Mladin Interview.

Hey, new guy here.   Let me start by saying I've been a fan of Matts for years and years.   But I just read his interview in the latest issue, and was wondering what he meant by "all these clowns now that are riding for free, all they're doing is taking it down for everybody"......  I'm  not sure, but when Matt was coming up, was he on a factory bike getting a fat paycheck when he was a Novice or Amatuer?  A lot of people build their own bikes, use their own money, and race on their own dimes, with limited sponsorship, or sometimes, no sponsorship at all.   For the love of the sport.  If each factory had 2 bikes out there, that would be 10 bikes on the grid (without the unpaid riders).  Is that what he wants?   A lot of the non factory guys are never going to be as fast as the million dollar riders.   I'm sure they  know and accept that fact.  For some, it is a really expensive hobby, pastime, alternate lifestyle, what ever.   Just because they aren't the fastest guys out there, don't have the multi million dollar teams behind them, doesn't make them any less worthwhile, than some bigheaded, big money rider.  

How long did Matt race before he got his first paycheck?   You have to start somewhere, and I think to refer to the non factory riders, and also Pegram and the other guy as clowns, shows a lot of disrespect, and forgetting where you came from.  

I think what Mladin was referring to regarding "riding for free" are various riders in World Superbike who are reportedly doing just that (although what he's overlooking is that many of them get endorsement sponsorships paid from aftermarket manufacturers, and those personal contracts are contingent on the rider being in a World Championship series like WSBK). I doubt he was referring to the privateers in nationals series such as AMA, because riding without a paycheck is a fact of life for them.

As far as the "clowns" referral to Pegram, that stemmed from his disagreement with Pegram about riding at Topeka, a track that many felt had too many dangerous spots to be approved for AMA racing. Mladin felt that the other riders should have boycotted the race as he did.