A man who should always be in the conversational mix when there is a debate about the greatest of all time, is two time world champ and three-time AMA champ all by the age of 23. Jean Michel-Bayle.
See one of the best of all time do some play riding back in that magical 1991 season where Bayle won the 250 supercross, 250 motocross and 500 motocross championship – a feat no American had ever achieved in one season.
By 1993 JMB was road racing! Genius.
We asked his former team manager, Roger DeCoster, about some of the riders that impressed him the most that he has seen or managed and he had high praise for Bayle:
“Bayle was fun, he was the first rider to blitz the whoops in supercross, he would do things completely different from that time. After the Americans really took over motocross and supercross , he was the first European rider that was able to beat the Americans. That was fun to watch and how he was doing it and his mentality.
“Stefan was fun to watch because he was so smooth and it looked like he was going slow, but when you put a stopwatch on him, you realised how fast he was going! Ricky was fun because you went to a race with him and you were certain he was on the podium.
“They are all different. Cooper today, he is fun to watch because when he is on, he can push himself at the end of a race like not many people can do.”
See Bayle win the final round of that dominating 1991 supercross season below: