King of Pain: Gary Nixon knows a thing or two about riding hurt. image from the always entertaining adams archives

The images I recall from watching motorcycle and car races on TV in the 1970's are of spectacular crashes. The promos made racing look like suicide - Indy cars sliding upside down across the finish line, or Evel Knievel rag-dolling after shorting a 14-bus jump. Crews in fire retardant suits scurrying to extinguish a burning flat track bike, while the rider patted out flames on his pants, all in slow-mo and set to a funk music soundtrack. These were the early days of extreme athletes, when all racers had three things: aftershave, corduroy sports jackets, and scars. The TV Networks used the violence, the potential for tragedy in motor racing as a selling point, and when the audience tuned in, they expected crashes--big ones. At ten years old, you don't really understand that those are people jumping out of burning vehicles, and the last thing they want to do is crash or get hurt. Everyone in the game knew this of course, but television, the press and even the racers realized that the danger was a big part of what kept people glued to their sets.

Thankfully, racing safety has improved, and the exploitation of the danger aspect of motorsports has toned down dramatically since those days. MotoGP and Superbike promos might feature a crash, but they certainly don't sound like an episode of Batman anymore (BIFF! BOOM! POW! It's high octane motorcycle RACING!!!!) The PR from the manufacturers is, well, a lot more sober. A recent release from HRC about Dani Pedrosa's physical condition for the upcoming Motegi MotoGP race touts "10 degrees more movement" in his injured knee, which he's excited about. There were pages written about Casey Stoner's off season wrist surgery. These guys deserve enormous credit for pushing themselves and these bikes to the limit while injured, and there never was, nor will there ever be anything entertaining about seeing any of these tremendous athletes in pain.

Check the bent goofball smile—as if some pretty young thing asked him "How did you break your arm & leg?" and he replied, "You lemme know what color underwear you have on, and I'll tell ya."

But there was something grittier in the stoic, "I laugh at how mangled I am" attitude of the older generation of racers. Yellowed black and white photos of the era show the physical price many racers paidtrackside, sitting out an event, plastered up but smiling, marginalizing their pain.

Like the accompanying picture of Gary Nixon, recovering from his huge 1974 Japan testing crash. Nixon looks like Merle Haggard's doppelganger; that's probably not a "soft" drink in that cup he's holding. Check the bent goofball smile—as if some pretty young thing asked him "How did you break your arm & leg?" and he replied, "You lemme know what color underwear you have on, and I'll tell ya." Shrug off the pain, get back in the show, laugh about it. Get on that bike with your fresh scars, roll up a sleeve at some dive bar in Riverside and show them off, like Quint holding court with Brody and Hooper on The Orca.

Dani Pedrosa deserves much respect for his incredible race through the pack at Qatar, given how injured he really was. Sete Gibernau too, raced with shoulder problems. Nicky Hayden kissed the moon and then the tarmac, and his ribs didn't like it one bit, but he raced. These are hard men, to be sure. But I scan quickly through the official team releases packed with info about range of motion improvements, magnetic bone therapy and Doctor Costa's magical injections. Secretly, I wish that just once, one of these guys would show up to a press conference in their wheelchair, bare-chested, rocking a 6-week beard and mirrored-shades, cup full of Hillbilly Pop, and say to the assembled journos:

"Wanna see my scar?"