Thursday, October 1, 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 sixth in the season standings after 13 races this season and will compete with the rest of the MotoGP grid at the Grand Prix of Portugal on Oct. 2-4 at Estoril.
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.
San Marino ... Misano was a race to forget for you. Have you forgotten it by now?
Oh, God, that was just … Occasionally you'll have that kind of issue. You're at a home race or whoever's home race it might be, they get a little bit crazy and try to do something crazy or stupid, or whatever the case may be. And (Alex) de Angelis did it. He needed to change helmets with Valentino (Rossi) and wear the donkey helmet, that's for damn sure.
Did you even see de Angelis coming, or was it a case of 'What was that?'
No, I didn't see anything. I didn't see him coming, man. Nothing. Zero. I basically tipped it in (the corner). In reality, it kind of all started, Valentino, if you watch the footage, he went into Turn 1, and he didn't even get his knee down. And if he was worried about cold tires, or whatever it might have been. So he kind of checked, and then Lorenzo kind of checked, and I didn't have enough room to stuff it up the inside of Lorenzo. So between everybody kind of checking a little bit, de Angelis thought, "Hey, this is my lucky day." But in reality, we were all still turning in. That was the first lap, first turn. He decided he was going to be a hero, I guess.
When you're feeling the bike going down like that, is there almost a sensation of slow motion, like 'Oh … my … God … I … can't … believe … this … is … happening?'
Yeah, exactly. To make matters worse, obviously I'm watching the (World) Superbike race a few minutes before we went out. And I saw John Hopkins get run over. I don't know whoever or whatever happened. It looked bad. He was out, unconscious, and I thought, "Oh, hell." John's a buddy of mine. And this is what happens in motorcycle racing. You just hope for the best and hope he's all right. And then sure enough, of all things, I'm sitting in there getting changed, ready to go out, and (team manager) Herve (Poncharal) comes in the truck and I'm changing, and he says, "How are you feeling?" and yad-da-da-da. And I said, "Well, we just got to get a good start here, the important thing." I was just a little bit worried about the Gresini guys, for some reason. I just had a feeling they weren't going to make it through Turn 1, was going to be too aggressive. And sure as hell, de Angelis come in and wiped the Americans out. I don't know if that was a premonition or you just knew what was going to happen.
What's more frustrating, a race where the bike just doesn't work for the entire race and you're tooling around out there, or a race where you get taken out on the first lap?
Oh, hell, you don't want to do 45 minutes of work for nothing. That's the reality. Especially if you've got some serious tire issues going on. So it was going to be good (at Misano). We were looking easily top five. That's a lot of points that I needed, that I wanted. A lot of points took away from me.
Moving on to Estoril. What are the characteristics of that place? Do you like it, and is it a track you think you can do well on?
Characteristics of that track are that I go fast there. I don't know why. For some reason, I've just jelled with that place from day one. Probably, in 2007 trying to help Valentino out, I farted around, trying to hold guys back and let him escape. Well, he never escaped, and that was the race (Toni) Elias ended up winning. But I was running a second to three-quarters of a second slower than I could have gone, just trying to help him out for the championship. And I probably could have won that race. So we need to go back there and get some redemption.
What are your goals for the rest of the season? Catching Dovizioso for fifth?
Yeah. You've got to have something to shoot for, and that's definitely it. If you just say, "Let's go racing," well, that's not it. You've always got to get there with something in mind, and definitely that's what we've got in mind at the moment.
(Note: This interview was conducted Sept. 28, three days before Edwards was confirmed to ride for the Monster Yamaha Tech 3 team again in 2010, with fellow Texan Ben Spies as his new teammate.)
I haven't seen any press releases from Tech 3 or Yamaha, but media reports seem to indicate that it's no secret that you've re-signed with Tech 3 for 2010. True?
Yeah, it's true. What it is Yamaha have always been good to me. We've done things on a handshake many a times, and it's just pretty much a handshake. We'll get it sorted out in Portugal. In Portugal, we should have something there, obviously, to sign. At the moment, I'm hoping it's Team Texas. If that works out and Ben (Spies) decides to come over to Grand Prix, then that would definitely float my boat. That would be awesome.
What do you hear about that possibility?
I don't know. You've got to look at so many different avenues here. As far as economical, would it be wise for Yamaha to continue doing the Superbike thing whenever their sales are down? I don't know how much percent they are, but everybody's down at the moment. Nobody is making any money. It definitely would be a lot cheaper just to put all their eggs over in Grand Prix, concentrate on that. That's where they spend the most money, anyways. That's one side of it; that's Yamaha's side of it. I think the smartest thing would be to put him over here with us. Ben's side, I think he's got a two-year deal that he's signed. Doesn't matter where he's at, he's going to make the same amount of money. I would definitely say, "Go to Grand Prix." You come, you get one year of learning, one year to figure out everything. We don't have that much testing anymore. One year to sort out the bike, and the second year to go. At the end of the day, you still have to come over through a satellite team before you can go to a factory team now. That's a win-win situation for him. He's got a two-year deal. Hell, yeah, I'd definitely come over to Grand Prix. The inside scoop of that is I was talking to Ben every day when we were in Misano. He was (racing) in Germany, and I was talking with him, and he was talking with me. He would call me, "Hey, what's going on?" We must have had a two-hour phone bill racked up that weekend.
You were his spy, huh?
Well, you know, a little inside information never hurt anybody. It's funny. When you get two guys that kind of have the same goal and you get two brains together, it works out better. I've never thought I was a motorcycle racer as far as my head was concerned. I always thought I was a businessman that could ride a motorcycle pretty good. So I passed along my knowledge.
A longer break than expected at this time of the year because of the Hungarian round being postponed until next year. Did you do anything fun over the break?
Oh, man, I don't know if fun is the correct word. I was hanging out with my kids and family. We got 20 acres across the street; it's about two or three minutes from my house. We built a little oval, and (son) Hayes is just cruising around on his pee-wee (dirt bike). My girl (Gracie) has just as much fun on it as he does. Other than that, went on a dove hunt. Shot a bunch of birds, a few coyotes, a couple of pigs. You know, just the normal clean-up. Getting rid of the pests. Just a couple of the little scavengers that were cruising around and happened to pop out at the wrong time.
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