Broc Hepler.
ASK THE MXPERTS:
WHAT STOPS EVERY PASS FROM
BEING A TAKE OUT MOVE?
"THE CODE" IS THE ANSWER
Dear MXA,
Jason Lawrence took Broc Hepler out last week. Then followed him around and tried to do it to him again. I have seen many take-out moves on the track, but this was excessive in my view. How is this regulated? Do the riders work on the payback system? What stops motocross from becoming a free-for-all? I think that dirty riding is wrong and the riders should be disqualified.
This isn't tiddlywinks.
One of the unwritten codes of motorcycle racing, at any level, is "if you don't touch me, I won't touch you." If you look back into the recent past of most take-out moves (sometimes only one corner before or often two months before), you will find that at some point before the incident the two riders touched. Before you can judge Lawrence's move (on a cosmic level), you would have to see what happened in the corner before this. If Hepler touched Jason--then Jason found justification in getting even with Hepler (maybe it was legally wrong, but it was right by "the Code"). However, if Hepler made a clean pass (which is to say, no contact), then Lawrence was just being dirty, getting even for an old incident or just a moron.
If at any point Broc Helper pushes Jason Lawrence high up on a berm, and they touch arms or bikes, then, by mutual and universal agreement, Hepler's action would make it okay for Lawrence to pay him back (and vice versa). Every motorcycle racers knows this, because every motorcycle racer operates by "the Code."
If you don't know "the Code," then you must not race. Of course Jason's action after he blew Hepler off the track go beyond the pale. You can't make it your job to ruin another rider's race--or try to cause him physical harm. Any rider who foregoes racing to try to take out another rider (after the initial parry and retort), needs to be sat down by the sanctioning body. And from the outside, Jason Lawrence is pushing the envelope (and the envelope for him could mean banishment--and it is likely that a Supercross ban would be extended into a National ban). You can only be on probation so many times.
"The Code" is traditional. If you go as far back as the infamous Windham/Vuillemin incident from several years ago (when the AMA tried to penalize K-Dub ten points for punting the French rider), you can't take Windham's action as an isolated event (because Vuillemin ran Windham up to the haybales in the corner before–which gave Windham, under the tenets of "the Code," the right to return the favor to Vuillemin). Was it right? Was it wrong? Should Windham have been punished for seeking revenge? Who knows, but whether you are a 125 Novice or a 450 Pro, you would have done what Kevin Windham did to Vuillemin (and if you didn't then you aren't playing the same game as the other people on the starting line with you).
As for the sanctioning body; what are they going to disqualify the rider for? Making a very smart pass? For cheating by taking a shorter route and getting to a spot on the track before the other guy got there?
There has to be a Sheriff--and unfortunately, there hasn't been a Sheriff with bullets in his gun at an AMA race in years.
A good move often looks like a take-out when the compromised rider refuses to shut off (which is always an option). Retaliation may seem like the Wild Wild West way of doing things, but it is the reason why there aren't more take-out moves. The message is "Don't touch me and I won't touch you." The fear of revenge is a large part of what keeps the racing as clean as it is.
You can send your questions or comments to mxa@hi-torque.com
