Don't wait for your ship to come in, swim out and meet the bloody thing.

The advantage of the rain is that, if you have a quick bike, there's no advantage.

I vowed I would do everything I could to stop the Isle of Man counting towards the World Championship. And it was stopped, so they love me in the Isle of Man.

I thought: This is not racing, it's a suicide mission.

They were ridiculous times. After I won my World Championship in 1976, I went to Japan.

Nobody within motorcycling has or deserves any respect.

Endless motorbike talk can and does bore me.

I race in two or three classic races a year and I may carry on for 10 more years or I may stop tomorrow.

Son, don't mind what's missing. Count allthat's free: friendship, laughter, all thelove your heart can carry, and time -- count time.

We often forget that we are nature.

True friendship must be akin to romance, I think. only without all the anguish and anxiety.

I never had a piece of toast particularly long and wide, But fell upon the sanded floor, And always on the buttered side.

If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy.

Life in a great society, or for that matter in a small, is a web of tangled relations of all sorts, whose adjustment so that it may be endurable is an extraordinarily troublesome matter.

When things go wrong, your best recovery effort is required. But don't just provide the missing piece (that's the recovery), also provide uniquely personal assistance (that's the memorable effort).

I do think there was a period there when my sanity was under intense pressure, and I didn't know what to say or do or how to act. I was literally living from day to day.

If someone else doesn't like your confidence, that's their problem. Why? You always come before they do, that's why.

And where the offense is, let the great axe fall.