Rider’s names and nicknames being printed on their butt patches has become a real trend in motorcycle racing and we reckon it’s here to stay.
Why do MotoGP, WSBK, MXGP, MXoN and other major bike competitions see riders with their names or nicknames printed on their butt patches?
It’s a question some of us don’t know the answer to – or maybe never even thought about.
Frenchman Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP), with his ‘El Diablo’ patch, and motocross legend Jeremy McGrath, nicknamed ‘The King’, are just a couple of high-profile examples.
McGrath’s sponsorship deal with Fox Sports changed the butt patch game – especially in 1997.
“That’s when that really became a real artistic thing because it was no longer those block letters cut out and kind of made to look like something, they were actually like art,” said McGrath.
In MotoGP, Italian legend Valentino Rossi was doing the same. The now iconic, multiple-coloured ‘The Doctor’ printed on the butt patch of the Italian will remain a true emblem of the sport forever.
“It’s funny because I’m friends with Valentino, and he was a huge fan of mine, so I’m not going to say that I take a little credit for that, but I’m kind of going to say I take a little credit for that,” joked McGrath.
Rider’s names and nicknames being printed on their butt patches has become a real trend and we reckon it’s here to stay. Photo by Andy McGechan, BikesportNZ.com
Investigating the correlation between Rossi’s rise and the revolution of TV broadcasting, and the influence of major sponsors like Repsol, Red Bull and Monster, ESPN and Quartararo explain that nowadays, the rider’s butt patch is one of the only places they can still show off a bit of their personality.
“For the image of the riders, [the butt patch] is important, but not really for the sponsor,” Quartararo said. “I think this is pretty nice from every team to leave this space to the rider and show off a little bit of their personality.”
From American football to the football that the rest of the world plays, and practically every sport in between, fans have learned that the best way to identify their favourite players is to look for the giant numbers on their backs and the names printed above them. In MotoGP, though, if you’re trying to tell which rider is which, your best bet is to check their butt.
Butt patches have a history in motorcycle racing dating back to the 1970s, but through evolutions in technology, the emergence of a few larger-than-life personalities and racing’s inherently all-consuming sponsorship model, they have become the de facto means of rider self-expression in 2023. Nowhere else on a set of leathers will you find a rider’s name than the seat of their pants.
The story of the butt patch begins in motocross.
This butt patch was on the pants of New Zealand’s Cody Cooper at the Motocross of Nations in Ernee, France, in 2015. Photo by Andy McGechan, BikesportNZ.com
As the sport grew more popular in the late 1970s and early 1980s, it became a business, with manufacturers like Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki and Yamaha beginning to field teams. Their riders wore identical gear, and often bibs covered up any names and numbers on the backs of jerseys, so suppliers like Fox Racing – a brand that’s been synonymous with motocross for more than 40 years – started printing riders’ names across their butts.
For much of the next decade, it was pretty simple: big block letters spelling out a rider’s last name were cut out of leather and sewn onto the back of their pants. Then Jeremy McGrath came along.
“In ’87 Loretta Lynn’s Amateur Race, I was novice class, I was a nobody at the time, and I had ‘Showtime’ on my pants,” McGrath revealed. “It was something that my dad put on there because I used to just show off a lot for my parents, because where my house was situated, my track was in the backyard and the house sat above it. So I would just be out there showing off the whole time, so my dad put ‘Showtime’ on my pants and, lo and behold, the results and then the image started to take [hold].”
The image that the Southern California native refers to is one of an icon, of an innovator, and of someone who “liked to smart off every now and again,” as he put it.
His 72 wins in the 250cc/450cc Supercross class are most all time – his closest challenger is 21 victories behind – earning him the nickname of the “King of Supercross.”
He won two junior-class Supercross championships (1991 and 1992), seven 250cc/450cc Supercross titles between 1993 and 2000, and one 250cc/450cc outdoor motocross crown (1995).
Words courtesy ESPN
Photos by Andy McGechan, BikesportNZ
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