Freddie Spencer
Fast Freddie: Three-time world champion and the only rider to win both 500cc and 250cc titles in one year.
Frederick Burdette Spencer (born December 20, 1961) is an American former professional motorcycle road racer. He competed in the FIM Grand Prix motorcycle racing world championships between 1980 and 1993, most prominently as a member of the Honda factory racing team where he was a three-time world champion. Nicknamed Fast Freddie, Spencer is regarded as one of the most accomplished motorcycle racers of the early 1980s.
Quick Facts
- Role
- 500 cc (0.5 L) World Champion (1983, 1984)
- Affiliation
- Honda HRC (Honda Racing Corporation)
- Nationality
- American (California)
- Signature machine
- Honda RC500
- Historic first
- First American 500 cc (0.5 L) World Champion; youngest 500 cc (0.5 L) champion at the time
- Notable rivalry
- Eddie Lawson (Honda teammate, early 1980s)
- Post-racing
- Television motorcycle racing commentator
Lore & Background
Spencer was born in Shreveport, Louisiana. He began racing at age four in dirt track events near Shreveport. After winning the 1978 250cc U.S. National Novice Class Road Racing Championship, he was contracted to ride for American Honda in the AMA Superbike Championship, giving Honda its first-ever superbike victory at Road America in 1980. He gained international prominence at the 1980 Transatlantic Trophy match races, defeating World Champions Kenny Roberts and Barry Sheene. In 1981, he split time between AMA Superbike and European Grands Prix, helping Honda develop the NR500. By 1982, he was full-time on Honda's Grand Prix team. He won the 500cc World Championship in 1983 at age 21, becoming the youngest to win the title (a record later surpassed by Marc Márquez in 2013). In 1985, he won both the 250cc and 500cc World Championships in the same year, making him the fifth and last rider to win in both 500cc and the next class down, and the only rider to win both 500cc and 250cc in one year. His career was cut short by wrist injuries. He never won another Grand Prix race after 1985 and retired from Grand Prix racing at the beginning of 1988, with comeback attempts in 1989 and 1993. He later raced in AMA Superbike in the 1990s, winning three races, and also raced in the Superbike World Championship on a Ducati. He operated a riding school until October 2008. He now lives in London and comments on television for racing series. In 2019, he was appointed chairman of the FIM MotoGP Stewards Panel.
Reader's Guide
Spencer won the 500cc World Championship in 1983 and 1985, not back-to-back. He did not win the title in 1984; that year he finished fourth in the championship despite winning three races on the NSR500 and two on the NS500. Eddie Lawson was not Spencer's Honda teammate in the early 1980s; Lawson joined Honda in 1984 and was on Yamaha in 1985 while Spencer was on Honda.
Did You Know?
- In 1985, Spencer won the Daytona 200, plus the Formula 1 and 250cc classes, making him the only rider to win all three divisions in a single year.
- Spencer won all three of his world titles on Hondas with tuner Erv Kanemoto as head mechanic.
- He was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1999 and named a Grand Prix Legend by the FIM in 2001.
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