all weekend. The top three guys, Pedrosa, Rossi and Lorenzo, just seemed to be going away with it. Actually, I should say Lorenzo and Pedrosa. Valentino looked like he was struggling a little bit. Come race time, got a great start, felt good right after the bat. After a lap and a half, I was like: “Hmmph. This is weird, man. I’m spinning everywhere.” I couldn’t hold load with the rear tire. The front was like super-sticky, super-grippy, and the rear just kept going in. It’s just coming around. I was like, “Oh, this is not a good sign.” Normally it’s not a good sign. You try to adjust; you have to adjust your style. But at the same time, if you can’t hold on your rear load, then you can’t get any front load. You depend on the rear to hold grip in turns versus the front. I don’t know. We made a decision to go with the soft rear. I had gone faster with the harder rear on Saturday. But I think Bridgestone were kind of worried the last 10 laps. Being that the rubber was so different, they were worried about, let’s say, degrading really bad, which sounds completely opposite. Normally you expect the hard tire to come in at the end, but because the weather was a bit cool and the track temperature wasn’t quite up there, they were kind of afraid of it cold-tearing toward the end of the race. So we went with the soft tire, and it just … yeah, it never … I did the same lap times all weekend. It’s not like I went any slower. But the other guys stepped it up a bit. Obviously, Valentino crashed. Pedrosa crashed first. And then de Angelis, he was just on fire. He came by me, and same with Nicky and Dovizioso. It was all I could do just to watch them walk away from me. We’re down on power: We know that. That’s never good.

What is it with de Angelis? The guy has been riding pretty well lately. Has the bike improved, or is the guy riding for his MotoGP life since he doesn’t have a ride next year?

You know, it’s weird because I know Alex. He’s a super-nice guy. He’s a great rider when everything seems to work. But I think I kind of put it down to something else. Let’s say, the track, the actual stones on the second half of the track (at Indy) are very much the same as what you get at Mugello. And he went really good there a couple of years ago. He went good there this year, as well, I believe. But I don’t know. I think he likes that particular surface, and he goes really well. He has lots of feel, lots of grip on it, which sounds strange. But I believe that might have something to do with it. And he was just on. All weekend, it seemed like he was going good. I talked with him today. We’re over here in Italy. We went and did a little Dorna event, climbing and went to a rehab center for drug addiction, and I asked him, “Did you have grip? Did you have any traction?” He goes: “Oh, yeah. I had plenty.” Which is completely the opposite of what I had. So I wish I had something set up pretty good.

I didn’t know you were fluent in Italian (Alex de Angelis speaks no English).

Well … (Edwards responds with three sentences in fluent-sounding Italian.)

Am I supposed to transcribe that? (Laughter)

I speak OK Italian. But you get me out on a late night when I got a couple of beers in us, man, I speak it like fluent. Your inhibition goes away a little bit.

Going back to Indy. The track doesn’t have elevation change, and it’s inside of a stadium setting. You have said IMS doesn’t feel like a stadium track. Even so, it’s not a classic natural road circuit. But have the different grip levels from the different kinds of asphalt created a healthy respect or even fear for the Indy track over the last two years, maybe more than you expected?

Ab-so-lutely. It’s a track that we don’t have any tracks like that, apart from the layout. The layout is inside like a stadium thing, which, you know, it doesn’t matter. We’re here in Misano. You could put Misano in a stadium, as well, and you’d never know it. It’s pretty tight. The front straight (at Indy), which is one particular pavement. Then you have the first little section, which is blacktop. Then you roll around to, I don’t know, Turn 5, and you’ve got a different pavement. Then you roll (Turns) 7, 8 and 9, and that is different. Then you roll back to the normal stuff through 9, 10, 11 or whatever, until the end. We just don’t have that. It’s something we don’t have throughout the year. Every track we seem to roll up to, it’s pretty much the same. I would say, World Superbike days, going to some different tracks, we would get a few different tarmacs or blacktop or concrete. Whereas now, everything is pretty much fluid. It continues with the same pavement throughout the track. Whereas Indy is very tough, especially in the rain. In the rain, it’s very tricky. If it looks like glass, it has good grip on some areas. In the dry, though, you really have to be on your P’s and Q’s to know where it’s at.

