Yes that is a picture of Scott Redding, once Britain’s most promising motorcycle racing prospect, scraping his helmet on that track while cornering his factory Aprilia in MotoGP. Lean angles are something to brag about in motorcycle racing, and if 8 time championship winner Marc Marquez can reach an elbow scraping lean angle of 67 degrees, and your own 2018 Aprilia isn’t good for anything else – why not?
Background
Motorcycle racing has an almost apartheid like split between two competing sectors of the sport. Southern European competitors have tended to concentrate on GP racing. GP was GP125, GP250 and GP500 in the two stroke era, and has now become Moto3, Moto2 and MotoGP in the modern era. For decades Italian Spanish and French riders have worked their way up through to what is regarded as the pinnacle of motorcycle sport, backed by the best sponsors and the best machines. MotoGP is the formula 1 of the sport, racing exotic one off prototypes.
For the rest of the world, particularly British riders, the competion to be in historically has been ‘Superbikes’, production based racing of what are theoretically road based machines. Partly because of the influence of the TT, Ulster road races and the Premier League thrills of the British Superbikes championship, many British and Irish riders miss out on the early education on the exotic moto machines and have to make a difficult transition up to MotoGP later on inferior equipment, even if they get the chance.
Very few riders make a success of this. Current British MotoGP hero Cal Crutchlow is one. Cal has either balls of steel of unacknowledged reserves of raw talent that have given him 3 race wins, and 19 podiums, but he is about to accept some well deserved rest.
The difference between the two types of machines, and their championships, is confusing and irritating for non enthusiasts as, unlike GT/touring cars and F1, the bikes in MotoGP and Superbikes look pretty much identical to the casual sports fan.
More than ever, in 2020, both MotoGP and WSB look like mirror images of each other. Since the rule changes of ? both championships race essentially 1000cc 4 stroke motorcycles (though with vastly different budget’s materials and electronics). Both MotoGP and WSB (like F1) have champions in Mark Marquez and Jonathan Rea who are so dominant that the ruling bodies of both sports are eager to introduce some freshness.
Enter Scott Redding
Or we should say re-enter
Redding has long been an outsider in British motorcycle sport. From an early age Redding went the MotoGP route and competed in southern European championships as a way of working his way directly into the top of MotoGP. When this eventually happened he found himself, perhaps inevitably, on a series of not great machines as most of the backing and sponsorship is obviously orientated towards the new Valentino Rossi’s, not the new kid from Gloucestershire.
Having set a record for the youngest winner in GP to win a race, Redding eventually quit MotoGP in despair having struggled on a particularly bad Aprilia in 2018. Some riders throw their kit into the crowd at the end of a race. For his last MotoGP race Redding stripped himself nearly naked.
After leaving MotoGP with some acrimony it was thought that would be the end for Redding, and yet he’s managed to stage what might be an extremely well timed comeback from the other end of motorcycle sport.
It would have been tough for Scott to drop down into World Superbikes but perhaps more sensible as would be more familiar with the intentional tracks. Redding is anything but sensible however and he dropped down a level below that, into the rough and tumble and provincial thrills of British Superbikes. BSB isn’t some Mickey Mouse competition – it is comparable in spec to the World Championship and was recently challenging it for excitement and viewing figures, but subtle it is not. BSB contenders are often British kids with a crash or bust mentality or vets with a point to prove.
Relegated to BSB’s Sturm und Drang Redding could have looked like Angel Di Maria’s embarrassing Bambi on Ice performances for Manchester United. Banging fairings with BSB bruisers like Josh Brooks and Tommy Bridewell at circuits like Cadwell Park and Thruxton would try the nerves even of British racing veterans. Instead Redding won BSB in his first season, on unfamiliar tracks, against hard challenges on similar machinery. This instantly promoted Redding up a level to this years World Superbike Championship, with enthusiastic factory Ducati backing.
WSB 2020 is covered in more detail here
Redding the Runes
Redding has arguably the toughest job in motor racing in trying to unseat five time WSB Kawasaki champion Jonathan Rea, but if he does well a really unprecedented comeback could be on the cards for 2021.
Up above in the premier class whole generation of riders in MotoGP is set to retire, including Valentino Rossi and Ducati’s own Andrea Dovizioso. ‘Dovi’ is most likely to find himself another team but they would still leave a large hole in Ducati’s factory MotoGP driver line up, only partially filled by Australian Jack Miller, who may be left as the only native English speaking rider in MotoGP when Cal eventually hangs up his boots and goes to well earned retirement with his family in California.
Suddenly the split between all the Brits in Superbike and all the Italians/Spaniards/French in MotoGP will look downright embarrassing. Sponsors and governing bodies will look to draft some English based rider in from somewhere. The obvious candidate based on merit would be the 5 time WSB champion Rea but he may be about to retire himself and, like Redding, was given sub standard kit to race in MotoGP in the past. Rea has just beaten an ex-MotoGP rider to win WSB title number 5, he may well feel he has nothing to prove.
Other than Rea what ‘English’ rider has the skills and recognition to be accepted back in MotoGP? If Redding can get that Ducati singing and make the the people in Italy happy things could look very good for his return to the premier class.
There is another excellent optic in Redding’s favour. MotoGP champion Marc Marquez is currently as dominant in MotoGP as Rea is in WSB and Lewis Hamilton is in F1, which is to say he is almost embarrassing the rest of the sport. Last year MM’s chief rivals could not get near him and when they did it seemed only because Marquez was saving himself for staged last lap excitement. With the imminent retirement of Rossi, Dovi, Cal Crutchlow and Jorge Lorenzo (?) the number of people who have posed any kind of threat to MM in the past is fast disappearing.
It is seems forgotten about now but Scott Redding was one of those riders who actually challenged Marquez in the past. They closely contested the Moto2 Championship in 2012 before their careers took dramatically different courses upon promotion to MotoGP. They are also apparently good friends despite Redding dislocating Marquez’s shoulder during a victory celebration in 2018.
Redding is a genuine on-off. A product of growing up as almost as European gypsy, floating between foreign championships as a teenager, he barely feels part of anywhere and yet still obviously has bags of talent and lots to prove. Currently a lack of dry testing on the Ducati means Scott will start WSB 2020 on the back foot, and against Rea he is up against arguably the toughest champion in motor sport. But if that goes well it appears a door for a return to Ducati in GP is wide open for him. Given the right equipment and backing by Ducati could he really challenge both Rea and Márquez?
Comparisons with Tyson Fury are possibly a stretch but no one gave Tyson Fury much of a chance against Klitschko and Wilder. Redding would know exactly what’s needed to emulate that, as amongst all his other idiosyncrasies, he’s a big boxing fan himself. Featured here on Eurosport, is Redding sparring with IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook.
Scott has his own Youtube channel (contains nudity, tatoos, boxing and various behavior)
