We’re at Austin MotoGP a million years ago. Roberts and Roberts Junior have their motorhomes parked together in the motorhome compound. We’re told by Junior to come by on Sunday night after the race as there will be burgers and hot dogs, beer, things of that nature.

On a clear Texas night we show up. Everyone from Modesto to Turlock to MotoAmerica is there, parked on picnic tables ... ‘this is Kenny’s second cousin and her husband... you know him, he worked for Doug Chandler’s father in law, Jerry, they built those frames ...'

Wayne Rainey is there with his wife. He and his partners had just started the MotoAmerica series and there is a strong good vibe. Rainey, slight wild-man as a kid, then focused totally sprung-from-the-cage monster when he rode, has a new vibe. It’s a businessman turned diplomat. Or is it a Superhero? He’s a calming presence to all. When he speaks no one interrupts him, no one changes subject, no one pipes in YEAH AND ‘MEMBER THAT TIME YOU LET ITCHY RIDE THE XR750 IN THAT FIELD AND HE TOSSED IT or anything like that. You don’t bench race with Henry Kissinger. Rainey and Shae together they are the ultimate zen couple.


A rule I have learned not to drink if the King is drinking. And he is in one of his moods. Every conversation is an opportunity to needle someone. For example Skip Aksland is there and following the tradition of their life-long friendship he is bleeding. If Skip is around Kenny something always happens and nearly always it ends in blood. That weekend at Austin he’d gone for a bicycle ride with Roberts and came back with a grazed up calf, where his skin had put up a valiant attempt at impromptu bench-sanding when his bike went sideways. It smarts and is too big for a normal bandage. He doesn’t want to talk about it but King Roberts does. So the story is repeated and that he gets hurt every time they are together is instilled in every person that the King talks to for a couple of hours. Skip, as always, endures the King.

Numerous attempts are made to get me an adult beverage, I fend all of them off with a simple no thank you. Junior finally brings me a fruit drink in a pouch and I do drink that even though it’s clearly marketed for kids.

It’s not a royal receiving line for Rainey and his wife but it’s not far off either. People wait to talk with them. They chat with each person, politely, asking how they are, taking in the well-wishes and encouragement for the new series.

Rainey, also, is not drinking. At one point as I am looking at him from a few picnic tables away he sees me and we look at one another from afar. I put the drink bag straw in my mouth and do a long pull as I look the three-time world champion in the eyes. I push my glasses up my nose with my middle finger. He smiles demurely then goes back to his conversation, being the calm, attentive, polite person he is, well-mannered and maybe two clicks off regal.

BOWLING GREEN??! I’VE NEVER HEARD OF IT.

Oh crap. The King has decided to descend on one of my Kentucky buddies at the picnic table so I turn and have to mediate. It’s not Willy the Marine that the King has decided to inflict himself on--LUCKILY-- but a fan guy, and the poor fellow hasn’t ever had to defend himself on every level to King Kenny Roberts before.

ARE YOU GAY? No, no, I’m not gay. WELL, WHAT’S WRONG WITH BEING GAY? I’M GAY.

Oh boy. I look at Roberts Junior, who is nearby, and is absolutely nothing like his father, at all, really, and we have a conversation with our eyes. You gonna do this one or am I? His eyebrows go up and he nods at me, as to say ‘your turn’.

After a couple of tries I get the King to veer in a different conversational direction. How is the cat-fishing, I ask him and he snaps into being normal Kenny. He tells us his edge in catfish is the stars. Somehow the fish know what the rotation of the earth is key on whether they will bite, and the really huge ones only come out when the stars are just the way they like them.

“Like in Orion,” I suggest as a joke.

No, the king answers, not Orion, and implies the suggestion of Orion in the summer months is possibly the dumbest thing anyone could suggest right now. Pisces, he says, inferring if you hooked a 9 volt battery up to an ice cube even that melting cube would know catfish don’t bite when Orion is clearly visible in the night sky. I shirk back to my juice box. Someone who is leaving walks by with Roberts’ empty cooler by mistake and the King exits our picnic table to go get it, which puts him in a new realm of people to tease, razz and poke.

Did you ever beat me, ever, even once? he asks a guy who used to race against the future king in Modesto dirt track races. No, the guy admits.

So this is your new husband, huh? he asks a woman he knows who divorced and remarried. Why didn’t you get one that was better looking? I mean, this guy ...

“Oh Kenny! He is just the best and I am so much happier.”

Well, alright but when you get rid of him maybe think about a better looking one. There is much laughter.

Three or four or ten more people who have been on the periphery of the Modesto Mafia come to Roberts and are harassed and hassled about things that happened 30 years ago or just their choice in footwear on this very night. Everybody gets a turn in the Kenny’s-in-one-of-them-moods night at Austin. Skip walks by and now a new group of people know that any time Skip and Kenny are together Skip suffers a blood-letting injury. “Since we were kids! Kids!”

Rainey and his wife are holding hands, and the receiving line of people to see them is down to just a dozen people or so. This is a new chapter for Rainey, with MotoAmerica he is going to save racing in America. It’s not something he takes lightly and people shake his hand and thank him for pulling the AMA Superbike series from the DMG death-spiral it endured in less expert hands.

Now Kenny focuses on Wayne Rainey.

Kenny tells a story about the outboard motor falling off the back of his fishing boat and where it still sits at the bottom of a lake somewhere and when it happened Rainey did nothing to save it. Nothing!

“I wasn’t there,” Rainey explains, defusing Roberts’ efforts to get under his skin.

Roberts tries a few more times to try and get under Rainey’s skin. Rainey is impenetrable. Unflappable.

Then he and his wife decide to begin the process of leaving the party which when you are Wayne Rainey is not simply a matter of getting in the car and driving away. Oh no. Everybody has to personally say goodbye to you, and again, thank you for saving racing. How is Rex? Married! Really?!


It’s like an hour later when Wayne and Shae can begin the second stage of leaving, which is them leaving but friends and family now yell GOODBYE or GOODNIGHT. IT WAS GREAT TO SEE YOU! Shae and Wayne stop and turn back, politely returning/shouting salutations. 20 minutes later ...

Finally they are rolling. The car is in sight. They are just a few feet from the party and a few late goodbyes are still being yelled at them.

Then, a voice like a bullhorn:

SAY, WAYNE??!

It’s Roberts. He’s now in his motorhome where he is watching a pre-recorded golf game with his friend Larry Little. Roberts is yelling through the back window of the motorcoach.

Yeah, Kenny?!, Rainey replies at just a touch softer yell over the party now hushed. Shhh! Kenny and Wayne are talking.

Roberts: SAY, WAYNE, SHAE LEFT HER EARRINGS HERE NEXT TO THE BED WHERE SHE TOOK THEM OFF, DO YOU WANT ME TO BRING THEM OUT? She was never in the motorhome but Roberts is being Roberts. The crowd chuckle; it’s comedic timing that only Roberts can pull off.

Rainey sighs, shakes his head a little. He screams:

SCREW YOU, KENNY! SCREW YOU!

Roberts, inside the motorhome smirks.

Got him.