Carl Fogarty in NZ

[moko]

He was here doing a book-signing last year and a lot of bikers ignored it because the guy`s an arsehole,just about anyone remotely well-known would have got a good turn out,joke going around was that he was turning up in a car with a motorhome for his ego,great rider,wanker as a bloke.

[Bob]

I've met him about three times. Once I was working - covering a bike show. My colleague was getting short quotes for the website on a digital recorder. So we spotted Fogarty and my colleague went over, asked him if he had a moment... then very patiently explained what the site was about, what he was doing and could Mr Fogarty kindly give a quote for the site.

All the way through this, Fogarty was going "Right", "OK" and so on. Then, when my friend finished explaining and put the recorder forward, Fogarty stood there blankly for a moment and then said "Sorry, what is this about?" He clearly thought it was some fan wanting to talk to him and screened out.

Fogarty is good if he knows there is media about though. Doing the photo-reporter bit at another show. And Fogarty was there for a book launch. and he knew exactly where *every* photographer was standing. To the point he got the silly media assistant girlie to move out of the way before anyone had to ask and ensured that each bank of snappers got a good shot.

Final time I met him was at the launch of his autobiography. My wife had intended to get it signed as a surprise present for me... but the queue was so long she was getting to the end of her lunch hour! So she had to call me and get me to come along and take her place with the book. Still took me about another half an hour to get to the front, handed over the book and... he didn't even look up. Just scrawled on the book handed it to Michaela (his wife) to sign it and hand it back. At least she had the decency to look up and say "Thanks".

I know the arrogance, putting every other racer down etc was a vital part of his armory as a racer (he HAD to believe he was the best and that was how he did it), but with racing career over, he could have paid a little more attention to the huge group of people that had just spent a lot of money for his (awful) book. Time for the image to be dropped, but he couldn't do it.

I know book signings must be incredibly boring, but he could have made more effort to reward people that spent a lot of their time just to see him and get his autograph.

I always compare this to going to cricket. I recall being at the last match of the season. The game ended, so all the players must have wanted to do was get a shower and go for a beer. But no, the likes of Alec Stewart, Graham Thorpe etc stood there for the best part of an hour, signing autographs for kids (or anyone else for that matter) and made the effort to talk to them and show interest.

I know whose response I preferred.