The making of a legend

Kerry Swanson shares extracts from her book, which tells the story of Mike Sinclair – crew chief for Kenny Roberts’ Grand Prix team…

I first became aware of Mike Sinclair’s quite remarkable involvement with both riding and building racing motorcycles after a number of interviews leading to a four-part history of the Marlboro Series (published in NZ’s ‘Bike Rider Magazine’ in 2014). Mike’s adolescent years were centred on motorcycles, and among his mates (off-track friends; on-track competitors) were individuals such as racers John Boote, Stu Avant and Dale Wylie.

Despite winning a New Zealand 250cc GP title (on a machine he had built-up and tuned himself ), as a result of racing against the best local – and the occasional overseas visiting – competitors, Mike came to the realisation that he was a good, rather than exceptional rider. This was a pragmatic decision that was to have a profound effect on motorcycle racing on the global stage, as Mike decided to focus on developing his mechanical skills.

For all he knew in doing that he might be able to make a bob or two as well! This story covers one of the most significant periods in motorcycle racing history, from the early 1970s, when larger capacity two-strokes were beginning to give an indication of their potential, through to the Nineties, at which point they were the weapon of choice in almost all classes of road racing.

Mike’s story is, in his words, ‘a view from the shed’, a unique perspective on motorcycle racing in general and the GP especially. Writing this biography has been an absolute pleasure and I have to say it was with more than a little sadness that I realised the long interview sessions with Mike had come to an end. Mike remains as self-effacing as ever and although the words might be mine, the story is his…

A champion in the making

There is an unknown side to Randy Mamola that Mike feels needs to be discussed, something that illustrates not only a willingness to share, but also something that is often underestimated with respect to being a top-class racer of any sort – a memory for detail. “Wayne Rainey had just started riding 250s in Kenny Roberts’ new team, and we were about halfway into the season. I’m sure we were at the Rijeka circuit for the Yugoslavian GP, a very interesting circuit and Randy really had it dialled. Wayne just couldn’t get his head around the track, American Superbike hero and all, so he came in and started talking to Randy about it and they had a good hour of conversation.

“It was interesting to hear Randy relay the exact detail and approach for every part of the circuit – Wayne was really attentive, and the next day he went out and claimed pole position. I thought, ‘man that guy is going to be good; he’s humble enough to take advice and then once that’s filed away, he can get on his bike and put it all into practice. This is a champion in the making. And only four years later, I’m working with him.’

“Randy was really generous giving that information. It is remarkable the level of detail about individual circuits that these guys can store in their heads. In 2015 I overheard Kevin McGee telling Stu Avant about a front-end we did and how the feel was in different corners, all done 30 years prior!

“We lesser mortals would go and ride the track, whereas those guys are down to minutiae for each metre of the circuit. Here they are riding short three or four kilometre circuits, right on the limit of adhesion everywhere and they know what is on and around each corner. That really puts the demands of the 37-mile IoM course into perspective.

“They really can concentrate, that’s why so many of them are good at golf, a game that is miles away from the average person’s capacity, a real head-bender, but for the top level motorcycle racers that’s what they do for a living. I used to say to Carlos Checa when he was crashing his brain out, ‘you need golf, go play that game in the off-season. It will frustrate the bejesus out of you, but it will teach you to focus and concentrate.’”

A new opportunity

At the end of the 1983 Grand Prix season, Mike had again returned to New Zealand with an uncertain future as to whether he’d have any further involvement in top-level motorcycle racing. Suzuki had withdrawn support for the now outdated RG500 and, at that stage, it had no alternative to offer. Once again he was unemployed. By the time the first two races of the 1984 season had been completed, Mike was becoming resigned to the fact that he needed to look at other career options. A phone call from Randy indicated that he had leased a three-cylinder Honda to do three big Internationals, including the ‘Champion Spark Plug Classic’ and another at Assen. Would Mike join his team?

God that was horrible, I feel like I’m stopped in the corner...

“Mike flew to HRC in Japan, where he undertook a compressed course on how to tune and maintain the NS500. The Mamola team of five then shifted to Belgium and set up base in the Honda Europe headquarters in Aalst. “We did a couple of races and then Randy got second in one of the early GPs [Spanish] and suddenly we could keep the bike for the rest of the season, so we did both Internationals and GPs, I’m pretty sure it was a money per race deal.” Despite the rather unorthodox machinery offered by Honda, what became apparent was how quickly riders like Randy and Freddie Spencer could adapt and by the time they had arrived at the Nürburgring for the German GP, Randy had already chalked up second and third places, while Spencer had one first and one second.

