If you're not a big fan of Americans, the 1994 WSC season must have been an immensely satisfying year. Yankee Scott Russell uncharacteristically choked on the bit and Brit Carl Fogarty purged Russell of the world title. Is this yet another arc in the cycle? Will, as close watchers of the series have predicted, the title reside in non-American mitts for seasons to come?

Before you count the boys from the Colonies out of world championship racing where the bikes have valves, examine the next American phenom: Colin Edwards.

Following fellow Texans Doug Polen, Bubba Shobert and Kevin Schwantz to the roadracing arena, Edwards is just twenty years old. Like Schwantz before him, has a great variety of motorcycle racing experience packed in his meager life years. A nationally ranked motocrosser in his teens, Edwards suddenly burned out by the constant regiment of racing and one day stopped, he dropped the helmet and picked up a tennis racket, finding near-instant success there as well.

Freddie Spencer thought this detail a vital indication of the kid's cerebral strength, "The best thing he can do is not get burned out by racing," Spencer said.

With the backing of a well-moneyed supporter, Edwards delved back into roadracing again a year or so later. Given his background he instantly flicked into two stroke racing and moved into the professional 250 class teamed with perennial 250 competitor Chris D'Aluisio.

During this period Edwards faced a great onslaught of criticism from competitors and race-watchers alike because of his seemingly red-carpeted walk to the premier two stroke racing class in America. Many waited eagerly for him to crumble under pressure or fail miserably in the face of tough competition. He did neither, dominating the US 250 class like no one since Kocinski. In his inaugural race, Daytona, he won spectacularly and never looked back, commanding the series and winning the championship with a flair that had long been absent from the class.

His success did not go unnoticed. By the third race of the series Edwards was under contract with Yamaha and they were preparing a Superbike berth for him.

Aboard a mondo horsepower Superbike, Edwards immediately found himself perplexed by the relative piggishness of the Superbike. The easy handling and honed mid corner line changes that were specialty on the 250 were non-existent on the OWO1 Yamaha as prepared by Vance and Hines. He and the Yamaha suspension engineers butted heads at racetracks around the US—Edwards, always trying to make the bike behave like a 250, the engineers, knowing this was not possible, trying to convert Colin to the machine. Other than a pole position at Elkhart Lake's Road America, Edwards' first season on a Superbike was not a raging success.

The pained expression Edwards had on his face any time the OW was rolled out for him disappeared in late 1993 when the OWO1 was mothballed and the much refined YZF Yamaha Superbike debuted.

Edwards, with a more responsive chassis under him, almost instantly became more threatening. The Superbike would obviously never be a 250 but the kid and the bike jelled well enough for him to run at the front of the pack and to garner his first AMA Superbike win in 1994 at Mid Ohio. And the party didn't end early, Edwards went on to win more races and out-qualify Scott Russell at Road Atlanta. The road had been perceived as an easy one for him to travel. It wasn't. Yet, he'd arrived.

As stated he's just a pup, twenty or some ludicrous age, and if one squints his eyes just right Edwards slightly resembles fellow Texan Kevin Schwantz, painfully thin with that porcelain-like bone structure. Body shape notwithstanding, Edwards exudes that Schwantz certitude, a confidence level that borders on invincibility, as if he would willingly stick his neck in a guillotine because he knew the blade would not cut his neck. Does Colin junior concur? "No", he says with a slow Texas drawl, "I feel that invincible is a little bit over-confident a word." But with a smile he affirms that he fears no other rider in the world.

Yet, there was obviously a time when Edwards did not gush confidence in himself nor the Yamaha Superbike. How did he travel from mid pack to the top of the podium? After a re-think of his approach to racing Edwards says he simply changed his attitude and made things happen for himself. He stopped looking for excuses as to why he wasn't winning. He explains his new approach, "Basically, it's mind over anything. Anything you want to accomplish you have to set your mind to it first; you can't just want to do it, you have to go out there and know you can do it. You can't be in this game and think, 'maybe I can do it, I think I can do it.' You need to know you can do it. You need to take a few words out of your vocabulary and stop saying 'I think so' or 'maybe.' You need to say 'I can do it.' Can't and hope and maybe and what if and might ... don't have any room in racing. I will. I can."

"It may sound kinda corny but I was going out on the track every time before this happened to me saying, 'Yeah, the Ducati's are going good and they're lighter and have more power,' and hell, I'd have myself beat before the race even began. At Mid Ohio I said that I was going to go out there and get pole and kick everybody's ass, set a new lap record and win the race. And I did."

Edwards will leave America for Europe without ever winning a Superbike championship. Does he feel a sense of unfinished business in America? "No I feel like I have pretty much proven myself. And I don't think it would have taken me to win a championship to prove to anybody that I'm for real."

Yamaha made the decision in late 1994 to make a multi-year push in WSC racing beginning in 1995, although the plan dates back several years. There are whispers that Yamaha's motivation for seriously going World Superbike racing are rooted in their dismal GP results since the end of Wayne Rainey's racing career. No matter the reason, Yamaha has not seen riders they felt were ready for such an assault in the current WSC or American farm system. Enter Edwards. He was ready, they readied a place for him.

And so, Edwards enters 1995 poised for greatness in a world championship series, but with a goal of winning races, not the championship. "My goal is definitely not to win the championship by not winning races. I would rather win races than win the championship ... there just isn't any glory if you win a championship without winning races."

"And I'm confident. I'm not going over there thinking that I can't be competitive with those guys. I haven't even seen the bike I'm going to be riding, but I know I am going to go over there and race. There is no other option. That's the way it's going to happen."

Young Edwards' eyes are assuredly set on racing the 1996 GP series, no matter the results from 1995. With even a marginal 95 outcome Yamaha will have a difficult time re-signing him to any contract where the bikes have intake valves, simply because the boy feels riding a 500 is his rightful place in the ecosystem. "My career goal is to get on a 500. I just feel that with all of the two stroke experience I have that is my place ... I'm so much more comfortable on a two stroke than a four stroke. A four stroke, it feels like the whole time I have been riding them I have been learning how to ride them. And a two stroke just seems to suit me better."

In racer slang, the WSC series is referred to as "The World". According to those around him and even the lad himself, Colin Edwards is ready for The World.