Carl Fogarty

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Carl Fogarty (born 1 July 1965, Blackburn, Lancashire) is the most successful Superbike racer in terms of the number of championships and number of race wins. Fogarty, known to his fans as 'Foggy' has now retired. He is renowned for his high corner speed riding style, combined with an aggressive competitiveness, which netted him 59 victories and four World Superbike Championships (1994, 1995, 1998 and 1999) while riding for the Ducati factory team.

Winning 6 of the first 8 races in 1995 helped him seal that title with 5 of the 24 races to spare, and he clinched it with 3 races to spare in 1999. 1998 was his closest title - after a disastrous weekend at the Nürburgring he lay just 6th in the standings, but fought back to overhaul Troy Corser and Aaron Slight in the final round. This was especially notable as his team was in its first year of WSBK competition.

Surprisingly, his first victory in any form of racing at Brands Hatch did not come until 1995. He had much greater success at Assen, winning all but 1 race there between 1995 and 1999. Large numbers of British fans would travel to the race on the ferries at this time.

[edit] Other races

Fogarty broke the lap record at the Isle of Man TT in 1992. His lap at 18 minutes, 18.8 seconds (123.61mph) on a Yamaha 750cc wasn't broken until seven years later by Jim Moodie riding a Honda RC45 in 1999.

Riding for Ducati, Fogarty finished second at the 1995 Daytona 200 in the United States. Scott Russell crashed during the first lap of the race but was able to remount and pass Fogarty for the win. Fogarty claimed that the pace car regrouping following the yellow flag allowed Russell to close the gap significantly [1].

[edit] Post-racing

Fogarty was forced to retire from racing in 2000 after a racing incident at Philip Island when he hit a back-marker and crashed. He suffered multiple injuries, including a serious shoulder injury which failed to heal well enough to allow him to race again.

In 2002, Ducati released a special limited edition model (only 300 units were built) in his honor, the Monster S4 Fogarty.

In the same year, Fogarty founded the Foggy Petronas team in the World Superbike Championship (WSB). They entered with Carl's former team-mate Corser and James Haydon in 2003, but their three-cylinder bike was never truly competitive. In 2004 they achieved two third places (one for Corser and one for Chris Walker), but in this season there was little manufacturer support in WSB. Once several manufacturers returned for 2005, they were not competitive. Petronas ended the project at the end of 2006, leaving Foggy's racing future unclear.

Carl Fogarty was never a person to stray away from controversy in the WSB paddock, and even in retirement, he frequently voices his opinion (most often in the British motorcycle newspaper MCN) in which he often berates past rivals such as Troy Corser, Neil Hodgson and Troy Bayliss. This attitude towards other racers has made him a love-or-hate personality in the motorcycling world.

[edit] External links

• Team Fogarty Petronas Racing
• Foggy Petronas racing
• The Carl Fogarty Photo Album
• Carl Fogarty interview - BBC Sport

Preceded by John Kocinski	World Superbike Champion 1998-1999	Succeeded by Colin Edwards
Preceded by Scott Russell	World Superbike Champion 1994-1995	Succeeded by Troy Corser