The racing in the 80's on these type of bikes was infinitely better than it is now. The bikes were capable of coping with and adjusting to the riders finesse and style. The manufacturers were different enough in their bikes to produce some very exciting and lethal machines which gave us the fans some amazing races and memories. Glorious times of sunshine and girlfriends that i'm so glad i lived through the 80's in my late teens and early 20's.

The 500s were much better racing than motogp is nowadays. It was raw and pure class .

I went to the Yamaha  Laguna Seca tour from Santa Rosa California with my father, we rode our bikes stopping along the way gathering multiple riders and as we rode onto Cabrillo hwy CHP held automobile traffic so us riders could have the entire Hwy 1 , a few hundred bikes. That year Kenny Roberts was favored. When we arrived all riders got a complimentary lap on the world famous track and were to be greeted by the man himself bur somehow it didn’t happen. One of the most fun events of my life. I was 18 years old and was riding a honda cb 350 and my father was on a yamaha 650 special. Good times.(edit) This took place in 1981. We lived in Santa Rosa.

I'm 53 and I love old school sport bikes

This was the first USGP in over 20 years and before my time anyway. GP coming to the States, gonnna make this happen somehow, gonna see Freddie! Flew out from Ohio on a "business" trip (thank you IBM), stayed free in the Presidential Suite of a 4star managed by my former college girlfriend, borrowed her car and went alone. Freddie took a parade lap on a street bike having announced his (1st) retirement in the previous week. Dude, really? The coolest thing? Jimmy Filice's 250 win. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7Z1tM-MtEs) Last second fill-in rider on an unsponsored NSR250 and his 1st GP. Won by 9 seconds on an all white bike with numbers and white leathers. Unforgettable. And Gardner on the left-hander after the corkscrew lap after lap the bike is twitching all over the place but his engine note never wavered. DUDE!

Long live these gods of the real MotoGP.  I still proudly wear several versions of the Wayne Gardener and Eddie Lawson red, white, and blue Shoei replica helmets on my blue/white/red '86 Ninja GPz600R.

My mouth is twitching from all the cigarette sponsorship. A lucky Strike sounds good.

4 of the top 5 finishers went on to win the GP500 championship. Very competitive riders. Schwantz had bigger heuvos than he had sense. The bikes he rode never would have done as well with a different rider.  Great track, fun race. For the GP500 (watched other segments over the week end walking around the track -- great spectator track for walkers) sat at the bottom outside of the downhill Dunlap bridge.  Best place if you had to sit at only one spot.  Randy Mamola walked through the crowd on Saturday; answered any questions; he had bumped his head in a crash during practice or qualifying (it's been too long to recall) and didn't feel good enough to race.  He turned down an offer of a beer, said he would feel the affect a week from now.  An early appreciation for conditioning requirements (not yet a general thing to do in motor sports at the time, but clearly things were changing quickly). Oddly enough, my mom worked with Lawson's mom at the time. Mom couldn't understand how big a deal it was. Eddie's mom said they spent every weekend in the desert (motocross or desert racing I presume) when he was a kid.

It was 1988 when I had my friend's mom record the Lemans GP on her VCR. I still have it. Became an instant lifelong Schwantz fan. Got to see him at Laguna Seca when he won the title in '94 (although Kocinski won the race on that  beautiful Cagiva 😍).

Dorna and the IRTA need to DITCH the Moto GP race in Texas and bring it back to Laguna where it rightfully BELONGS

This looks like an awesome era for racing, I'm much too young to have known about this era, but it looks awesome. The first thing I noticed however is the modern strides we've made in commentating. We have such better information and commentary throughout the race, not just announcing numbers and positions.

Thanks for this, we went on a 3 day pilgrimage every year to camp at the bottom of the screw, we even had the same camping neighbors every year, good times.

I'm not sure if I have commented before, but watching this brought back some good memories with my younger brother. So my youngest son bought tickets for Firestone GP this weekend, Thank you. While studying and planning my weekend, I came across this video. I and my younger brother.
Who I lost about 2 years ago. Rented a convertible Mustang GT.
We flew down to Monterey, made it on time.
We ended up posting back by the CorkScrew. What this doesn't show is Eddie Lawson through/tossed his helmet in the crowd, we were right there. What A souvenir/ Piece of history. Also reminded first Gran Prix in America.

wow neil had such a great race ❤

Thanks for posting this bit of history!

I was so lucky to ride up to Laguna to see this, awesome time!

Back in the days of the overnight special tire compounds lol!

Laguna is like Knockhill but a bit longer. Mackenzie obviously loving it and racing it like a 12 lap dash. Nearly did it too.

I was there👍🏼

I was there! I got the t-shirt and the memories to go with it.  The sound and ferocity of a 500 ‘on the pipe’ is a sound that you must hear to appreciate.  The power to weight ratio was insane! Only a handful of riders could ride them at the limit. It separated the men from the Europeans.