From: Back to The Future by Michael James - MX East, May 15, 2000, p. 12

I was saddened recently when I read that former multi-time Amateur National Champion and current Team Yamaha rider Jimmy Button suffered severe spinal injuries while practicing for a Supercross race. I was stunned, speechless, when I read the report on an online race service. I couldn’t believe it. We had hardly gotten over the Donovan Mitchell injury, and now this. I don’t know what to say; I felt a need to blame someone...anyone for the tragic situations. There really isn’t anyone to blame, however. We all realize the inherent risks of our sport. That’s why we got into it in the first place.

I am a racer, as I am sure you are, too, if you are reading this publication - and I am as aware as the next guy of the risks we are all prepared to take when we strap on our helmets. I approach life now with a different perspective than in my younger years and have seen even the outdoor race tracks look less like Motocross and more like Supercross. I am all for making tracks challenging enough for the more skilled among us, but there has to be a cut-off point. Some will argue that we have a choice to shut the throttle down, but as racers, that is not in our nature to do that, even at the risk of common sense at times.

Too many of our top riders are getting injured and we keep looking the other way as if there is no one to be held accountable in all of this. The papers first printed that Button was paralyzed; then they said he wasn’t, and now they say he is more seriously injured than first thought. I have seen all of this before. In 1987 when David Bailey suffered his career-ending injury, they said the same things. "He is a fighter and if anyone can beat this, he will be the one." I think this is said so that the racer and his family can come to the slow realization that all of their lives have just taken a very sharp turn and they are in for a long road and a series of adjustments....

...Loudmouth former national champions from the past can wax eloquently about how the racers of today are not the men they used to be; not the same mettle as the "old schoolers" and how they aren’t training enough. Rubbish! I have seen both generations race and I would tell the loudmouths to their faces that the riders of today are facing a much different and more difficult set of circumstances than the riders of their era.

For one thing, we are racing on machines today that are capable of nearly impossible-to-imagine acceleration and performance compared to the old days. The tracks are unbelievably difficult compared to the old days and yet, the speeds that today’s racers are achieving - both indoors and outdoors - makes the "old-schoolers" look pale in comparison. I look at Supercross races of the bygone era and see that I could’ve raced on those wimpy tracks with little or no trouble. Loudmouth number one retired when the tracks started to look like today’ war-zone Supercross venues. The tracks of today are ridiculously difficult in their layout and risk factors. The only person who seems to be able to handle the Supercross tracks of today is McGrath. That does not make for good racing, people. A mildly toned-down track would bring things much closer and give people like Button, Ward and company (who are only a smidgen behind MC in the ability department) a safer reality. This would also force MC - who is a demi-god in the sport to prove how much fight he has when someone thinks they can beat him with the less hairy tracks. If MC’s heart is in the right place - and I wouldn’t bet against him - he would still win, but he would have to work harder than he does now to do it.

I know that a race is a race and a racer is a racer, but look back to professional wrestling of decades ago. That was not fake or staged or prearranged outcome-precalculated or whatever choice of words float your boat. The guys were literally killing each other until they woke up and realized that the fans don’t care whether they are actually killing each other or not. They come to see "The Show." That’s all people really want to see, is "the show." They don’t want the Buttons and Mitchells hurting themselves for real. The fans don’t care about the challenge of a triple jump (they’re not the ones who have to jump it); they want to see the daring young men flying through the air, not splattering on the ground. A huge tabletop, camelback or step-up does the same thing.

Why the insane obstacles? Do you really want my opinion?

Reason number one is the "Showtime" machine. Jeremy McGrath is a multi-million-dollar media machine. His own name doesn’t even belong to him anymore. His name is a product and there are numerous people who are cashing in on it, including MC himself. As long as the tracks are overly hairy, the former BMX-er can pre-jump his way over obstacles, around his competition and all the way to the bank. No doubt, the entourage of people making tons of money off the "Showtime Media Machine" are a couple of steps behind him on the way to the bank, as well. As long as MC keeps winning and setting records, they are all making money. But, what about the likes of Heath Voss, Jean-Sebastien Roy and the privateers who are taking the same risks as MC and company? They are not making what they should.

Reason number two is that we (anyone, including me until now) didn’t say or do anything about it when the tracks got insane and the riders started getting hurt. Many people I have talked to have voiced the same opinion and yet no one has tried to make any changes; no one spoke up about a wrong thing as it happened before their eyes. A notorious German bad-guy exploited this phenomenon all too effectively back in the World War II days. The silence of the people is a dangerous thing and silence back then resulted in a catastrophe of epic proportions. Do we want this to happen to Motocross?

The show will go on, with or without our fallen warriors, but who among us can look in the mirror and not feel in the back of our minds that the obstacles these Pro Supercross racers have to deal with have gotten way out of hand? Where and when is someone going to realize that as our warriors keep getting hurt, something has to change? The answer isn’t by going to a WCW or WWF format of racing, but there has got to be a better way to keep our racers safer than has been taking place. I, for one, will not race on any local outdoor track that remotely resembles a Supercross track. Call me yellow, but the benefits don’t outweigh the risks. As a youth, I wished I were a professional Motocross racer; today - I only wish I rode like one. The changes have to take place on the local level first and filter its way upward to the Pro ranks. Talk to your track promoters who throw in too much SX stuff on an outdoor track. Maybe the upper echelon will see the light by the time Ezra Lusk’s brother, Shane, makes it up to his level.