Is it good for the series to have a track like that? NASCAR has Darlington; it’s “too tough to tame.” Is it good for MotoGP to have a track that on paper may not look that tough but in reality be a bit of a beast because of the different grip levels?

Is it good? I don’t know. The race, I haven’t watched the race. I can only assume it was kind of exciting for the first few laps, but I don’t know after that. But the fact: We are spoiled. I know we’re spoiled. We roll up to the track, and everything seems to be very fluid. You set your bike up; you have the same pavement. As far as going to Indy, you have all the different kinds of pavement. That is something that probably most of the guys would say, how do I put this politically correct? It’s just not the normal. It’s not normal. It’s not what we normally run on. But it works. I wish the race would have been a lot better. I wish Valentino would have stayed on two wheels. That would have been a pretty good battle. But there’s some bumps. There’s some bumps around there that caught me out, caught Valentino out, caught Pedrosa out. We just need a little more time.

Any specific moments that you remember from last week that were really fun or really cool?

The whole weekend. Just having friends there and family. My dad was there. The one thing that I would say is in my top-three list of all-time ever motorcycling events that I’ve ever seen or witnessed or been there was to see Kenny (Roberts) Sr. do the dirt track on that 750. That was just … I was nervous. I’m sweating. My mouth was open, I was sweating. It was cold as hell outside, but I was just nervous watching him. I know Kenny is halfway crazy, but I think he’s kind of the godfather of our sport. Without him, I don’t know how long it would have taken for Americans to come over and do World Championship stuff. But man, I don’t know: Either he was drunk or was very impressive. Maybe a little of both.

I wasn’t there, but people said he pinned the throttle pretty good.

Man, it was just insane. It was not normal. I know Kenny thinks he’s still 18, but the reality of it is he’s 57. I just kind of expected him to fart around. I’ve seen him. I’ve been out to Hickman; I’ve been out to his place. I’ve dirt-tracked with him years ago, with him and Junior (Kenny Roberts Jr.) and Rainey and Jimmy Felice and Bubba Shobert. We’ve all dirt-tracked together out on little XR 100′s. But that was very impressive watching that.

And that bike just sounds evil, too.

Oh, eeee-vil, man. God. Yamaha asked me, they said, “Hey, Ben Bostrom is thinking about taking a ride. You want to take a spin, maybe Valentino?” And I was like: “Are you crazy? There’s no way.” I’m not a dirt-track background guy, but there’s just absolutely no way. But to have 10,000 and 20,000 people watching? Maybe I’d go out and have a little spin on it. But I don’t know the feel of a mile. I’ve never done a three-eighths mile. We just fart around on little pit bikes.

Moving on to Misano. What are your expectations considering the way your bike is running?

My crew chief, Mr. Guy Coulon is … I go track to track, and he’s been here long enough that he knows what we need for this track, what maybe we didn’t need at Indy. Here you need maybe a little bit something different, but he’s already got the bike adjusted. We’ve already lifted the front end a little bit, jacked around with some spring rates. This is from years and years and years of experience. Also kind of what I did last year from Indy to here, knowing what you need and what kind of feel you need and what kind of setting that we would migrate to if we started on Indy settings. Just to save time, let’s just already kind of migrate that and work from there. I don’t know. It should be a good weekend. I like this track. I had 10 laps of torture last year, the first few laps. Cold tire. Once it came good, we were doing good lap times. I’m looking forward to a good race here.

Ducati has re-signed Nicky. Jorge is staying with Yamaha. It seems like pieces are starting to fall into place. Any update with your situation?

Honestly, as we’re sitting here talking, I got a beep-beep on my phone, and that was Aprilia calling. So I’m going to have to call them back and see what they’ve got going on. But you know, I would love to stay where I’m at, honestly. I talked to Ben Spies a little bit a couple days ago. I think he’s kind of on board. And obviously Yamaha would love him to win the championship there (World Superbike) first, which it looks like he has a very good possibility of doing that. If we had Team Texas over here at Tech 3, that would just be stellar. I don’t know if it’s feasible or if it’s possible. That’s kind of what it’s looking like. We need to put our heads together and see what we can come up with. We need to come up with some more sponsors, man. If you’ve got two guys from Texas, we either search Texas companies or American companies. We just need to come up with a couple more sponsors to throw some cash in and support us.

