Some great photos of a great European rider
Some great photos of a great European rider
Hi everyone, from the late 80s through the mid 90s I was a contributing photographer for Hi-Torque Publications (MXA and Dirt Bike magazine). The photos that you see here were never published and have been stored as 35mm slides for the last 15-20 years. A month or so ago, I finally got around to purchasing a quality scanner and the journey began, going through these images has been a revelation, as I haven’t looked at any of them since I put them away and had only seen them as tiny little 35mm slides. Scanning them, then seeing the images on a computer screen has been like seeing them for the first time, they stir up lots of great memories, and bring back a great era for motocross, lots of bright color, big characters and of course, some true legends of the sport.I hope you enjoy viewing them as much as I have-Mike Sweeney
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Sweeney-“Alex Puzar and the Team Chesterfield Suzuki works RM250. There was a bunch of cool things about the USGP’s, among them was getting to see the FIM riders, their compete level and even more so, works bikes!
This bike was really cool to see, here in the states, we were 3 years into the production rule and the bikes that were showing up in the back of box vans every week at the nationals were pretty much stock looking. This bike was definitely different, white plastic, cool graphics, and a much different appearance than the stock/U.S. factory RM’s that the Suzuki guys were running here in the states. I wish I still had detail shots of it, the machining and casting was impressive, (check the swingarm in the Screw U photo).
These were taken in 1989, Alex was in his sophomore season and would go on to win two FIM World Championships, one on the Chesterfield RM and another on a Honda.
For those of you that don’t know, Chesterfield is a cigarette company, another thing you definitely don’t see any longer in US motocross. (Our series had Camel cigarettes as a sponsor at that time)
The action shots are the launch out of Screw U (when are the TV guys going to go balls out and start saying that during the broadcast?) and an early race drop into Gravity Cavity. The photo along the fence was taken during practice while the grass was still being mowed, as I recall Alex sat there for a while just watching. Note the guys checking the bike on the fence, this happened wherever he went.
That’s it for this week, hope you enjoy this look back in time!”
