TxheThe ley interview

Mat is a TT winner, endurance racer, author and Motogp paddock insider

and arrow – the bow string stretched as taut as it’ll go, ready to unleash all kinds of hell.

‘It’s mad – it feels like I’ve retired,’ he says. ‘I’ve struggled with that. I thought the feeling would blow over after a few weeks, but then the talk about going racing got later and later. I’m thinking, fuck! What am I going to do? Then I’m thinking, is it worth training, or should I just be doing nothing at all?

‘It’s wrecked my mind, because I can’t just do nothing, so I’ve been losing my mind! I have to really focus on something, because when you’re a racer you always focus on the next season and when the season starts you break it down to each race weekend, ticking them off. After each race weekend you’re focusing on the next race and you’re always looking for improvements.

‘That’s what I did after the first World Superbike round at Phillip Island [in early March]. I thought about the races we did there and I knew where I could improve, so I was ready to go to the next race and drop some bombs. And then there was no next round…’

Due to the ongoing crisis Redding still isn’t 100 per cent sure when he will get to race his factory Ducati Panigale V4R again. WSB rightsholders Dorna hope to stage round two of the 2020 season at Jerez, Spain on the weekend of 1/2 August, but Scott still feels like an angry junkie, wondering where and when he will get his next fix.

‘I’ve been watching the Phillip Island races on my laptop, trying to give me some peace, but it’s made things worse. I nearly threw the laptop across the room, saying, “I just want to race!” It’s no good watching it, I want to be there! I want to feel the hunger, feel the tension and feel that drive and that pressure to be successful.

‘I’m gagging for it and it’s getting worse. I need to ride! It’s the adrenaline, that’s what I miss. It’s all gone, so now it’s a bland day-today life. The most exciting thing that’s happened to me since Phillip Island was getting chased by a rattlesnake. Me and Jacey were hiking and it got to within a foot of me. Boy, was I gone – I was out of there!’ COVID-19 limbo couldn’t have come at a worse time for Redding. For the first time in almost a decade he has the chance to win a world championship. After he battled for the 2013 Moto2 world title he had a soul-destroying five seasons in Motogp, from Honda to Ducati to Aprilia, never on the right bike. At the end of 2018 he came close to quitting racing.

‘The 2018 season with Aprilia broke my mind,’ adds the 27-year-old. ‘My head was gone. I wanted to stop racing. My Motogp years were tough because I couldn’t succeed to the level I knew I could.

‘It’s a really hard place to be – you don’t want to be there anymore, you want out. That’s when I told Michael

[Bartholemy, his manager]: just find me a bike and a team that can win. I don’t care if it’s BSB, Motoamerica, World Superbike or jet-ski racing, just so long as I can prove to you and to everybody that I can win.’

A decade ago Redding was Motogp’s next big thing. Halfway through his rookie GP season in 2008 he won the 125cc British GP to become the youngest GP winner in history, aged 15 years and six months. In 2010 he moved to Moto2, challenged for the title in 2013 and graduated to Motogp in 2014. During his five years in the class of kings he scored two podiums, in rain-affected races, and got his first factory ride with Aprilia in 2018. But that year’s RS-GP was a dog.

‘I went from fighting for the Moto2 title to nowhere because I had shit bikes. I know what a bike should do and what it shouldn’t do and it breaks my heart when it won’t do something I know it should. Doing BSB last year was great because I had the right bike, so I got back to winning and I was enjoying racing again. Now I’m back to where I was before – I want to go racing, I want to get on the bike. If this COVID-19 thing had happened when I was at Aprilia it would’ve been a dream because I really didn’t want to ride that thing.’

Redding’s 2019 BSB deal – riding a factory supported V4R for Paul Bird’s team – brought him 11 victories and a total of 18 podiums from 27 races.