Michael Scott | June 29, 2022
Wayne Rainey basked in a hero’s welcome from a capacity crowd at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in the UK, June 25-26. More important than the mass adulation was the pleasure of winding on the throttle and hoisting the front wheel of the Marlboro Yamaha YZR500 that took him to his third and final World Championship in 1992.
Wayne Rainey lights up the iconic YZR500 for the first time in 30 years at the Goodwood Festival of Speed.
The Californian was fighting for a fourth consecutive crown when he had a career-ending crash at Misano in 1993. Sustaining a fractured spine, he has been in a wheelchair ever since.
“I’ve waited 30 years for this,” he beamed after the first of five runs up the English festival’s 1.16-mile hillclimb (two each on Friday and Saturday and one on Sunday).
Rainey, dressed in his classic Marlboro leathers, was escorted by grand prix racing royalty each time. Kenny Roberts Sr. and contemporary rivals Mick Doohan and Kevin Schwantz escorted him up the hill, while a packed trackside crowd applauded wildly. Roberts rode his own Proton KR3 and later a factory Yamaha, Doohan and Schwantz their traditional Honda NSR and Suzuki RGV machinery.
“I’m not an emotional guy, but that was very special,” said triple-champion Roberts, who originally brought Wayne from U.S. racing to the grand prix series. He added, “I think I could have beat him if there’d been another lap.”
Riding a motorcycle is dauntingly difficult for a paraplegic. Rainey had to be lifted onto the bike, his feet attached to the pegs with bicycle clips, and his knees secured against the tank with a strap.
With no control over his torso, the bike was fitted with Velcro pads on the tank that could support his weight while he used the handlebars. At the end of each run he had to be lifted back to an upright position.
“It is so different riding a bike now. The only thing I feel is the handlebars. I feel nothing else.
“I tested on a minibike, and you catch everything late, because you only see that you’re making a mistake when you see it, not when you feel it. So it’s a little bit later than feeling it in your feet or your butt or through the bike. It’s a whole different experience.”
The hardest part was starting and stopping, with helpers launching the bike up to speed from the off and catching bike and rider at the stop.
Wayne revealed that he had dreamed of getting back on the YZR almost from the moment he regained consciousness in 1993. “Maybe it was the drugs they had me on, but I was determined to get back on the bike.
“It took a long time, but finally it happened, thanks to Goodwood and the Duke of Richmond.” The Duke had originally invited him in 2020, but a scheduling clash and then the pandemic got in the way.
“I can’t say how grateful I am to him, and to everyone else at Yamaha and elsewhere who made this possible,” Rainey said.
Goodwood FOS
Rainey with mentor and former team boss, Kenny Roberts.
The bike was fitted with rain tires, steel brakes, soft sparking plugs and with a rich mixture dialed in, to soften the responses. After first tests, Rainey asked that it be leaned off to make it sharper, and it was enough for it to pop little wheelies when he wound it on.
A one-off gear-shifting system was fitted, but on a bike without electronics or even full electrics, it proved erratic, and Rainey kept it in one gear. It was still enough to recall the thrill and give nostalgic viewers a welcome whiff of two-stroke exhaust.
It was not Wayne’s first time on a full-size motorcycle. He rode a specially modified Yamaha R1 in 2019: a shake-down test at Willow Springs Raceway in the USA followed by an emotional public gallop at Suzuka. As a street bike, however, the affair was less daunting. The 500cc racing two-stroke was more of a challenge.
“The R1 has got electric start, and then with fuel injection it runs really good at low rpm. It’s like riding to the local grocery store. But on a YZR500 it’s nothing like that,” he said.CN
