Early AMA career Realizing that Roberts needed more help if his racing career was going to progress, Aksland introduced Roberts to airline pilot and amateur motorcycle racer Jim Doyle, who would become Roberts' personal manager. In 1971, Doyle and Roberts approached
Triumph's American distributor to ask about the possibility of a sponsored ride, but were told that Roberts was too small for one of their motorcycles. Carruthers ended his riding career after the 1973 season to concentrate full-time on maintaining and tuning Roberts' motorcycles while mentoring him in the AMA Grand National Championship, while Doyle remained as his business manager. In his second professional race as a rookie expert class rider in 1972, Roberts rode to victory at the Grand National short-track race in the
Houston Astrodome. He led the race for one lap before he suffered a flat tire. Roberts made a name for himself that year by battling the dominant
Harley-Davidson factory dirt track team aboard an underpowered
Yamaha XS650 motorcycle, making up for his lack of horsepower with sheer determination. He finished the season ranked fourth in the country.
Saarinen influence In
1972,
Jarno Saarinen was considered one of the top road racers in the world, having challenged the previously dominant
Giacomo Agostini for the 350cc world championship. At the end of the 1972 world championship season, Saarinen traveled to America to compete in the season ending Champion Spark Plug Classic AMA sanctioned race held at the
Ontario Motor Speedway. Roberts observed Saarinen's riding style where he shifted his body weight towards the inside of a turn. While Roberts had a natural talent for riding motorcycles on dirt surfaces, on paved road circuits, the motorcycle felt unsettled beneath him while negotiating a turn. He tried Saarinen's technique and found that it helped settle the motorcycle. He adopted the cornering style and exaggerated the body shift to a greater extent than Saarinen had by extending his knee out until it skimmed the track surface. With his new riding technique, Roberts began to excel in road race events. Yamaha motorcycles performed very well in road racing, where the
Yamaha TZ750 was the dominant motorcycle of the era.
AMA Grand National Champion In 1973, in just his second season as an expert, Roberts won the AMA Grand National Championship. Despite his Yamaha dirt track motorcycle lacking the horsepower of the Harley-Davidson team, he won three races and consistently finished among the top ten, amassing a record 2,014 points in the 25-race series. In April 1974, Roberts ventured to Europe for the first time to compete in the prestigious
Imola 200 road race for 750 cc motorcycles where, he made a positive impression competing against the best road racers in the world. Wearing the trademark bumble bee yellow and black racing livery of the Yamaha USA team, Roberts took the lead at the start of the race with Agostini in second place. He began to build his lead over Agostini until his tires began to lose their adhesion, forcing him to reduce his speed and, eventually allowing Agostini to overtake him for the victory. Although Roberts finished second to Agostini once again, his first European racing experience left a deep impression on him as, he marveled at the size of crowds and the warmth of the Italian fans. Roberts' first European performance also left an impression on European race fans, as, few had ever witnessed a Grand Prix motorcycle sliding its rear tire, in a bucking bronco manner as it sought to regain traction. Italian journalists labelled him "Il Marciano", or the Martian due to his small stature, his bright yellow riding suit and his seemingly otherworldly riding abilities. Roberts dispelled any such notions by winning three of the six races and finishing second in the remaining three races. Roberts was the top individual points scorer in the event with 93 points, five more than
Barry Sheene, the top British rider. Following his success at Imola and the Transatlantic Trophy match races earlier that year, Roberts returned to Europe to make his road racing world championship debut in a one-off appearance in the 250cc class at the
Dutch TT on June 29, 1974. Against the world's top competitors, Roberts claimed
pole position during qualifying then, broke
Mike Hailwood's seven-year-old lap record while pursuing race leader and eventual world champion
Walter Villa. Roberts eventually crashed but, recovered to finish on the podium with a third-place finish.
