Anthony Gobert's wasted 'talent'

Tom said:

I don't see how Gobert's ability at racing a motorbike has any relevance in this discussion. Everyone is good at something, and everyone has the potential to be happy. It is sad when anyone gets caught up in something like serious addiction, whether it is legal/socially acceptable or not, unfortunately this can easily lead to crime. I appreciate that we on this forum are more interested in the case of Gobert because he is did something that we have a passion for, but in the greater scheme of things going from a world class bike rider to a drug addict is no greater shame than any other person who goes down the same unpleasant route.

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All absolutely correct.

BarryMachine said:

I have never thought much of Gobert as a rider. As such I never really followed his progress.



Just then I looked up his record in GP:

First Grand Prix 1997 - ITA First pole position - First race fastest lap - First podium - First Grand Prix victory - Grand Prix victories 0 0 2nd Positions 0 0 3rd Positions 0 0 Podiums 0 0 Poles 0 0 Race fastest lap 0 0 World Championship wins 0

0











WhyTF do you folk idolise ( as is bother to even discuss ) Gobert. He was nowhere ........

This thread justifies 10 pump threads on its own.



This thread could be the first recipient of what will hitherto be known as:



"The Chilean Miner Award"



Award criteria .....



All kinds of boring going on, just to hear the words of a bunch of guys who have been in the dark for an era!

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I mainly remember the weekend on the wsbk kawasaki which had no business being where he put it. Otherwise the lack of discipline at least partly involved with later becoming an addict as mick d says probably wasn't conducive to bike racing success.

chopperman said:

Crack heads and smack heads who rob people to feed their habit should be lined up against a wall and shot imo.

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You make the common mistake that most people do. You believe these people take drugs because they are bad.

The opposite is true.



Moreover I would ask you to state categorically that you have never stolen anything,



Furthermore - I would ask you to go 90 days without a drink or a drug. Or barring that... tell me the last time you did.

BarryMachine said:

I have never thought much of Gobert as a rider. As such I never really followed his progress.



Just then I looked up his record in GP:

First Grand Prix 1997 - ITA First pole position - First race fastest lap - First podium - First Grand Prix victory - Grand Prix victories 0 0 2nd Positions 0 0 3rd Positions 0 0 Podiums 0 0 Poles 0 0 Race fastest lap 0 0 World Championship wins 0

0











WhyTF do you folk idolise ( as is bother to even discuss ) Gobert. He was nowhere ........

This thread justifies 10 pump threads on its own.



This thread could be the first recipient of what will hitherto be known as:



"The Chilean Miner Award"



Award criteria .....



All kinds of boring going on, just to hear the words of a bunch of guys who have been in the dark for an era!

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No one is idolising the man - indeed in my case you couldn't be further from the 'Mark'.



The fact that you are oblivious to his enormous natural talent and his huge unfulfilled potential ( which is precisely what we are discussing/lamenting), is again testament to your general lack of comprehension and knowledge of the sport that you claim to be an authority on. I have never met a single individual either with the sport or as a plaudit or pundit that does not acknowledge this or remember those classic Philip Island rides. Delve into the history and the circumstances behind that contrived to turn the Go Show into a tragedy instead of merely posting goggle derived stats as you are so prone to do.



I maintain that Gobert was a ct, but by God on motorcycle - was he a stunning one.

I might as well contribute to this thread, so here’s my two cents. Regarding A. Gobert's talent, I'll say we will never know for sure, though I’d be inclined to err on the side that we all missed out on potentially a brilliant career. He had some moments of sheer brilliance, but they were too short for me to estimate his potential over a career with any degree of certainty. However, there is no doubt he exhibited something special to those who can appreciate and detect the nuance of the sport, unfortunately, it was never fully exercised.



The question of addiction is completely irrelevant to what he did as a motorcycle racer, its discussed here only because we are all motorcycle racing enthusiasts, which in that regard, makes it relevant to this forum. I don’t know enough about his case to make much comment, except to say, drugs most often than not destroy lives. I’ve seen some good kids who get on the pipe and become complete POS to who they were before. When they can manage to get back off the pipe, they sometimes return to who they were before. Who knows why they pick up the pipe in the first place, it seems to run the gamut of what I have personally observed, some for kicks, some for experiment, some through peer pressure, some to fill a void, some to relieve pressures they can’t cope with, some because they are weak minded, some to relieve terrible memories of their past, etc. That they stay on the pipe also runs the gamut, some seem to be predisposed, others simply tried a drug that created a physical addiction, others a physiological addiction, etc. All I know is I’m lucky enough not to be addicted to illicit drugs. I never tried them, and never had a spark of interest. I’ve also never had anything too tragic in my life to have tempted me to try them for an escape. I will say while on the subject, I find it interesting the contrast of acceptance illicit drug users in the entertainment field enjoy versus athletes.



