AMA Announces The 2016 AMA Motorcyclists of the Year

From an AMA press release:

The American Motorcyclist Association announced today that its 2016 AMA Motorcyclists of the Year are U.S. World Trophy Team members Taylor Robert, Kailub Russell, Thad DuVall and Layne Michael. On Oct. 16, 2016, they accomplished something that no team of American motorcyclists had done before: They won the Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme’s International Six Days Enduro.

“This shared achievement of Taylor, Kailub, Thad and Layne is historic,” said AMA President and CEO Rob Dingman. “Generations of AMA members have chased the ISDE World Trophy, and these four riders have finally caught it for all of us.”

The AMA Motorcyclist — or Motorcyclists — of the Year is the individual or group of individuals who have had the largest positive impact on motorcycling in the calendar year. Since 1913, the ISDE has invited the countries of the world to send their best racers. It is a crown that has always eluded American racers. Until now.

“This triumph is unprecedented, and it is my honor to recognize these riders as the 2016 AMA Motorcyclists of the Year,” Dingman said.

The 2016 ISDE was Oct. 11-16 in Navarra, Spain. The U.S. World Trophy Team started strong, powering to a 26.02-second gap on the first day. The team added to its lead on the second and third days, slipped a bit on Day 4, then held fairly steady on Days 5 and 6, finishing 3 minutes, 38.66 seconds ahead of the second-place Great Britain team.

In addition, Taylor Robert won the individual overall at the event, only the second time in history an American has accomplished that goal.

The U.S. World Trophy riders led a strong U.S. effort that saw the Junior team finish second in its division, the Women’s team come in fourth, club teams finish second and third, and American Fred Hoess win the FIM Vintage Trophy.

“For decades, American teams have struggled to win at the ISDE, but in 2016, all those efforts paid off,” Dingman said. “While Taylor, Kailub, Thad and Layne would surely be the first to give credit to lessons learned in previous years, they are the riders who hoisted the ISDE World Trophy for the first time in history.”

Profiles of Robert, Russell, DuVall and Michael can be found in the January 2017 issue of American Motorcyclist, the official journal of the AMA.