We’d love it at Indy, I know that.

Yeah, absolutely. For the right sponsor, it’s a dream team. You’ve got two guys from the U.S. or two guys from Texas or whatever it might be. For the right person, the right group or the right company, it’s a dream team. But in these times, it’s just a matter of finding who that is.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

---

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, is in his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Yamaha Tech 3. He is fifth in the season standings after 11 races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The colorful Edwards will join fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo in the race.

That was a weird race for you at Brno. You had a swollen gland in your neck Friday and took medicine at the wrong time before qualifying? What happened there?

That had to feel really good under your helmet, huh?

Yeah, it was a little touch and go. The chin strap is a little bit in front of it, so it didn’t really affect me too much on the bike. The medicine thing was the main thing. I took that on an empty stomach, and that just kind of knocked me around on Saturday. Sunday, I was fine.

During the race, did you have a bit of a power problem?

You know, I’m usually the first guy to say … I don’t like blaming anybody for anything. I’m usually the first guy to say, “My fault, my mistake,” or whichever it might be. Reality of it was I knew I was riding as hard as I could. I did a drive on somebody, it didn’t matter who it was, hell, they’d pull me four or five bike lengths down a little short chute going to the next corner, and I thought, “Something is not right.” Sure enough, we came in from the race, and the bike was still slow. Me and James (Toseland) were second-to-last on the speed chart. We’re normally fifth, sixth, seventh, up around there. This new rule, five engines for the last seven races, that’s what hurt us a little bit. Yamaha is going to have to re-engineer a couple things and get some more mileage out of the motors.

Is that why you didn’t test at Brno after the race, or weren’t you scheduled to test there?

I had asked to test there at Donington, but we didn’t go through. It didn’t go through. We didn’t test there, anyways. As far as bike setting, I don’t think we really need to test anything. We seem like we got a pretty good balance. We just need to get some more of the ponies back we used to have.

With this rule, do you have another engine you can put in? The engines are sealed, right? Can you put in a different engine besides the one at Brno, because that long straight at Indy needs power.

Two of our five engines are sealed up. Once you drop it in the bike, it’s sealed. You can’t touch it. So we have three engines left that we haven’t sealed yet, but they can still do really whatever they want as far as material changes or whatever they might have to do to get it to run a little bit better. If they will, I don’t know. This is something that you’re going to have to take all the data back from Brno, look at what went wrong and say, “We can do this, or we can’t do this.” We’ll just have to wait and see.

Think back to last year at Indy. You only had been there once for a PR appearance at the Brickyard 400 in July. You never had raced there. Other than the weather, what was most unique about the track and atmosphere for you?

Man, you work there. You know what the air is like. It’s always like that. It’s Indianapolis. All the memories I have as a kid growing up and watching the Indy 500, and now to be able to go there and ride on that track. Just to ride on it, much less race on it, I think is pretty special in itself. OK, we’re not doing the full four corners (of the oval), but we’re using part of the track, running over the bricks. Just being in that area is quite special.

You saw maps of the track before the first race and saw the track during your visit in late July 2008. Was there any part of the track that really surprised you, that was much different than you thought it would be?

Generally, any time you try to put a road course into the middle of an oval, usually 90 percent of the time it doesn’t work out. And I don’t know why that is. You’ve got to account for runoffs. You’ve got to account for “What if this happens; what if that happens?” Plus with Dorna and FIM, you’ve got to have enough safety to get the track to pass safety standards. And I was quite impressed. It’s actually a track that you don’t feel like you’re running around an infield. Of course, we know Indy’s huge. The track itself is just massive. But there’s plenty of real estate there so you don’t feel confined. That’s the main thing.

It’s easy to pick the “Big Three” – Valentino Rossi, Jorge Lorenzo and Dani Pedrosa – as podium finishers at this year’s race. But who is a possible dark horse? Yourself? Anyone else?