“Cocaine is a hell of a drug.” Rick James

what did he throw "it" away on?

Arrabbiata1 said:

I maintain that Gobert was a ct, but by God on motorcycle - was he a stunning one.

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Yes I see that. And as I have posted the guy was nowhere on a bike ...... very little achievement whatsoever .........



so why is he even remotely famous?



cos some pissheads idolise the guy. Cos "he's livin the life" no doubt You "spectators", you are all the same ........ yes yes Gobert was one of you Skiddyboy.



And don't get me wrong, I don't see any distinction between the pissheads and drug monkeys. You are all skidding it into corners with the back brake, so to speak.

Numbers don't always tell the entire story Barry. Go and watch the world superbike races that have been mentioned in this thread.



And generally, you really don't seem to be grasping what is being discussed here...

I have said it before and will say it again ................ Anthony Gobert was the single most talented rider of a motorcycle that I have had the pleasure of seeing live at a race circuit. The guy, when on his game which was, to be fair often early in the career was a pure freak who could do things on a motorcycle that it took many many years for others to become capable of doing. What he did at PI all those years ago on the Muzzy Kawasaki still lives with me and I often will check out the youtube clips if I come across them whilst searching for other races - simple, for me he was talented.



But, he was also an addict and sadly as we often see or read, there are some people whom become addicted and it takes their livelihood, their future and sometimes sadly their life but at all times there are many many more people affected than the addict.



Many attempts were made to get Anthony clean throughout the years but Anthony was a 'party boy' and sadly all to easily he would fall off the wagon, and yes he did try at times to clean up.



I was fortunate enough to meet Anthony during one of these clean periods when he tried to make a come back to racing in Oz as it was hoped that the racing would help him recover from the bout of addiction that it was felt that depression had again led him (Anthony is not a strong personality). Lucky for me he was clean, older and still extremely talented and it was a pleasure to see an unfit Anthony Gobert take the racing up to the established Aussie factory stars at the time whilst he rode an old beaten up ZX10 that handled like a truck. No results came his way but I saw the fire in the eyes as did the team that backed him at the time, but sadly when not racing he again fell into old habits and deteriorated to being arrested for assault and robbery.



Ultimately, Anthont Gobert made his bed and must now lie in it, but it is not and was not through lack of support from others that today we discuss 'what could have been' and not, what is, was or forever will be. It is a sad story and he is not alone in being a high performing athlete that allowed other influences to destroy his entire career, and ultimately his life as he is now no more than a sad junkie.



Further to this and an aspect that often saddens is the impacts that Anthony's failing had on Alex and Aaron who are both good racers in their own right (nowhere near as good mind) who were subject to more random drug tests throughout their careers than have been many cyclists.



It is a shame that we discuss Anthony this way but it should also be seen as a lesson to those other riders who may have temptation thrown at them, that whilst the life looks good you need to look carefully, listen and have support around you to help when needed.



Sorry, it is a long post but as Arrab knows as we have discussed before, Gobert is a topic that really saddens me as I have seen the extremely good and now the poor.

Nice post Gaz, I don't really have much to add. In his early career he was the most talented rider I've seen, especially on a dirt bike. We've discussed this before and I get sad/angry thinking about what could have been.



I do think he gets singled out on here, especially when compared to a lot of musical talents who seem to get a free pass when it comes to drugs.

barbedwirebiker said:

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCDzekt1a1A&feature=youtube_gdata_player[/media]

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Thanks for that. As I remembered that kawasaki does not exactly look like it was well sponsored either.



Also a reminder of what to me remains the best bike racing commentary team.

Who cares. It's all speculative what he would of became and achieved in his career.



Like Gilles Villeneuves, he haven't even achieved much in his career, which we will never know, knowing how his life was unexpectedly cut short......... but because humans are sheep and like to root for the under-acheiver (just like Nicky "The Kentucky Squid" Hayden), he becomes a 'champion' in their eyes. It's become a popularity contest........well, it's always has been to a certain degree, not just in racing, but in any sports in general.



Sometimes human emotions becomes irrational and blinded by true talent......... not to say rooting for someone with 'heart' and 'character' is wrong, but in the end it's in the record books that counts, well depending how you look at it.



