Transcript of a phone interview conducted January 16, 2007 at 4:35 p.m. Pacific Standard Time: Roadracingworld.com: Did you ever race on Pirelli tires? Jamie James: “No. But (in 1990) I rode on Yokohamas and we finished second in a World Superbike race on them and had a good shot at winning it. But somehow things got messed up and they just kind of slowed down on the support. I don’t know if it was problems with the U.S. distributor and Yokohama or what, I don’t speak Japanese. I don’t know what happened but we weren’t getting the tires that we needed so we decided to switch and go to Dunlops.” More, from a reader who was there: FIRST PERSON/OPINION Via e-mail: During the 1990 season, Jamie James used Yokohamas up until July. It was at the Miami round of the AMA Superbike Series that the Yokohama rep ran out of the special “A” tires (which weren’t as good as off-the-shelf Dunlop items), and Ferracci said “No way!” The Yokohama rep “ordered” him (‘DO NOT PUT THOSE TIRES ON THESE RIMS!’) not to put the Dunlops on the wheels, as they stood at (Dunlop race tire distributor) Phil Flack’s canopy and Ferracci said “I got to. I wasta’ the talent (motioning to James) and wasta’ da guy’s expertise (motioning to Phillip) for what? Because you canta bring no tire? Ess f–king stupid.” That was after practice on Friday. The bike never rolled on the Dunlops until Saturday. After Friday practice, myself, Jimmy Adamo and the Ferracci crew all went back to the hotel together. As we were driving, Jamie kept saying, “I wanna put a Michelin on the front.” (He obviously wasn’t looking to change one tire, but the front Yokohamas were the real concern and the front Michelins at the time were excellent.) He was still not sure about the switch to the unfamiliar Dunlops (I think he was a Michelin guy prior to all of this.) I did my best to re-assure Jamie that Eraldo had made the right choice. At the time, Adamo had recently switched from Michelins to Dunlops a few rounds earlier, at Road America. We ran them for the rest of the 1990 season and that was it. The Dunlops had very different characteristics than the Michelins, but the Dunlops had the upper hand and Adamo had no real tire sponsor at that time, so we ran the Dunlops and went faster. I told Jamie that the switch to Dunlop from Michelin made Adamo’s lap times drop. He was skeptical, but he calmed down a bit after I fired off some before-and-after lap times from Wisconsin. Both Jamie James and Jimmy Adamo were running Ducati 888s, so it was a fair comparison. During Friday practice when Jamie was on the Yokohamas, he seemed to be tip-toeing out of the final corner that incorporated the pit wall. You could see he was clearly not comfortable. The next morning during practice, we all waited at the wall to see if the Dunlops were going to make the teeth come out for JJ. Jamie came around and after three laps was wide open 50 feet earlier than the day before, leaving darkies all the way up to the Armco barrier. He was immediately faster. He got off the bike and was all smiles. Jamie had a chance to win that race but unfortunately crashed out. Enzo Assainte Bergenfield, New Jersey