I don’t see anybody. Myself, if we get a couple of things sorted out, of course. Valentino and Jorge have just been on fire this year. Dani had a little bit of inconsistency here and there. I think he’s getting back to being pretty much 100 percent fit. Those are the three guys. They’re the three guys. I think if you’re looking at who could possibly fill the podium. Myself, (Andrea) Dovizioso’s another one. You know, (Toni) Elias has come on strong the last few races. So I don’t know. We’ll see. You never know about (Loris) Capirossi. He depends, if the bike’s set up, how he’s feeling.

When you go to the three races in Spain, you see the adulation the Spanish riders receive. Same with Valentino in Italy at Mugello and Misano. What does it mean for an American to ride at home? Do you feel the same kind of passion from the fans when you race at Laguna and especially here in Indy?

Yeah, but it’s different, though. Once you travel around and you see how it is for Valentino in Italy and you see how it is for Jorge in Spain and you see how it is for (Casey) Stoner in Australia, I think you kind of feed off of that, and you make the U.S. a bit more than maybe what it is. We know that road racing over here is not what it is in Europe. But once you see the hype over there, you kind of treat it over here maybe a bit more … I really don’t know how to explain it. But it’s probably not as big a deal as we make it out to be. But it’s the two times in a year we get to ride in front of our home crowd. So it’s still something that’s still that. It’s still a big deal.

How many friends and family do you have coming to Indy this weekend? Are you a popular guy with people mooching tickets off you?

Well, I think I got 55 passes, and I think they’re all gone.

Hey, job done!

They’re all gone. Man, I’ve got a lot of folks. They’re not just all just family. I’ve got a lot of friends from all over coming up to see. Yeah, it’s going to be a good weekend.

What are you hearing about Silly Season? Is Lorenzo truly the domino that’s going to make everything fall into place? (Note: This interview was conducted Aug. 24. Jorge Lorenzo re-signed with Yamaha on Aug. 25.)

I think Lorenzo is the guy. Obviously, I guess Yamaha gave him an offer, Honda gave him an offer. The last I heard, Ducati gave him an offer. I think, in reality, out of all the guys that are riding on the circuit, I think he is the one that could probably ride that Ducati how it needs to be ridden. He was really good on the 250, and I think his style, I think he could ride that Ducati and make it work like Casey (Stoner) does. There’s been a couple of guys, (Marco) Melandri and Nicky (Hayden), that have been on it recently that really hadn’t made it work up to its potential. But I think he could do it. I don’t know. He’s definitely the guy. Once he does and gets signed, sealed and delivered, then I think everything else will just … It’s like trim work in a house. Once the trim gets done, then everything else is easy.

When you come home from a race, you unplug from motorcycle racing and spend time with your family and friends. But do you pay attention to Silly Season around this time of the year, even if it doesn’t involve you?

I could lie to you and say, “Yeah,” if that makes a better story. Honestly, no. I’ve met with Yamaha. They seem to be pretty happy. I’ve given them the better part of most of my life on two wheels, so they seem like they would like me to stick around. I would like to stick around. I’m pretty confident that as long as I’m riding motorcycles, I’m pretty confident Yamaha want to be involved with me. So, do I pay attention? Yeah, if it’s some big news, of course. Somebody texts me or something or somebody, “Hey, did you hear this?” I would say five, six years ago, yeah, I probably used to look at the Internet all the time to see what was happening. But now, I don’t have time for it, really, anymore, to get wrapped up in it. At the end of the day, there’s somebody out there that’s going to want you to ride the bike or develop the bike or stick with you. There’s always somebody out there. You can stress over it and look at this stuff all day long every day. “Where am I going to go? And oh, my gosh, and this and that.” At the end of the day, I woke up this morning. I was still breathing. So I can’t complain. It will all work out.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

---

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, is in his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Yamaha Tech 3. He is fifth in the season standings after 10 races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the Grand Prix of Czech Republic on Aug. 14-16 at Brno.

The colorful Edwards will compete in the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at IMS along with fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

Donington. What a race. What a finish for you. First podium of the season.

