RIP Nicky

Very sad indeed. I first saw Nicky and Tommy as 13-14-year olds on 125s at a Formula USA event at Pacific Raceways; they laid waste to the field.

The accident is ironic at Michael Schumacher's level; but, the crash also shows that when even the best of us fail to pay attention to basic rules of the road, we pay the price. There's a lesson here for all of us.

 

:rip: Nicky, I have not gone out on a bicycle road ride in Ft. Lauderdale in years, its too dangerous unfortunately, they hit you, and they run...God Speed Nicky,

 

Thanks for that video GatorGreg.
He might have been a good TV commentator for the races in a few years. :disturbed:

 

Video apparently shows Nicky running a stop sign into traffic.

 

Some of you may know Ken Hill, great guy and teacher and contributes to our forum . He shared this yesterday.



What I posted on social media today....

The first time I officially met Nick Hayden was at a Freddie Spencer Riding school at the end of 2006. NH had just won the World Championship, next years Moto GP bikes were going to 800cc and NH was there to ride with Freddie, working on his next steps for the new era of displacement. Nicky walked in the instructor dressing room that first morning, and after some small talk said, ‘Hey guys, this is what I’m working on, let me know what I can do better….” So for the next few days, we rode with NH, watched Freddie work with him and had full access to his thought process of his riding.

Those few days (and a few more like that later) were instrumental in building the methodology and the language I use today. Sitting on the inside of the track at LVMS with Nick Ienatsch, we watched Nicky ride, lap after lap, later talking with him and decoding his thoughts, simply a priceless experience. Nicky’s thought process to his riding was simple, which became the cornerstone for how I teach today. There was no complication, just a very clear and concise way of hauling ass. His dedication to training, to be better at his craft, was simply unparalleled as witnessed by him running low on gas, coming in, filling up to go ride again and never getting off the bike. He just wanted to be better.

Losing Nicky is more than losing a good dude. Losing Nicky is losing a piece of what we all wanted to be. His dream and our dream, that a Kentucky kid, brought up in a great family environment through hard work, sacrifice and dedication, could be a MotoGP World Champion.

Losing Nicky seems surreal. It can’t be. He was so much hope and inspiration for SO MANY people, larger than life, yet somehow completely reachable, as witnessed by many of the riders I work with that rode and trained with him. Losing Nicky hurts on so many levels, but I will do as Nicky would do – share what you do with others, never stop working at being better and to keep riding. Godspeed NH.

Ken Hill

 

This is from another friend.



"Aaaw, cum-awn! Maaan! I wanna race!!"
The past week has brought those words back like I heard them yesterday. The voice, the accent, the moment.
It's 1996. Denton, Texas. 10.5 hours into a twelve hour race. It's pitch black out past the track lighting, the sky is one solid, ugly, black cloud. The lightning has been out there for hours, slowly closing on us. It's finally within a mile of the track. Huge bolts crackling thru the clouds and attacking the ground, lighting up the Texas pasture to our north. The race director has pulled us all in for a meeting. He plans to call the race. We can race in the rain. We can race in the wind. But we can't race in the lightning.
I'm not certain exactly what hour the front hit but it's been cold most of the day. The wind has not taken a break. I recall not bothering to remove my leathers when I wasn't on the bike, I just put a jacket and hood on over them. We've got tool boxes, spare tires, and five gallon gas jugs strapped to the corners of every EZ-up in the pit. Most of them won't survive the day, being upended and twisted shortly after the race is called by the gusts on the front edge of the lightning.
A father with a clip board and stop watch has paced just outside the pit fence at the edge of turn two most of the day. He brought two of his three boys from Owensboro, Kentucky to race with us. Tommy, Earl Hayden's oldest had another race so Roger and Nicky, 13 and 15, have split the ten and a half hours between themselves. For reference, there were five riders on my team.
We gather at pit row, the race director points at the lightning and says we're done. For the most part the riders are quiet. It's been a long race day. Nobody is heart broken...except the fifteen year old that drove twelve hours to race half of a twelve hour endurance race before driving twelve hours home. He's already been on the bike a good five hours and he's now hopping up and down at the edge of the group hollering in the Kentuckyest of accents:
"Aaaw, cum-awn! Maaan! I wanna race!!"
I became a Nicky Hayden fan that day. I watched him become a national champion three years later, THE national champion six years later, and within the decade, the world champion. I've watched every one of his races for the past 21 years.
He set his mind at four years old to become a world champion. Wrote it down. And spent the next 31 years doing what most of the world calls "dangerous". Doing it at the highest level of the sport. And it was clear to all that watched that he was loving every minute. ...He left us this morning. 35. Too soon. Taken from his family, his fiancee, his legion of fans while riding his bicycle. Something most of the world calls safe.
Live well, y'all. Go hard. Chase your dreams. Don't "be careful". Be hungry. There are no promises.
Go fast, Nicky. wfo.
[Some of this is fuzzy, we've had several twelve hour races and I might be mixing two, it's been 20 years, but this is how it happened to the best of my memory. ]

 

I saw this earlier this morning...

Celebrate Nicky Hayden's life instead making his death your cause

 

I came across a wonderful story about Nicky Hayden.

http://www.sportrider.com/back-story-behind-american-flag-that-hayden-carried-on-his-2006-motogp-championship-victory-lap

Jose

 

:thumb: I particularly like this from the article. As there are some folks who still hold a grudge on Dani Pedrosa.

For those of you still holding a grudge against Pedrosa for the Estoril incident, you might want to hear Hayden's words after Valencia: "Dani didn't have team orders today but he let me by at the beginning of the race. We spoke last night and had a gentleman's agreement, and I told him that if he helped me to win the world championship that we would be straight and I won't forget it. In two or three years from now if we're still teammates and I can help him then I'll return the favor—he's a good man."

 

Someone made a nice tribute video...