Wayne Rainey Reveals The Anatomy Of A Motorcycle Racing Legend

In the span of a decade of professional motorcycle roadracing, Wayne Rainey cemented his status as an icon of the sport. He captured two AMA Superbike titles and then moved on to the world stage, winning three consecutive 500cc Grand Prix world championships before suffering a career-ending injury that left him paralyzed from the chest down.

But Rainey didn’t stay down. He managed domestic and international race teams, raced karts, and ultimately helped birth MotoAmerica. This past October at Alabama’s Barber Motorsports Park—Round 10 of the 2017 MotoAmerica Series—I sat down with the 57-year-old Californian for what proved to be a candid and insightful conversation.

At what age were you introduced to motorcycling?

My father got into soapbox derby, go-kart racing, and then motorcycles. He had a 90cc Yamaha in the mid-1960s and was a tinkerer as well as a rider. I was about six years old when I first started riding a Honda Cub. The Cub was kind of tall for me, so my dad put a seat right where the fuel tank meets the underbone.

The handlebars were above me, the seat was hitting my back, and I was sitting down in it. First time I ever rode it, we were in the garage. He said, “Keep your foot on the shifter, give it a little gas, and let off the shifter.” I wheelied that thing right into his cabinets. I ran out of the garage crying. I came back though.

When did you start competing?

I started racing at the age nine. In Southern California, we had 10 different racetracks—a definite hotbed of dirt-track racing—and I could race seven days a week. We lived 10 miles from Ascot Park, and my dad built bikes to race the Ascot Half-Mile. I’d go with him every Friday night and I learned all the riders by their names, numbers, everything about them.

I ate, slept, and drank racing. When I was old enough, I finally got to go do it myself. I didn’t do my first roadrace until 1980, when I was 20 years old. Kawasaki wanted to sell KX250 engines to dirt trackers. They asked Eddie Lawson, “Who do you know that could help us develop that motor?”

Eddie recommended me, so they reached out: “We’ve got this engine. We’d like to build a short tracker out of it. Will you run it? We’ll buy your tires and pay for your gas.” I said, “You’ve got a deal!” We had some success with it. Soon after, they asked, “Have you ever considered roadracing?”

They sent me to Keith Code’s California Superbike School. I went through the training, progressed pretty quickly, and they asked if I wanted to try a race. I won 15 out of 16 races. They contacted me again, saying, “There’s an AMA National in Loudon, New Hampshire. If you can be there in three days, we’ll have a bike waiting for you.”

A buddy and I drove cross-country—still with my dirt-track leathers and gear—for my first pro 250cc novice race. It rained during the race. I had never ridden the bike, never ridden that track, never ridden in the rain, and we won the race by 20 seconds. Next day, Kawasaki showed up with a contract to race Superbikes for the next two years.

Did your flat-track racing experience give you an edge when you transitioned to roadracing?

I think so, and it helped Kenny Roberts before me. Freddie Spencer did it that way too. All the American world champions had flat-track backgrounds. The 500cc GP bikes were wicked machines. It took a special style to adapt to them. The Europeans are doing it now, but they weren’t back then.

Valentino Rossi, Marc Marquez, all those guys, work on dirt track, but we were doing it decades ago. So, yeah, I’d say it was an easy transition of skills. We didn’t know how good we had it. Whole front rows were Americans. Podiums were all Americans. With Nicky Hayden’s passing, PJ Jacobsen is currently the only one on the world stage. We hope to change that.

Much has been made of your rivalry with Kevin Schwantz. How did that develop?

Schwantz came along with a lot of natural talent, and I saw he was going to do whatever it took to beat me. He really raised my game because I didn’t want him to beat me. We raced each other really hard—much harder than the other guys. I’d like to think I got the best of Kevin every year, but the rivalry certainly made us both better.

People win championships for all kinds of reasons. But one thing is always the same: The guy with the most points at the end of the season wins. I was very consistent, on the podium most of the time, and ultimately consistency wins championships. And I wasn’t just battling Kevin; there was Mick Doohan, Eddie Lawson—a lot of really huge names.

How many years did you race for Kenny Roberts?

I rode for Kenny from 1988 to 1993—six years. We had known each other, and I had started to hang out with him a bit. He put a team together for me to race in Europe. I ran 250cc GP bikes my first year, 1984, with him. I really didn’t think I was ready for it but we did it and I got to see the future.