What caused you to drop back after the good start? Did something happen?

No, no, nothing happened. It’s just the last thing you want to do in those conditions is pitch it on down the road after a lap, or whatever. Then you’d really feel like a dumbass. I think, like everybody, it was just kind of follow the lead and see what you could get away with. Well, guys started pulling away from me pretty rapidly, and I thought, “Man, I don’t know anything about the conditions.” Anyways, after I got way too far (back) in the beginning. I’m a feel guy. I like to know I’ve got something underneath me. Once I got the feel for what was going on, then it was time to put the head down.

Did the feel get better for you as the race progressed, or was it steady and other guys dropped off?

The feel, yeah, it got better and better. With about 10 laps to go, it rained a pretty good bit. So then you had to slow down. Then it kind of starting drying up again a little bit. It rained the whole race. It was just a feel and then, you didn’t know. Especially those last three laps. I remember I caught the guys (Andrea Dovizioso and Randy De Puniet) and I saw I had three laps left. I remember crossing and seeing my pit board and thinking: “My God, I don’t know if I can stay on two wheels for three more laps. I don’t know if that’s even possible.” It was right at that time that it started again, and then everything got slicker than owl poop.

You said this summer stretch of tracks would be good for you, but it took until Donington to get that first podium. Was that reassuring for your confidence to get back up there, especially in a race with such terrible conditions?

Yeah, it was good. I’ve always been, probably been too much of a thinker at times. Instead of throwing caution to the wind, I’m more of the calculated risk, assessing the situation, the calculating pass. I’m not the guy that’s going to outbrake somebody and see what happens. Sometimes that’s maybe a little bit too conservative. But there, the podium there, I had a bunch of friends come out, and the conditions were just horrible. To survive it and come out with a podium, I was happy.

Was the feeling on the podium joy that you had finished second or relief that such a hairy race was over and you were upright?

It was probably more of the latter. I’ve stood on the podium enough throughout my career to where that’s just where you expect to be all the time. When you do get on the podium, that’s part of being a racer, as well. When you do get on the podium, usually it’s not: “Woo-hoo! I made the podium.” This is where we all expect to be. This is why we’re out here. But yeah, that was just relief. It was over, man.

Was there ever a point when you passed De Puniet and were catching Dovizioso where you thought, “Man, I can win this thing?”

Yeah. About that time (three laps to go) I had caught up to both of them, and I think we were pulling like five seconds a lap at one time on Dovizioso. Once I caught him, man, I assumed he was leading the race since I was in third. And I thought, “Man, we can win this thing.” I passed De Puniet, and with a few laps to go, he passed me back, which probably was a blessing in disguise because I came up behind him going down Craner Curves, Turn 3 or whatever, and I was like, “Why is he going so slow?” If he wouldn’t have been in front of me, I would have been going faster, obviously. And that thing snapped so sideways on me. I don’t know how it came back, but I would have been going a lot faster, and it probably would have been all over. He obviously knew something at that point that I didn’t know. So after that, it was like, “Whoa.” And then Dovizioso actually put his head down. He did a couple good laps there at the end, time-wise, that he actually extended the gap on us that last lap. He rode a great race, as well.

Everyone loves the summer break. But is there a small part of you that wishes you had a race a week after Donington because you finished on the podium and wanted to keep riding that momentum?

Nope. No, not at all. I needed a vacation. We’ve been traveling around and running around. My wife is pregnant, I’ve got two kids here at home. I was looking forward to get some time at home. As it happened, I came home, and I flew up to Indy with you guys for a couple of days. Went to fart around with the troops and have some fun. And then I came back for a day. And then I went on a three-day, offshore deep-sea fishing trip that was held almost 110 miles out to the Gulf (of Mexico). It was a Legends of Sailfish tournament that I got invited to, so I thought, “Hell, I’ll go.” Blue marlins and sailfish. Glad to really do it, man.

Talk about your trip to Camp Atterbury near Indianapolis. That must have been cool for you because it combined your affection for the U.S. troops and the chance to fire a few weapons.

