James Randolph in 1995.
Most riders have a lean meter – a little alarm in their brain that goes off when they pitch it in a turn and their bike hits maybe 35 to 40 degrees. Maybe it’s the footpeg dragging, or the side of a header, but for most mortals when hard parts even think about scraping pavement it’s time to pick up the bike a bit. It seems racer James Randolph was born without that tilt alarm in his noggin.
Randolph's Kawasaki poster
Randolph, one of a number of talented road racers from Santa Rosa, Calif., grew up racing the twisty, hilly Sears Point Raceway (now Infineon Raceway). Sears Point placed a premium on cornering speed and Randolph became one of the fastest riders mid-corner on the West Coast. It didn’t take long for Randolph to make it to the pro ranks. Winning the AMA 750 Supersport race on his hometrack in 1994 earned Randolph a ride on Kinko’s Kawasaki the following season. I can’t prove it with certainty, but I believe the lanky Randolph was the first rider in AMA road racing who regularly dragged his elbows through turns. His lean angle was so extreme that Kinko’s Kawasaki team owner Robert Nutt once told me that Dunlop actually suggested telling Randolph not to lean so radically through the turns. His angle was so extreme that he was actually running off the edge of the tire!
Unfortunately I don’t have a photo of Randolph’s elbow dragging antics, I had stopped shooting at the time, but I’m sure there are photos out there with Randolph pushing the limits of his race bike and DOT tire technology.
Randolph's bio info
Rider Files 
I think the current Moto GP and WSBK (Spies – announcers called him ‘Elbows’ at Donnington last week)guys must have taken note of James. Speed is a natural force from whithin. You just need to know how to tap into it. Once you do you win!
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Larry,
Thanks for the great article. I really had fun that day you let me drive the rental car.
Good Stuff!
Cheers
James
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James
Good to hear from you. Yeah I think you set some sort of speed record from San Jose to Santa Rosa.
Thanks for stopping by.
Larry
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Jim Randolph and Mark McDaniel, both from Sonoma county, CA rode for us in the early 90’s.
I remember arriving at Laguna during the first practice.
Talk about lean angle?
I watched Jim flick it into T3 and I instinctually exclaimed “C**p!Lost it!”
Then he came out of the corner, elbow almost dragging…….
Then, McD flicked it into the same corner and I exclaimed about the same thing…..
And he went right on through the corner.
Those two guys leaned an incredible angle.
Maybe that’s the year that McDaniel almost won 600 Supersport?
He ran down Yoshimura’s Britt Turkington and when he got right behind him, our Yosh pipe Duplex canister broke and we lost 4-5 hp.
I turned to the Yosh guys next to us and said “How’d you do that?”
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