“The threecylinder in the push start days was great because it just fired up so easily, the Yamahas on the other hand were firing like a big twin and were hard to get going. We arrived at the track for the German GP and Freddie was using the new four-cylinder NSR500. The track had a number of 180° corners, and getting round in 1min 45sec was a big deal. Randy was on the three-cylinder and doing 1min 44sec but Freddie, on the four, just couldn’t get under those times.

“On the Saturday night before race day Freddie and his guys drove back to Aalst and picked up the other three-cylinder bike, and next day Freddie did 1min 42sec! Freddie was miles faster than anyone else and so, after the race, I measured the brake pads on the Hondas. Randy had used 4.5mm on the front brake and finished second behind Freddie, who had used only 1.5mm of pad – remarkable! I wanted to figure out what Freddie was doing that allowed him to be so easy on his brakes.

“I spent time just observing what he was doing at the next circuit, which was Le Mans,, another track with constant-radius 180° corners. In such circumstances Freddie was unbeatable. It then became clear; he’d come into view and in effect ‘V’ the corner, throwing the bike onto its side as he entered using hardly any brake but, instead, using the front to sledge the machine out to the apex, scrubbing off heaps of speed, then standing his motorcycle up to get it in line for a straight, full-throttle exit. What he was doing was wonderful to watch, but it just seemed so illogical.

“I explained this in detail to Randy, saying ‘this is what you have to do, thee only dangerous part to his manoeuvree is the apex whereas for you, it’s the entire inner circumference of the corner. You have 180° of danger when you are canted over on your side. Anywhere he has that kind of corner he is going to blow you off! Anderstorp and Le Mans were like that; if a track had three or more similar corners he could gain three quarters of a second per lap. Randy – don’t brake like you normally do’. “Honda had used the old two back, one forward engine configuration, meaning a lot of the weight was set well back in the frame and they had a lot of steering-head rake. When they turned the NS500 into a production racing bike, a lot of those who bought it just couldn’t ride it because it was so light in the front. This alone destroyed the careerss of a lot of guys who had heaps of potential, but just couldn’t adapt theirr riding styles.

“Honda didn’t build bikes with a lot of adjustability, its attitude was ‘we build the motor and frame, now your job is to go away and race it.’ Even when Randy was riding the three-cylinder, we always used to try to come up with ways that we could change things – nothing was adjustable, the only options were springs and damping to try to make it work. Good riders like Randy got used to it, but they were never 100% because the front always felt so vaguevague..

“Then we got to Sweden [Anderstorp]; another circuit with 180° turns and again I said to Randy that Freddie was going to blow his doors off unless he could negotiate those corners as Freddie did. After qualifying, Randy came back into the pits saying, ‘God that was horrible, I feel like I’m stopped in the middle of the corner’, I then pointed out how good his lap times were. He was doing really well in the race and then he had big trouble with the throttle sticking…”

A real understanding

Randy had the opportunity to ride one of the original, underslung fuel tank V4s in the 1984 British Grand Prix at Silverstone. In many respects that fast circuit was ideal for the machine, though the progressive lifting of the centre of gravity as the fuel tank emptied was disconcerting. And Mike’s opinion? “You don’t want a low centre of gravity on a motorcycle, especially in fast S-bends; you have to have the crankshaft and the gyroscopic effect in the right place. The V4 also fired one cylinder every 90°, insteadd of firing like a twin. Randy always said he couldn’t feel what was going g on, and when he was drifting on the e power it was disconcertingly smooth,h, the firing impulses one after the other making it difficult to drift – the necessary rear-end traction feel just wasn’t there. The British GP was the only race where we used that bike, and despite the criticism, we did manage to win!”

In contrast, the three-cylinder NS500 did have some redeeming features, not least of which was that it was so easy to push-start (clutch starts being introduced to GP racing in 1987)… “By the time one of our four-cylinder motors (in effect a big twin) had fired up, the NS Honda was well gone.

“There was another advantage to do with rear-tyre wear; because of the relatively long period between each spark-pulse, the tyre has sufficient time to ‘recover’, which is essential to maximise the efficient transfer of as much power as possible to the asphalt. With a smooth, turbine-like power delivery of the open-firing order (once every 90°), the demand for grip occurs around almost the entire circumference of the tyre; the result was less feel for the rider and a higher rate of tyre wear.

“You have a whole bunch of little pulses, which was completely wrong for a race-bike – too smooth and very hard on tyres – power-sliding only works when the rider feels what the rear-end is doing; he must be able to predict what is going to happen when he gives the bike more throttle.” Despite starting his season with a two-race deficit, Randy ended with three firsts, three seconds and three thirds, clinching second spot in the World Championship behind Eddie Lawson.