Sponsors in the 80's

I remember Rodney Smith and Donny Schmidt having Chesterfield gear. Kinda makes me want to start smoking cigarrets . Smoking makes you look cool.

Camel was a Supercross Sponsor through the 90s.



Several companies sponsored SX and outdoors events. Wangler was a SX sponsor and the Grand National Champion IIRC was called "the Wrangler Jeans Grand National Champion" and got to run the blue numberplate with the yellow number one.

Private teams were tried but failed. The LOP privateer team lasted from '78 or 9 until '81 I believe. Team Tamm ran in the 1984 and 1985 seasons.

In the US it was more about manufacturers than outside corporate sponsors because 1) America was at the time by far the biggest off-road market in the world and 2) so the Big Four (esp. Honda and Kawasaki) were spending IMMENSE sums to build and run successful teams. Picking up even a couple of percentage points in market share meant a lot of additional bikes sold.

I believe Stefan Everts had L&M

Indeed he had.

Suzuki GP team was sponsored by Johnson cigarettes.

Great pics Tgo. Gene Fireball Gensch was from my area of the USA. After mx he went on to doing jump shows and some kind of rodeo shows down near you, maybe still to this day. His sister is married to my buddy.

There was also Glen Bell's '87 Marlboro Yamaha YZ250 froma down under!

I luv this pic!
So stylish..

We also had Peter Jackson Yamaha in Australia for a few years.

Here's team owner Craig Dack in 1992



and Kim Ashkenazi in 1994

Glen Bell on his Marlboro Yamaha, 1986

Craig Dack's 1990 Marlboro Yamaha YZ250

#4 was actually his team mate James Deakin's bike



Glen Bell (left) and James Deakin (right) in 1987

Peter Melton, Marlboro Yamaha, 1991

Peter Jackson Yamaha, 1992



Ben Perese



Steven "Wicksy" Andrew

Peter Jackson Yamaha, 1993



Lee Hogan

Peter Jackson Yamaha's Kim Ashkenazi, 1994. The final year of tobacco sponsorship in Australia.



From memory the law changed mid year about the ban on tobacco advertising. Hence the team ran the Peter Jackson team colors sans the logo as seen below...