Yeah, it was great. The weapons thing was cool. The simulators are hard to get pumped up about, in any case. But it was fun. I just hanging out with them. You know, just going and b.s.ing with them and talking with them and seeing how they’re feeling, as they’re being shipped off here in a few days. It was good just to hang out with them, have some lunch. A lot of the troops I see around the world are vets, as well, that are older. You see some 30s, 40s. Big, old guys. You’re always thinking military guys, those big muscle guys. But they’re built like a brick sh*thouse; that’s how I mean to say it. And you forget, you just forget that a lot of young kids that are defending our country. That was probably the one thing. I don’t know why, but I expected to go there and kind of see guys my own age. Maybe I just still consider myself 18. But the reality is that a lot of younger people who are defending our country and loving what they’re doing and enjoying it. My hat’s off to them, man. I can’t express enough respect in words.

Especially at that age. Most guys who are 18 or 19 are chasing beer and girls.

Yeah, exactly. It was all about chasing tail and beer. That was it. These guys, they’re just amazing, they’re just awesome. The amount of sacrifice, and I’m not talking about life or death; I’m talking about just sacrifice in all the things they have to give up to hang out there and train, and some of the fun things in life like boating with your buddies on the weekend, the fishing trips. All that stuff, they’ve got to put that on hold.

Brno is the next track. What’s unique about that track, and how does that track shape up for your bike this year?

I’ve never really had a result worth a damn there, be it in Superbike or MotoGP. I’ve always thought of myself as a good chicane rider, but there it’s just basically chicane after chicane after chicane. A little bit big ones and smaller ones. I don’t know. We’ll have to change that this year.

Will you need to shorten the bike again because there are no really sweeping turns at Brno? It’s all chicanes.

Yeah, but at the same time it’s about momentum. I don’t know about shortening the bike up. Usually you shorten it up, and your corner speed, mid-corner speed might drop a little bit. We might run with what we’ve got. What we had at Donington seemed to be in the right direction. I think we got some more information, as well. I think I just need to get lift the front, drop the rear. I need to get to where I’m not sitting so much on the front of the bike. I need to get more in it and comfortable.

The Red Bull Indianapolis GP is less than three weeks away at Indy. How is your sense of anticipation growing for that event?

Yeah, I haven’t thought about it, to be honest with you. I’ve been busy flat out, getting everything else sorted out. I really look and assess the situation after Brno. That’s kind of how we’ve always operated. You can’t really think too far ahead. But man, it’s always there; you always look forward to coming home.

We’re starting to hear a lot about Silly Season. Where will Lorenzo go? How will that affect other riders? What about you? Anything to report for next year?

At the moment, no. I had a meeting with the Yamaha guys, and it seems like obviously they’d like to keep me somewhere in Yamaha. I think there are possibly three options. Be where I’m at, or the factory team or Superbike. I think everybody’s in freeze mode at the moment. Let’s see what (Jorge) Lorenzo does. Based on his decision, Ben Spies’ decision, as well, with Yamaha. There are some factors in there that are probably going to dictate my destination.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

---

Colin Edwards, a Houston native nicknamed “The Texas Tornado,” will offer candid insight about his performance, competitors and life in the exciting world of MotoGP motorcycle racing before every event in 2009 in “Tornado Warning.”

Two-time World Superbike champion Edwards, 35, is in his seventh year of MotoGP competition, riding this season for Yamaha Tech 3. He is fifth in the season standings after nine races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the Grand Prix of Great Britain on July 24-26 at Donington Park.

The colorful Edwards will compete in the second annual Red Bull Indianapolis GP on Aug. 28-30 at IMS along with fellow American MotoGP star Nicky Hayden, and MotoGP superstars Valentino Rossi, Casey Stoner, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

Talk about the Sachsenring. Another weird weekend. The weather, your race.

