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Borrowed from Updated Again: Assorted Reader Letters News Article // RoadracingWorld.com (fourth email down)
FIRST PERSON/OPINION
Via e-mail:
For those of you that do not know me my name is Scotty VanHawk. I have been an AMA privateer for many years. I have multiple Daytona 200s and AMA Superbike races in my results, finishing them all. So the Saturday Superbike race at Mid-Ohio was not quite my first race as stated in a story published in another publication. Currently we are in 13th position in our class AMA Superstock. I am not a factory rider but I do demand the same respect that all competitors are entitled to. I have earned my Superbike license, qualified under the 108%, and earned my position in the AMA National round at Mid-Ohio. We chose to run the Superbike class for the extra exposure for our sponsors.
During the first restart of the first Superbike race at Mid Ohio Miguel Duhamel once again decided that he was more important than the rest of the grid. After he had already crashed for the first time (his first of two crashes in the same race), he restarted the race, laps down I presume, at the back of the grid and one row behind me. I got a great launch and latched onto Hawk Mazzotta and Ryan Elleby. So the freight train rolls into Turn One down the chute to Turn Two, then we set up for Turn Three only to have #17 blast in and push me wide--and then he proceeds to flip me off!
I can't imagine why he would think that this is behavior that is becoming of a competitor in the premier series in America. We didn't even make a lap and had another red flag.
As we were coming into pit lane I rode beside him and held my hand palm up in the universal "What The Heck?" signal. He then decides to flip me off again and points to his butt. Well, I am not fluent in sign language, but I know what the middle finger means and pointing at your butt afterwards? Miguel, you are looking for love in all the wrong places. As my hot pit was coming up I started to change my trajectory for the approach and Miguel, in his rage, accused me of trying to take him out at 20 mph. He then proceeds to the start/finish tower and demands that AMA officials eject me from the race. When the AMA officials rejected his request after due investigation (including getting another AMA official's eyewitness report), Duhamel became even more belligerent.
In my very first Pro race in Daytona in 1997, I was tucked in and had the throttle pinned coming out of the horseshoe and Duhamel came by and flipped me off. Later during the riders' meeting Miguel chose to get up in front of everyone and show his true self. In one of his usual rants he tells everyone that there are some of them there to do a job, not there to wave at our family and friends on TV--like he is more important than us lowly privateers.
Now, 11 years later, he is the same person. The same person who had everyone on pit lane at Mid-Ohio saying, "Don't worry about it, he is just a (choose your derogatory expletive)". The same person who talks great in front of the camera but has no respect in the paddock because of his actions. The same person who the AMA paddock will be better without.
Miguel, do the world a favor and go back to Quebec and spend the rest of your life sulking about privateers that you had a hard time passing. Get a clue, Miguel, it is not just the AMA that thinks so little of you as you stated in the published article, it seems to be most of your peers as well. You are not the sun and the earth does not revolve around you, no matter how many times you tell yourself that it does.
I would like to thank everyone for their kind words and support at Mid-Ohio and since then. We appreciate all of our fans and our peers and look forward to many more years in the sport that we all love.
Scotty VanHawk
Warsaw, Indiana
In all fairness, the email that followed it deserves a read, too... and there's some funny one-liners in there as well
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Originally Posted by Pookie
