It's a fact. Motorcycle racers are selfish, vain, greedy, guiltless people, who will swindle and cheat their own grannies to the top step of the podium. You need look no further than having two riders in the same team. Team-mates is the term, yet it can be so far from the truth. And all because of the psyche of the motorcycle racer.
Psychologically, racers tend to have above average intelligence, but they're loners who dislike team sports. But a number of factors dictate it still does make sense to have teams of two riders on the same motorcycles.
Rob McElnea has the unique distinction of having been managed by the world's best (Giacomo Agostini was his team boss) and having ridden alongside the world's best too (Eddie Lawson and Kevin Schwantz.) He's also managed some of the world's finest (Niall Mackenzie, Chris Walker, Jamie Whitham, Steve Hislop and Simon Crafar) in the most successful British Superbike squad in history - Yamaha. "It's generally the sponsor who demands two good riders in the same set-up," reveals Rob. "In '96, I wanted a proven runner and a youngster in the Boost team, but they wanted two solid performers, so if one got injured, the other could still run up front."
This can also make sense for machine development - two heads are, after all, better than one. Thing is, when you have two riders on the same - or very similar - bikes, it all becomes painfully obvious who's best. Suddenly the number one person to beat becomes your team-mate. And having a team-mate flies in the face of that ruthless streak of selfishness that runs through the best racers. Look at some riders and you'll see many thrive in a solo team environment. To put it simply, bike racers don't play well with others and putting two matched talents together may seem like a good idea, but can be tantamount to chucking a Mongoose into a box with a Cobra. Something's got to give...
One way to victory is to out-psyche your team-mate. Triple World Champ Wayne Rainey would do his all to beat his team-mate, whether at running, tennis or racing bikes. In his book 'Wayne Rainey - His Own Story', he recalls his approach when teamed up with four-time World Champ Eddie Lawson during Wayne's first Championship-winning season of 1990. " I liked having team-mates. I could work off them. With me as a team-mate you had your hands full because I would try and beat you at everything. I wanted to devastate Eddie. I don't think he was ready for a team-mate like me. Maybe he thought he could control me, but I was past being controlled then. When we went out I was always looking at Eddie's pit board. I always wanted to be faster than him."
Our very own Niall Mackenzie has his own views: "In GPs, I got on with everybody, and back in the UK, me and Jamie Whitham got on so well that when it came to the crunch towards the end of the season we tried really hard to hate each other, to motivate ourselves for the showdown we knew was coming. We couldn't! Same with Chris Walker, we got on. I'd even try and spin it as a positive thing. If you work together you can develop the bike to a point that the opposition are so far behind you only have to worry about your team-mate. But something happened with Steve Hislop. He put moves on me the others never would have. He'd lean on me in corners and I'd think, 'if that's the way you want it, you've got it.'"
The Mackenzie/Hislop scrap was titanic and it gave Macca a focus he'd perhaps never had before. "I sometimes think if I'd had that sort of team-mate back in GPs, it would have fired me up even more. By 2000 I was getting to feel so pleased for Neil Hodgson's success at GSE it was what made me realise I had to quit. You can't like your team-mate too much!"
Former BSB champ Hislop is an enigma. He was one of the greatest talents but suffered confidence problems. In '95, battling with Whitham for the BSB title, he was the underdog on the Devimead Ducati while Whit was aboard the factory machine. Hizzy was on it, all year long, but was still known in the team as 'Private Fraser' after the Scottish harbinger of doom from Dad's Army. As one team member recounts: "He'd stick his head out of the garage, see a cloud, think it was going to rain and say: 'We're dooomed!'"
After years of playing second fiddle in a string of teams and with a few mid-season splits he's now in a team which exists solely for him and he's been the man to beat since. So why's that? Hizzy's put some of it down to Jon Hargill. Jon doesn't like the use of the phrase 'faith healer', but when you hear what he's done for the Scot, that's perhaps the best description. After years of racing, Hizzy was hurting. It's common sense that injuries over the years (including a broken neck) take their toll. After a few sessions with Jon, Hizzy feels better and as Jon says: "A confident person under no stress enjoys themselves and what they are doing so they can be better at what they do. That's what's happened to Steve."
You'd think with this stress on the mental edge, on performance and on out-psyching your team-mate that the pits would bristle with sports psychologists and not just super-trick machinery. But as the old saying goes, a good mechanic spends 80% of his time tuning the rider's mind and the other 20% the bike...
In the meantime, here's a selection of famous team-mates past and present, who fell out to varying degrees or other. Makes you glad to ride alone, some of it...