It was just a frickin’ struggle. Same as Laguna. Assen and Laguna, we kind of changed the bike setup and went to the longer, little bit longer bike. Now it just seems … We’re back to the short bike for Sachsening, and I just can’t get this thing to turn. I feel like I go lean in and as soon as I lean it on its side, I’m just straight-lining it. For all the folks listening or fans trying to understand, it just feels like you have an 18-wheeler truck tire behind you and you’ve got this little bicycle wheel up front. So every time you go in, you’ve got this big mass pushing you forward. And it doesn’t matter what you do up front, it’s always just trying to tuck it under. So it’s not a very secure feeling. Then as the race wore on, hell, the better the bike got. The worse the rear grip got. It’s almost like the rear grip is overpowering the bike and just plowing it forward. The actual tires we have, we know that Bridgestone are bringing a little bit hard in the range compared to other tracks we’ve been to where it works. So a little bit harder in the range. Maybe we just don’t have the grip that we’re accustomed to having, but you shouldn’t have to rearrange the whole bike to create grip. And obviously, it worked for the other Yamahas. Hell, Valentino and Lorenzo were like scalded cats. They were gone.

You can sit there and say, ‘The less traction it has, the more it turns.’ There’s a few way to go about that. Take weight off the rear. You can do with the front end, with head pipe, moving the weight back. Moving the front wheel back, or you can extend the swingarm, move the swingarm, the axle points back. There’s all kinds of ways to take weight off the rear. But I don’t know. That’s what we did at Laguna. At Laguna, the bike was shorter up front and longer in the back, and it didn’t really help. We still had the same issues. We’re really trying to understand. Tire pressure of the rear is a big thing, as well. If you carry less tire pressure, your contact patch is huge. We’re analyzing everything at the moment and just trying to start off Donington. With Donington, we know what tires we’re going to have. We know which group or family of tires we’re going to have, and our group is going to be awesome. I can tell you right now, before we go there, we won’t have this problem.

That must be weird, fighting this problem at some tracks and never seeing it at others.

Last year’s bike, and even this year’s bike we went testing in Malaysia, I tried to run with this hard front that we’re running, and it worked great there. But the track surface is pretty good. We go to Germany, and it wasn’t warm at all. It was like 50 degrees on race day. This hard rubber on this hard tarmac doesn’t seem to dig in as much. And I’m a very front-end guy, anyways. If my front end is not stable, I’m slow. I know I am. I’ve got to have a front underneath me to go fast. I don’t know. The one thing we do know is this particular group we’re going to run at Donington, the rubber on the front, they’re awesome. They’ve got so much grip that you’re actually looking for a rear with more grip.

You mentioned after qualifying in Germany that the electronics were changed on your bike to help your starts. What changed?

Everybody has got it. Traction control, anti-wheelie control, frickin’ scratch your ass while you’re racing control; whatever control it is, there’s always some new thing they’re coming out with. Basically, it’s more like a new wheelie control, something that kind of helps you for the wheelie. But our old system was … I didn’t like it. It was just delayed. It was too late. By the time I was trying to adjust, it would adjust. It was almost like a double-negative. I know it’s going to wheelie, so I’m trying to back it off, but then at the same time, the bike’s brain is starting to bike off. It was two things happening at once, so I prefer just to try to control it myself. Now they’ve got a new system that seems to be a lot better. Not only does it seem to be a lot better, I know without a doubt that it’s the bee’s knees. It’s awesome.

I take it from the tone of your voice that you’d rather run without electronics. Is that an accurate assessment?

Hmm. I don’t think you could do it on these bikes. To be honest with you, I just don’t think you can sit there and say, ‘All right, take the electronics off, everything that you guys have. We’re not going to run anything,’ because half of the people would be in the hospital, man. It’s just impossible. The only way you could even mention no electronics and get away with it is if you also raised the capacity back up to 990 or 1000 or whatever. At least then you’ve got a lot of torque, everything happens a little bit slower, your cornering speeds are down a little bit. Our cornering speeds right now are so just astronomical that if you didn’t have traction control, man, you would be in orbit every other frickin’ race. We’ve got so much force. We’re not having the aerodynamic downforce. Our suspension and bike and chassis are so in tune now that you can get away with murder. But if that rear grip goes, you’ve got to know that you’ve got something covering your ass. Those electronics, they help you out, for sure. And the thing is, the more load and the more force and the better the tires are, whenever it steps out, it doesn’t step out half an inch. It wants to go. There’s that much load on it that it’s just going to go if you don’t have your electronics.