I hated that year. We had to push-start the bikes. I had to listen to Kenny yelling at me as I was pushing the bike, “Push harder!” Often, by the time I got going, I was 20 seconds behind the pace car. They usually had no idea some guy was behind them. Kenny pushed me, for sure. He made me a better racer.

Kenny and I really clicked. He had plenty of riders under him who didn’t have the success we had together. I think he saw in me someone who would do everything to get the most out of myself, my team, and the machine, so he fostered that environment for me. A lot of teammates came and went, but there’s no doubt that the friendship we had was special.

Your crash at Misano in 1993 was major life change.

Yes, it was. That was 24 years ago, September 5. It’s not really that long ago, and yet 24 years is a long time. I’d probably do a few things differently now, but I was a 33-year-old man, a world champion, who did everything on my own, then suddenly, I needed help going up a step, or grabbing a cup, or anything.

The way you do everyday functions—how you get in and out of a car, or the bathroom and shower, the bed—everything changes. The first thing you see in the morning is that wheelchair, and the last thing you see at night is that wheelchair. So it’s become my legs. You either adapt or you die.

It was a very tough time. It took a few years, a lot of mistakes, some deep pockets of grief, but you know, I have strong faith in the Lord and that pulled me through; that’s what worked for me. I had a 10-month-old son at the time, and he only knew me in a chair, so I had to be strong for him.

I had to show him that his dad’s going to be challenged, but everyone is challenged in their own way, every single day. You can whine about it or pull your pants up like a big boy. It still could get worse too. I don’t know. I just live every day. I have so many memorable moments, and I’m still creating them.

I loved racing motorcycles. I loved the competition. I loved the challenge. I loved racing at the highest level. I loved every win that I got, loved every 10th place that I got. I remember the battles, the rivalries. Now, in my current situation, I try to pay attention to what some people have to go through when they’re physically challenged. I’m sensitive to that.

We have no idea what each day holds, where it will take us. Nicky Hayden is a perfect example. I won three world championships. Some say the only place to go is down, but I didn’t see it that way. I wanted to keep winning as long as I could and keep getting better. I was getting to the point where I wasn’t going to accept anything but first.

How was MotoAmerica born?

Two of my partners, Richard Varner and Terry Karges, were building a motorcycle. Through a mutual friend, they asked if I would help. I was pretty far away from the sport, but that relationship started me back in the industry, calling my old contacts about parts. This bike looked like a 1980s roadracer but, in actuality, it was a 2010 Yamaha YZF-R1.

Now that I was back in the sport, I was getting a lot of questions like, “What’s going on with American roadracing?” I still had a relationship with Dorna, so I started thinking, “There aren’t many Americans; maybe I should start a young rider series.” There were only three Grands Prix left in the US and one World Superbike race.

My idea was to run a young spec class in the world championship races held here in the States—an eight-race series. Gill Campbell from Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca asked me, “Why don’t you just fix AMA racing?” Initially, we couldn’t get a deal with the Daytona Motorsports Group, so I returned to my original idea of doing our own thing.

That started gaining momentum and support, so pretty soon the DMG came back and said, “Hey, let’s talk about this again.” We worked a completely different deal the second time, so that’s basically how it all started. It took time to evolve, and it was never something I thought we could achieve, but I figured, unless you go all in and try, you’ll never know.

I had the right partners, for sure. Chuck Aksland from my Grand Prix days came onboard, joining Terry and Richard and me, and all these pieces came together at the right time. So now we are trying to make a go at it and revive American roadracing. We started in 2015 with eight rounds. Now we have 10.

After three seasons, how do you rate your progress?

I think our skeptics are now fans. And some of the manufacturers, who thought we’d be gone after three races, see we are still here after three years. We began with live streaming, and now we have live TV with beIN Sports. We have a good schedule, we have solid teams, and year four will see a Superbike-only class.

Kyle Wyman drives his truck to the race, engineers his own bike, and he almost won the race in New Jersey. If a guy can do that against factory riders, we've done the right thing. So many Superstock 1000 guys—Hayden Gillim, Jason DiSalvo, Mathew Scholtz—ran well this year. Next year, it will be an easier sell for them because they will be in Superbike.

What is the future of roadracing in America?

We are trying to make MotoAmerica a competitive championship. We want to recapture the fans we lost, as well as get new fans. It’s not “Win on Sunday, sell on Monday” anymore. We know we have to host an event with a motorcycle race. We need to build the events, market them, and invest. Our focus has now gone from stabilizing the series to growing it.