I agree Franki is the "man", but have you heard he has Parkinsons? https://www.visordown.com/news/gene...-chili-reveals-hes-living-parkinson’s-disease
Fogarty seems to have a lot of love on here, is it a Ducati thing because this is a brand based forum or is this a general consensus of the man not the bike he rode. Jonny Rea has way surpassed Foggys achievements but he seems to be a man that not many like, bit like Marques in the fact that they agree he is a great rider but cannot warm to the personality.
That’s a great question. For me, it’s both. No doubt the Ducati love is a thing on here, it is for me too, but the story is a great one too. Won IOM races in the 80s, his 92 lap record stood for 7 years at a time when race bike development was going through the roof. Bought his own bike, went racing as a privateer & was immediately up with the works riders, winning on his first day out. Went on to win multiple WSB titles in what was now a very competitive series, took 11 wins to Scott Russell’s 5 in 93 & still lost the title that year! Arguably put Ducati on the map, so much so actually that they honoured him with a SE V4 recently & called it the 916! Famously said once that the 916 was too pretty to race & that his first thought was how could he take that racing & risk damaging it! No doubt he was a flawed character at times, who isn’t? But his achievements stand up now, second only to Rea. Rea is the real deal but like the Hamilton argument, he’s on the dominant ride & many simply don’t warm to him. Can’t deny either achievements, I just think Foggy’s is the greater & the more influential story...& he did it on a 916
There is no doubt that Foggy was an amazing rider and I loved to watch him race. That's where it ends for me though. I met him a few times in various scenarios back then and compared to many of the other riders of that era he came across as a bit of a tosser. Chatting to him and Whit together in a bar was like chalk and cheese, with Whit being full of craic and Foggy just glowering at folk. Back before the days of the riders becoming "professional sportsmen" and brand ambassadors, they would all hit the bars and get wrecked amongst the fans on the evenings of the race weekends. Assen used to be fantastic for propping up the bar with Slighty/Scott Russel/Hodgson etc Foggy not so much. What finally finished him for me was a night in Cattolica, where we were at the next table to him and his entourage in a pavement cafe. They were loud, obnoxious and after several "chats from staff" to calm it down, it got quite ugly. While having a stand up "do you know who I am" moment it attracted some papparazzi, who started snapping away. Some of the hangers on started trying to wrestle the cameras off the snappers, while Foggy and his missus became screaming banshees. Foggy rounded off his performance by spitting on the photographers.
A friend of mine was marketing and sponsorship manager for the FP1 team so I got to go to a few races when they were doing the WSB championship and the atmosphere in the hospitality was very tense when he was about. As previously mentioned his skills as a rider are without question but his people skills back then were poor. I watched a link someone put on here recently where a YouTube car guy meets him and they have a ride on CCM’s and he seemed to have mellowed somewhat but it might have been for the benefit of the camera. Looks like he’ll have plenty to stress about with two daughters though ! https://www.greatbritishlife.co.uk/things-to-do/whats-on/storm-fashion-launch-party-7040092
Sound like a “Tonya Harding”. Extremely talented but with a hillbilly style... Don’t know the man in person, and never met him, but do know what he’s achieved, he really put Ducati on the world stand, something to be proud of. Cheers.
It doesn’t matter one bit to me if you’re a world champion or a street cleaner! It costs nothing to be nice and if you’re not nice it’s a slur on you’re parents in my opinion! My lads race and I’m really not bothered one bit how successful they are ! What would bother me is if people didn’t think they were nice friendly lads! So I’m afraid mr fogarty would definitely go in the stingers!
After reading the last few posts with interest a little well known saying popped into my head. !!, “You better be nice to people on the way up because if not they bloody well remember when you’re on your way down.”
Fogarty admits he was a nightmare back in the day. He’s also said it’s amazing his missus put up with him. It’s fairly common with high end athletes etc
To be fair, the racers back then were grilling more birds than George Forman ! chicks still thought racers were cool in those days
Oh God yea , one of the perks of the racing world. We would all be no different. Enjoy it while it lasts.
If I remember correctly (and I might not) that race was for the 1979 World Championship at Silverstone when Bazza & King Kenny duelled at Silverstone. I think Roberts beat Sheene by a less than a foot, after Fogarty's dad got in the way on the start of the last lap...
Fantastic racer in all classes! Oh and Queen of the jungle. Just such a shame he was such an arrogant knob! You certainly can’t take away any of his ability to ride! But Personally I’ve never been a fan of big named riders with a salty attitude
He did a talk with Steve Parish at Brooklands Museum a while back. It was a good evening and he was pretty interesting - admittedly Mr Parish kept things moving along nicely (good interviewer). Foggy was pretty open about his demeanour while in SBK but overall seemed a decent bloke really.
Speaking from seeing this over the years. A big part of it is that when you’re winning races for whoever and whatever team, everybody loves you , everybody praises you, everybody sucks up to you ( maybe not intentionally ). Everybody gives you whatever you want, everybody runs around trying to make your life easier, everybody can’t do enough for you as your now such an important person within that team. So anything you start asking for becomes a “ No Problem “ answer from them which over time and naturally you never see it for yourself what a pain in the arse your becoming and losing touch with the real world and how you behaved when you were first were starting out. Everybody becomes afraid of upsetting the superstar and yea for sure it does go to a lot of peoples head. Just my 2 pence worth.