Donington Park is one of your favorite tracks. Why?

I don’t know. What do I like about the place? As in the square mile that it’s in? Outside of that, I don’t know why, I don’t like it at all. No, it’s just a good track, man. They’ve got everything. Off-camber, positive camber, blind crests, brow of the hill. For me, it is a riders’ track. You’ve got the stop-start section right at the end, and then you’ve got the nice, smooth, just carry your momentum in the first eight or nine corners. Then you’ve got hard on the brakes. It’s about two tracks in one. I’d say it’s a compromise, but at the end of the day, you can lose massive amounts of time in those hairpins. You kind of have to tune for the hard braking.

Are you bummed this is the last year at Donington because the GP is moving to Silverstone next year?

I’m one of the elder statesmen in the series, and I’m a traditionalist. I like Donington. Ever since I came to Europe, I’ve been going to Donington. ’95 was my first year. I like Donington. I’ve been to Silverstone a couple of times. It will be the same for everybody, at the end of the day. But Donington will always have a special place for me.

What are your thoughts on the rule that will prohibit rookies from racing on factory teams in MotoGP starting in 2010?

You know, being a right-wing extremist, the rules are made to be broken. That’s the reason you implant a rule in the first place so a few years later you can come in and change it. I think it’s B.S. Personally, only I’d say there’s one main reason. If you find a guy that’s hot, that’s really hot, let’s say your Lorenzo or your Ben Spies or your Simoncelli’s, the guy’s that are accustomed to winning at whatever series they’re in, and then you tell them to come over, and you know what, you can’t have a factory bike. But you can go on this team, and if you prove yourself, then we’ll move you to a factory team. It’s kind of a recipe for disaster because you’ve got a guy that’s accustomed to winning. And obviously if he comes over, he wants to prove himself immediately. So I just think you’re increasing the odds of taking a ride and ending up in the hospital. You’ve got guys that are hot and believe they should be winning on sub-par bikes, and they’re going to go out there and risk everything they’ve got. That’s one reason. The other reason is that it’s somebody putting their fricken’ thumb on your forehead, saying this is how … I just think whoever works the hardest makes the most money. I just think whoever rides the best gets the best rides. And when you try to implement any rules saying, no this or that, I don’t know, I think it’s all bullsh*t.

Yeah. And what about guys who come here with a lot of experience from Superbikes and other series?

Yeah. I try to stay out of all this politics stuff, especially in my own series. I kind of enjoy the politics going on in the U.S. It’s fun. But in the series, I try to stay out of it. But I don’t know, man. The reason it is is to get more money to satellite teams. If you’ve got a hot guy coming, hopefully he has backing. And if he has to go to a satellite team, well, then hopefully whoever is behind him and backing him through his last series will come into that satellite team with him. And the reality is nobody has any money. Nobody has any money; everybody wants something for nothing. There’s really nobody out there paying large, you know, Telefonica money. I shouldn’t even say that because that wasn’t that great. But big, big money. The old days, the old cigarette money. You know, you get a come in, and he’s got $4 million, $5 million behind him. It doesn’t happen like that no more. Nowadays, a kid’s got a sponsor, but it’s like a half-million dollar sponsor coming behind him. It’s not like mucho. So to me, the rule is kind of B.S. when you look at the big picture of it.

So you don’t like politics. You’re not going to be the president of the FIM when you retire?

No. Hell, no. I figure if Barack (Obama) was the president, I should just run for president. I probably have more fans than he does. I should try and run the country. (Laughter) No, I stay out of that. I like to talk against politics. I don’t know one politician I like.

You have the three-week summer break coming up. Any special plans?

I’m just going to hang out, man. I’m probably planning on going stalking or hunting or fishing. Just go relax and bring my boy out and go shoot the .22, go shoot some cans. I don’t know. I just want to go home and chill. We were thinking about going up to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to a place up there and just check on everything. But I don’t know, with Gracie starting school here soon. We’ll just veg out and have fun. Alyssia, she’s three months into her ultimate pregnancy. We’re just be vegging out.