On The Pegs December 2019 - Volume 4 - Issue 12 | Page 141

On The Pegs
VOL. 4 ISSUE 12 - DECEMBER 2019
141
World Championship career was over. I knew straight away he was right and
although I don’t blame the injury I think it made me realise that I was struggling
and not enjoying the races as I should and that is always the time to stop.
Since retiring from the World Championship you have remained very
competitive at the classic events – adding seven more Scottish Six Day Trial
wins to your tally, having already achieved five previous victories at the
SSDT from 1994 to 2012. You stand in a class of your own with twelve SSDT
wins, compared to the next best total of five that both Sammy Miller and
Mick Andrews managed. When you add these to your twelve World titles
– can you understand why many peo-ple consider you to be the best Trial
rider to ever grace the planet, even despite Toni Bou’s in-credible feats
over the last decade or so?
I love to ride in the classic events as it also gives me that special feeling of be-
ing under pres-sure especially before the start of the Trial itself. My SSDT record
is something I’m very proud of as I grew up watching my family at this event and
its very special to us now as it has always been. I find it very difficult when peo-
ple talk about the greatest rider of all time as we all rode at different times with
different bikes etc., although I must say I would have liked to have given Toni a
run for his money, but that’s not the case and I can tell you that to win twelve
was amazing so I can only imagine how twenty six and counting feels like so he
gets a massive congratulations from me.
Outside of your many competitive titles, you are on the record as saying
that becoming the first rider to wheelie the entire TT course on the Isle of
Man ranks up there with your biggest achieve-ments – three years later do
you feel that is still the case?
After my championship winning years I have experienced some fantastic op-
portunities espe-cially through my long term role as a Red Bull athlete. “Dougie’s
Wheelie” was something that had been kicked around for a couple of years,
when it got the go ahead I suddenly realised how hard it would be especially as
when I returned from the meeting at Red Bull HQ and told my dad. His reply was
“That’s ridiculous you can’t even wheelie to the end of my drive.” He was right
too! The feeling when I crossed the line was just like winning the World Champi-
onship and it’s definitely right up there with my finest achievements.
Obviously the huge success of the wheelie project came at a difficult mo-