Let broc bye

[motogrady]

One of the most controversial, and famous, pictures ever taken in the world of motocross.

In 1977, Yamaha had 3 or 4 warehouses in California packed full with their 125cc motocross bikes. And rumor has it they weren’t really the best bike out there that year.
Chock full of product, they needed something to sell that inventory.

Enter teammates Bob Hannah, the hard charging roughneck, some might say from the wrong side of the tracks,
and The Golden Boy Brock Glover, silky smooth style with GQ looks.  

Yamaha, if they won the championship with Hannah’s determination and grit would sell bikes.  Same with Glover,
win on Sunday sell on Monday,
with the bonus they would have another Marty Smith lookalike as a marketing tool.

It’s the last moto of the series.  Hannah is leading the race by like a minute.  He’s crushing everyone.
He’s still in it, but to win the majority of the other guys need to DNF.  

His teammate tho, is a mere 3 points, the difference between 1st and second, from clinching the brass ring for Yamaha.

With 2 laps to go, then mechanic, and now head of American Yamaha Racing, Keith McArthey, flashes the infamous, “let broc bye” pit board.  Only out there for maybe 2 seconds,
and erased immediately after Hannah went past, it’s one of the only times team tactics at play have been recorded.

Hannah would pull off on the last lap, Glover would go by and win the moto.  This caused a tie in series points, with Glover winning the title for Yamaha by virtue of most races won that year.

Yamaha went on to sell out their stock of 125s.

Hannah is said to have ridden off into the woods, seething for 20 minutes.  It is said he showed up at Yamaha headquarters the next day, Monday, and demanded a check for $100,000, the bonus one would get that year for winning the Championship. And got it.

Glover would go on to win his fair share of championships.

Keith McArthey would go on to become a big wheel at Yamaha.

And these 2 pics would sit in the photographers camera for days, before he realized what he had grabbed.  2 pictures, almost taken by accident, conveying a term often used now in the world of racing.  Something almost always denied, but
accepted as a fact of reality, when things get real.

.........let Broc bye.

[Fatfatboy]

You know,, I've seen that photo but had no idea of the significant of it.
Grady, You have a shear wealth o knowledge.
Thanks for sharing that.

[motogrady]

Looking at that pic a bit closer, the one with Hannah in it, jeez, a few things come to mind.  If you notice, everyone on the right side of the pic, in the front, is looking at the board.
The look on those faces, you can tell, every one of them knows the ramifications of what’s written.  And you can see the, I’m not gonna say disgust, resignation maybe?

The other thing, yikes, is how far the sport has come.
Is it me, or do most of those guys look like stand ins for
a Deliverance movie or what?
All those guys are industry.
Nowadays every one of them would be in a uniform with a haircut out of Men Fashion Magazine lol.

One note of progress tho, look at the pit passes.  
All located in a certain place, fixed to the thigh in what appears to be hunting license carriers.

Gone are the days when the unwashed could just grab a baggie, throw a piece of ribbon and a note in it, flash it in some unsuspecting gatekeepers face, and have unlimited access all around the track😄