Second National Championship In the 1974 Grand National championship, Roberts won the San Jose Half-Mile dirt track race then, won his first national road race at
Road Atlanta on June 2, 1974. On August 18, Roberts won the Peoria TT race to complete a Grand Slam with victories in each of the five different events on the Grand National calendar. After having won the national championship in 1974, Roberts faced an increasingly difficult battle in dirt track races, as Harley-Davidson continued to improve their
XR-750 dirt tracker while Yamaha struggled to maintain the pace. He battled Harley-Davidson factory rider
Gary Scott throughout the 1975 season but mechanical breakdowns hampered his title defense. He had been leading the Daytona 200 when mechanical problems yielded the victory to his Yamaha teammate
Gene Romero. He spent the practice period trying to learn how to cope with the excessive amount of wheel spin caused by the high horsepower engine and, then barely qualified for the main race as he struggled with the steep learning curve of the new motorcycle. Afterward, Roberts was famously quoted as saying, "They pay me enough to ride that thing". The AMA responded to Roberts' Indy Mile victory by banning two-stroke motorcycles in 1976. Roberts later recalled the Indy Mile victory on the Yamaha TZ750 as the most significant dirt track accomplishment of his career. He also led the
Loudon Classic when a lapped rider collided with him causing him to crash out of the race. He dropped to third in the national championship as Jay Springsteen claimed the title for the Harley-Davidson team. Roberts returned to England in April 1977, winning four out of six races at the 1977 Transatlantic Match races. Roberts then travelled to Italy where he raced in the Imola 200, leaving no doubt he was capable of competing at the international level by winning both legs and setting a new track record. Back in the United States, he won five of the six road races that made up the pavement portion of the Grand National championship. In the road race event at
Sears Point, Roberts started the race at the back of the pack and passed the entire field within four laps to win the race. Despite being in contention for much of the season, Roberts was unable to win any of the dirt track events and eventually finished the year in fourth place.
First American world champion When it became apparent that Yamaha could not develop a dirt track motorcycle capable of competing with the dominant Harley-Davidson dirt track team, the American Yamaha importer, Yamaha USA, offered to send Roberts to Europe in
1978 to compete in the World Championship Grand Prix road racing series, along with
Kel Carruthers to act as his mentor and crew chief. At first, Roberts resisted the move to racing in Europe as, he felt that he had left unfinished business racing against the Harley Davidson team in the AMA Grand National Championship but, realized that Yamaha didn't have a competitive dirt track motorcycle. Before going to Europe, Roberts met with executives of the
Goodyear tire company and secured financial backing and as well as a tire supplier for his upcoming world championship campaign. Roberts did just the opposite, braking early then, quickly applying the throttle which resulted in the rear tire breaking traction and spinning. He then won a rain-shortened Imola 200 race and was the second highest individual scorer behind
Pat Hennen at the 1978 Transatlantic Match races. (11) during the
1978 Nations Grand Prix at
Mugello. Roberts would eventually go on to win the race. The
1978 world championship chase did not start well for Roberts at the season-opening round in Venezuela. Although Roberts won the 250 cc Grand Prix, Sheene claimed the victory in the 500 cc
Venezuelan Grand Prix while Roberts' Yamaha suffered a mechanical failure on the starting line. The championship then moved to Europe where Roberts would experience his first encounter with FIM bureaucracy at the Spanish Grand Prix. The promoter of the Spanish Grand Prix, Don Nicolás Rodil del Valle, was also the president of the FIM. Roberts began to realize that many of the world championship race promoters were connected to the FIM ruling body, an arrangement that left little incentive to make safety improvements to the race circuits. Roberts was accustomed to racing in the AMA where competitors could rely on an AMA referee to ensure that race promoters provided a safe venue however, competitors racing in the FIM world championships were provided no such recourse. When Roberts arrived at the
1978 Spanish Grand Prix, he was denied entry into the 500cc race. As Roberts had withdrawn from the previous Grand Prix in Venezuela, Spanish race promoters claimed to have no record of Roberts' previous 500cc class experience. The thought that race organizers feigned having no knowledge of the Yamaha factory sponsored American champion incensed Roberts, who felt that the FIM was trying to exert their authority on the newcomer. At the
1978 Swedish Grand Prix, Roberts crashed during practice for the 250 cc race, sustaining a concussion and a thumb injury. Shaken up by the accident, he could do no better than seventh place in the 500 cc race. Eventually, Roberts was declared the winner with Sheene being awarded third place behind
privateer Steve Manship, who did not stop for a tire change. The final race of the season was the
German Grand Prix held at the daunting, long
Nürburgring racetrack, considered too dangerous for the
Formula One championship. Roberts broke the unofficial lap record during practice then qualified second and finished in third place, ahead of Sheene in fourth place to claim the first
world championship for an American rider in Grand Prix road racing history.