But having 'heart' and having the necessary 'skills' are two completely different fields to look at. We would all like to see a racer which posseses both........ ala the great F1 driver Ayrton Senna. And Maybe.....just Maybe that one racer comes along once in our life-time to see such a racer. As much as I dis-like Valentino Rossi to a certain degree (personal opinions and matters), he's become the closest to being there in a long time as far as a motorsport figure goes, close to Schumacher, which in itself is debatable.

Son of Doohan said:

Nice post Gaz, I don't really have much to add. In his early career he was the most talented rider I've seen, especially on a dirt bike. We've discussed this before and I get sad/angry thinking about what could have been.



I do think he gets singled out on here, especially when compared to a lot of musical talents who seem to get a free pass when it comes to drugs.

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I understand your frustration - there are innumerable examples of highly talented musicians who have destroyed their own promising careers and even taken others down with them and don't seem to get similarly vilified - if anything, venerated. However as has been painstakingly pointed out, there are so many musical talents that lacked the support Anthony had, furthermore I can't think of many - if indeed any - having fallen from grace that would steal an old persons pension to feed their rampant drug habit and yet ostensibly remain so arrogant and lacking in compunction afterwards.

Keshav said:

You make the common mistake that most people do. You believe these people take drugs because they are bad.

The opposite is true.



Moreover I would ask you to state categorically that you have never stolen anything,



Furthermore - I would ask you to go 90 days without a drink or a drug. Or barring that... tell me the last time you did.

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Ok you got me there. I could say no i have never stolen anything but calikid may come here and tell you how i stole his bottle of tequila at Laguna 2011 and bought it back to england with me. Oh .... i robbed him to feed my habit

Arrabbiata1 said:

I understand your frustration - there are innumerable examples of highly talented musicians who have destroyed their own promising careers and even taken others down with them and don't seem to get similarly vilified - if anything, venerated. However as has been painstakingly pointed out, there are so many musical talents that lacked the support Anthony had, furthermore I can't think of many - if indeed any - having fallen from grace that would steal an old persons pension to feed their rampant drug habit and yet ostensibly remain so arrogant and lacking in compunction afterwards.

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The problem with addiction is that it doesn't matter how many people love and support you and try to help you.

An addict or alcoholic will never turn the corner until they bottom out and reach the point where they will ask for

help. The depths of depravity to which an addict can attain before acknowleging their inability to stop is something that

regular citizens cannot comprehend. The percentage of addicts that recover and stay recovered is abysmally small.

Look at all the actors and musicians who go in an out of the mega-bucks re-habs over and over with their friends,

family and managers all rooting for them to do well... but don't. Addiction is a disease of the mind and spirit which

are not so well-understood as we'd like to believe and harder yet to cure.

Arrabbiata1 said:

I understand your frustration - there are innumerable examples of highly talented musicians who have destroyed their own promising careers and even taken others down with them and don't seem to get similarly vilified - if anything, venerated. However as has been painstakingly pointed out, there are so many musical talents that lacked the support Anthony had, furthermore I can't think of many - if indeed any - having fallen from grace that would steal an old persons pension to feed their rampant drug habit and yet ostensibly remain so arrogant and lacking in compunction afterwards.

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No one can defend the behaviour, and such people will even rob their own grandmothers, not just other people's. Anecdotally people who are involved in drug and alcohol counselling etc professionally seem to find the narcotic addicts in particular unpleasant to deal with also.



As far as I know keith richards never stole from anyone to feed his drug addictions though, and people who partake of alcohol might be more likely to engage in such behaviour as well if a pharmacologically effective dose of alcohol could not be had for less than several hundred dollars.



I have no answers, and am not directly involved in the field, but I do know there are genetic factors involved and not just "strength of character", and that there is a medical issue and not just a moral one. My philosophical inclination in isolation is that adults should be allowed to go to hell in a handbasket any way they choose, and that making the drugs legal would at least get rid of much of the crime, which doesn't however address the problem of kids being exposed.

michaelm said:

No one can defend the behaviour, and such people will even rob their own grandmothers, not just other people's. Anecdotally people who are involved in drug and alcohol counselling etc professionally seem to find the narcotic addicts in particular unpleasant to deal with also.



As far as I know keith richards never stole from anyone to feed his drug addictions though, and people who partake of alcohol might be more likely to engage in such behaviour as well if a pharmacologically effective dose of alcohol could not be had for less than several hundred dollars.

