Another account, some years later:
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/opinion/motogp/you-release-brakes-and-believe
On the final lap, racing through the forest in top gear, their 500s yowling like a thousand angry chainsaws, Rainey was ahead by a few yards, Schwantz tying his RGV in knots trying to stay with him, a bit like Márquez on the last lap at Motegi, losing the rear of his RC213V so badly that he was half off the bike. This, in fact, was the moment that decided Sunday’s race.
With half a lap to go at Hockenheim Schwantz somehow found himself back in the lead, which is just where he didn’t want to be, because Hockenheim was a huge racetrack, with straights like autobahns, where the key to success was using the vacuum created by the bike in front to magic a few extra miles an hour from your own motorcycle.
Exiting the chicane that took them onto the final straight before the stadium section and the chequered flag, Schwantz moved to the right of the track, Rainey ducking out of the RGV’s slipstream and passing him on the far right. Usually at this point Rainey would be on the far left of the circuit, lining up for the right-hander into the stadium; the last realistic overtaking opportunity. But this time he was on the wrong side of the track, which messed up his perception of where he was, because he wasn’t where he had been on every lap of practice, so his mental picture of his braking markers was all wrong.
Schwantz was now in Rainey’s draft, just inches off the YZR’s rear wheel at 180 mph. What happened next was possibly the greatest overtake in Grand Prix history. But this wasn’t so much Schwantz’s genius at work – “see God, then brake” – this move was in fact unplanned.
“When Wayne comes past me I get a really good draft off him and I’m thinking, it’s not over yet! All I can see is the Marlboro on the back of his seat and then it’s like it comes right back at me, because he gets on the brakes earlier than he intended. So I’m thinking, f**k! What did you do that for?
“What happened is he’s a bit lost, because we’re on the opposite side of the track to usual, so the brake markers and reference points are all different. My first intention is to not hit him. I have to take evasive action and then I start getting the bike stopped. I’m getting out of shape but that’s helping me slow down.
“I’m up the inside and if you watch the video you’ll see me look back. Reason I look back is because I’ve gone back to first gear for a second-gear corner; I’m trying everything I can to stop. When I get back on the gas the engine goes dead and won’t run. I’m like, mother**ker! What’s wrong? I look down and the tacho is at 15,000, when the engine barely turned above 12,000. So I grab another gear and that’s when I look back to see how big is this **** fight going to be when we get to the Sachs Kurve, the final left-hander.”
Rainey found no room to counter attack at the Sachs Kurve, so he crossed the finish line 0.0176 seconds down. He was deeply unhappy about Schwantz’s pass, because the youngster was totally out of control, even though (for once) it wasn’t his fault.
“I was pissed off because Kevin just saw me braking and then he braked and ended up way deep in there. I was still trying to go around the outside of him, but his momentum carried us both to the edge of the track and I knew then it was done because there were no more chances to get back by him. He did a move where he was going to make it or we were both not going to make it. I could’ve leant on him really hard and the chances are we both would’ve gone down. If I had done that, Mick Doohan would’ve been champion that year.”
The Texan and his crew were in paroxysms of joy. There is no official record of what happened next, but you can be sure that one or two of Suzuki’s rent-a-cars didn’t make it back to the airport the next day. Meanwhile, Rainey was burning with anger and so was his team boss ‘King’ Kenny Roberts, who took losing just as badly. Back then, especially when those two Americans were involved, every defeat was the end of the world.
In 1991 Schwantz and Rainey hated each other – really despised each other – and this wasn’t a put-on thing for the cameras. Their loathing had festered in US superbikes and ripened in Europe.