Repsol YPF
Ruta
NICKY HAYDEN
© Repsol YPF
CAREER HIGHLIGHTS 1998: 4th AMA 750 Supersport Series
1998: 4th AMA 600 Supersport Series
1999: AMA 600 Supersport Champion
1999: 2nd AMA Formula Xtreme Series
Rookie of the Year AMA Dirt Track
Speedvision Professional Sportsmen of the Year
2000: 2nd AMA Superbikes
4th AMA Pro Honda 600 Supersport Series
2001: 3rd AMA Superbikes
2002: AMA Superbike Champion
2003: 5th MotoGP World Championship
2004: 8th MotoGP World Championship
2005: 3rd MotoGP World Championship
BIOGRAPHY
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The young North American Superbike champion, Nicky Hayden made his MotoGP World Championship debut in Suzuka at the Japanese Grand Prix. 22-year-old Hayden was born in Owensboro, Kentucky and is contesting the MotoGP class after having been crowned in his country as the youngest winner of the American Superbike Championship AMA, on a Honda SP-2.
2002 US Superbike champion Nicky Hayden is part of a new wave of American
road racing talent to arrive in MotoGP. Throughout the eighties and early
nineties GP racing's premier championship was mostly ruled by Americans -
legends like Wayne Rainey, Kevin Schwantz, Eddie Lawson, John Kocinski and Freddie Spencer.
Like those heroes before him, Hayden has been involved in motorcycles all his life. His father was a pro dirt tracker, famously using the number 69 because he wanted his bike to be identifiable "whether it was right way up or upside down", and both his mother and elder sister contested so-called 'powder-puff' ladies' events. Nowadays Hayden and both his brothers race, elder brother Tommy and younger brother Roger Lee currently competing at the highest level in America. Indeed his proudest moment so far is the family's remarkable one-two-three result at one of the Grand National dirt track events some years ago. The siblings monopolised the podium at Springfield, Tennessee - Nicky first, Tommy second and Roger Lee third - ahead of the nation's best dirt trackers, including Jay Springsteen and Chris Carr. Soft-spoken, polite and quick with a smile, Hayden is a laidback youngster with a tough racetrack streak who chooses bike riding (he owns a full stable of Honda dirt bikes plus a CBR600 streetbike), driving his Hummer jeep, hanging out with friends and music - from rock to rap - for his off-track fun.