The rebel leader The
1979 season began disastrously for Roberts when he suffered career-threatening back injuries and a
ruptured spleen in a pre-season crash while testing a motorcycle in Japan. His injuries caused him to miss the season opening Grand Prix in Venezuela, but he completed an impressive recovery by winning the second round in
Austria, followed by a second place in Germany, and another victory in Italy. An angered Roberts went on to win the race, and then proceeded to the podium where he refused to accept the winner's trophy, telling the promoters that they should melt their trophy and sell it in order to help pay the competitors' expenses. Roberts' act was merely a symbolic protest as, the FIM felt no compulsion to change the status quo, however his act of standing up to the FIM's shoddy treatment resonated loudly among his fellow competitors and signaled a break from the old ways, galvanizing them into taking action to further rider demands for increased safety. Further controversy ensued at the Belgian Grand Prix at the
Spa circuit. The circuit had been paved just days before the race, creating a track that many of the racers felt was unsafe due to diesel fuel seeping to the surface. The FIM later reduced this to another probation. Roberts' battle with Sheene at the
1979 British Grand Prix at
Silverstone has been cited as one of the greatest races of the 1970s. Minutes before the start of the race, Roberts' Yamaha blew a seal and sprayed the bike with oil. Roberts ended the season with a victory at the prestigious
Mallory Park Race of the Year. In December 1979, Roberts made good on his threats when he, along with the other top world championship riders, released a letter to the press announcing their intention to break away from the FIM and create a rival race series called the
World Series. When Roberts first arrived on the Grand Prix scene, motorcycle racers were competing in front of tens of thousands of paying spectators for as little prize money as $200, at venues such as the
Imatra Circuit in Finland that featured railroad crossings and hay bales wrapped around telephone poles. Rather than suitable financial compensation for risking their lives, race organizers expected riders to race for prestige and the opportunity to compete for world championship points. Roberts adopted a confrontational, sometimes belligerent stance with race promoters, challenging the previously accepted poor treatment that motorcycle racers of the day were accustomed to receiving. He followed that the next evening with a third place in the Houston short-track national. For the
1980 Grand Prix season, the Yamaha factory made the Yamaha USA team of Roberts and Carruthers the de facto factory racing team. Roberts' bike had a
suspension failure in the Grand Prix season opening
Austrian Grand Prix, but he rebounded to win the next two races in
Germany and
Italy. He came back to score a second place behind Lucchinelli in the
Belgian Grand Prix, but was once again struck by misfortune when a bad case of
food poisoning forced him to miss the
San Marino Grand Prix. Roberts then injured his knee and finger at the
British Grand Prix and had to miss the
Swedish round, but by then the world championship had been claimed by Uncini with a total of five victories while Roberts fell to fourth place. With Roberts injured, Yamaha allowed his teammate
Graeme Crosby a chance to ride the V4 Yamaha during practice for the season-ending
German Grand Prix however, the New Zealand rider declared that the experience had taken years off his life. By the end of the 1982 season, Roberts had won sixteen 500 cc Grand Prix races, more than double that of any of his contemporaries. Roberts began the season with his YZR500 having problems with overheating and rear suspension, while Spencer started strongly, winning the first three races and five out of the first seven. In
Round 3 at
Monza, Roberts crashed while leading Spencer three laps from the finish. Heading down the back straight, Spencer placed his Honda right behind Roberts' Yamaha as they reached the second to the last corner, a ninety degree right-hander. Spencer was able to get back on the track and back on the power first, crossing the finish line just ahead of Roberts for a crucial victory. In July, Roberts won the first leg of the
Laguna Seca 200, then finished second to Randy Mamola in the second leg, as Mamola was declared the winner based on aggregate times. In September 1985, he appeared at the Springfield Mile Grand National dirt track race riding a
Mert Lawwill-prepared Harley-Davidson XR750, but failed to make the final. In July 1985, Roberts won the pole position at the prestigious
Suzuka 8 Hours endurance race, held in Japan. Teamed with
Tadahiko Taira, the duo were leading the race until the final hour, when mechanical problems dropped them back to seventeenth place. Roberts returned to compete in the 1986 Suzuka 8 Hours, this time teaming up with American
Mike Baldwin. He qualified second behind
Wayne Gardner, but failed to finish the race.
Career statistics In a 13-year professional racing career, Roberts won two Grand National Championships and three 500 cc world championships including 32 Grand Nationals and 24 Grand Prix road races. He was the second AMA rider after
Dick Mann to accomplish the Grand Slam of winning all five events of the Grand National Championship. ==Race team manager and owner==