Cole Seely to Race Japanese National
Honda HRC announced today that Cole Seely will contest the final round of the ALL Japan MX National Championship at Sportsland Sugo in Miyagi, Japan, on October 22-23. This is the second straight year Honda has sent a rider to compete in the final round of the championship. Last year, Trey Canard represented the team.
The trip to Japan for star American riders was once a time-honored tradition, with riders such as Jeff Emig, Damon Bradshaw, Jeff Stanton, Rick Johnson, Jeff Ward, and David Bailey, among others, traveling to Japan to compete in select nationals and supercrosses. It had fallen on hard times in recent years mostly due to economic reasons, but has seen a resurgence in the last two years. Cooper Webb, Jeremy Martin, Romain Febvre, Tim Gajser, and Canard have all competed at the final round in recent years.
Honda HRC team manager Dan Betley has been a big proponent of the trip, telling us last year he would “do whatever it takes to make this happen. I’m going to push them every year to do this.”
In our “Factory Land” feature (which ran in the February 2016 issue of Racer X Illustrated), detailing the trip made by Yamalube/Star Racing Yamaha and Honda HRC last year, Betley talked about the importance of engineers in Japan seeing riders up close.
“Ever since I became manager, even before then, I’ve been trying to push to make this happen again. The only supercross they ever see is what they see on television. So they’re designing equipment or parts or bikes or whatever for something they’ve never even seen in person. So for Trey to go over there and ride at the level that he rides at … he was four or five seconds faster than anyone who’s ever ridden around it. Those guys were blown away.”
Seely said he’s excited for the trip, as it will be his first time traveling overseas.
“I’m really excited for the opportunity to race in Japan,” he said in a team press release. “I’ve never been anywhere overseas, so I’m just as excited to see another part of the world as I am to race and have my team there with me. It will also be a great chance to meet everyone at Honda and HRC; being a part of the Honda family has been a dream come true, so I’m looking forward to showing them my appreciation. Helping develop the new 2017 CRF450R has been going really well. It’s crazy how good it is already in the early stages, and it will just continue to get better—I can’t wait to race it! I’m looking forward to working with the crew in Japan, and I want to thank everyone at the Kumamoto factory for working so hard to get this bike out despite dealing with the damage from the April earthquake.”