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It's been my experience that medical professionals in general only view addicts from a clinical perspective. In general doctors are taught to keep a degree of emotional distance from patients of every kind. Doctors who never imagined (before choosing their speciality) dealing with addicts are not taught in medical school to understand or empathize with the disease of addiction. It's the rare doctor who really comprehends the concept of addiction as a disease. The self-destructive and self-absorbed qualities of addicts are not a matter of a determined conscious will to hurt themselves or others, anymore than a person with Alzhiemers. The damaged brain chemistry of an addict results in a singular lack of will; an inability to do the most simple "next right thing'. As long as the medical community remains ignorant of the concept of addiction as a disease - they will continue to be ineffective at treating it; they will continue to see addicts as weak-willed or depraved; and continue to wall themselves away from the empathy required to connect with the patients in a meaningful way.



As to Kieth. Did you read his bio? He never robbed anyone's granny - but he was at the center of a scene that ruined a number of lives. I've made my living in the music world for more than three decades and I've known numerous people whose lives went down the toilet as a result of being in the sphere of Kieth and others like him. There's a ....-load of musicians who might never have used heroin if they'd not worked with Kieth. His influence in that regard, is staggering. Richards was like a plague rat with a syringe.

Keshav said:

I experience that medical professionals in general only view addicts from a clinical perspective. In general doctors are taught to keep a degree of emotional distance from patients of every kind. Doctors who never imagined (before choosing their speciality) dealing with addicts are not taught in medical school to understand or empathize with the disease of addiction. It's the rare doctor who really comprehends the concept of addiction as a disease. The self-destructive and self-absorbed qualities of addicts are not a matter of a determined conscious will to hurt themselves or others, anymore than a person with Alzhiemers. The damaged brain chemistry of an addict results in a singular lack of will; an inability to do the most simple "next right thing'. As long as the medical community remains ignorant of the concept of addiction as a disease - they will continue to be ineffective at treating it; they will continue to see addicts as weak-willed or depraved; and continue to wall themselves away from the empathy required to connect with the patients in a meaningful way.



As to Kieth. Did you read his bio? He never robbed anyone's granny - but he was at the center of a scene that ruined a number of lives. I've made my living in the music world for more than three decades and I've known numerous people whose lives went down the toilet as a result of being in the sphere of Kieth and others like him. There's a ....-load of musicians who might never have used heroin if they'd not worked with Kieth. His influence in that regard, is staggering. Richards was like a plague rat with a syringe.

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I agree with you and do see addiction as a disease with a strong organic/biochemical/genetic basis as I thought I said earlier, which I think is also now the widely held scientific view. I like everyone else don't know the solution to the problem, but the criminalisation/moral condemnation approach to the addicts themselves anyway isn't it imo. Some pragmatic things have been done in Australia such as needle exchange programmes which despite obvious public health benefits even for the general community are still railed against by shock jocks.



My point obviously poorly made in regard to keith richards was that the illegal nature of the drugs leading to the exorbitant cost has as a consequence both the petty crime of the addicts, and the financing of vast empires of criminality many orders of magnitude greater and nastier, and that richards' drug addiction while having very adverse consequences for him and even more so for others as you say didn't result in him becoming a petty thief as far as I know given he could afford the stuff.



I am a huge fan of the music of keith richards and the rolling stones , but having his biography on my coffee table upstairs as I type, having read previous unauthorised biographies and much of the stuff in the musical press these several decades, agree absolutely that he has had a terrible influence on the lives of many, going back to the likes of gram parsons, mick taylor joining the band at age 19 or whatever and leaving an addict, even charlie watts getting on the stuff at one stage. For reflections on drug addiction I would look more to Neil Young , particularly " Tonight's the Night" , both the song and album, as well as the more famous song from "Harvest".

Young's "The Needle And The Damage Done". One of the most heartbreaking commentaries on the whole Rock 'n' Roll heroin thing.



Also a big Stones fan. Seen them live many times. Kieth was a huge style innovator for rock guitarists everywhere and huge influence on me as a player. When I see any concert footage of the Stones from the last 20 years I'm staggered by how badly he and Woody play. Far as I know Woody is still completely strung out too. The contrast between the awful playing from those two and the magnificent fireworks from Jeff Beck who didn't do the drug thing, is staggering.



I've wondered at times if Kieth hadn't been surrounded by a financial cushion and endless sycophants telling him how great he is

- if he would have perhaps got genuinely clean. Guess we'll never know.