Robbie Knievel Long-Lost Interview: I Was Greater Daredevil Than My Dad Evel

Famed motorcycle daredevil Evel Knievel’s son Robbie Knievel, who died Friday, aged 60, swore he was a spoke off the same wheel as he father.

In a 1983 interview, Robbie Knievel, then aged 20, exposed the cracks in his fraught relationship with his world-famous daredevil dad.

“Hell, by the time I was a high school sophomore I was jumping bikes better than my dad,” boasted Robbie, who first rode a mini cycle in Evel’s shows at age four.

“The only way I can make a name for myself is to do everything he did — and do him one better — and I won’t quit until I do.”

As a teenager, Robbie displayed icy nerve by jumping 15 cars and two vans at a Commie California show.

But Evel wasn’t thrilled at his son’s bluster. He insisted Nobody could ever topple his records — and he admitted Robbie’s obsession with beating his father scared him.

“I thought I was a superman even when I was hurt,” Evel, told The National ENQUIRER, the magazine that chronicled the pair’s death-defying stunts.

“But I did what a motorcycle jumper should have done — and now there’s no room left for anyone else.

“After all the tears, I’ve asked Robbie Knievel not to risk his life. What good is it to gain notoriety after you’re dead?

“Robbie’s mother and I pleaded with him to finish high school. But he quit – and now he doesn’t even have a trade.

“Most kids Robbie’s age are half-wits. I don’t mean that in a derogatory way. It’s just that he’ll think differently when he’s older.”

Evel, who died in 2014, admitted he was lucky to be alive after his accident-studded career.

He set one record that will be tough to top — 422 broken bones. During Evel’s spectacular career of 300 amazing leaps, the daredevil broke his back seven times. 

Robbie insisted on becoming a professional daredevil, so Evel came out of retirement to manage his son’s career.

But the two had constant business arguments, and Robbie Knievel struck out on his own. 

Robbie also told The Enquirer: “Dad is the man I’ve always respected most in the world. But right now, we cannot get along in a business relationship. I just wish he’d stay in the background and let me be the boss.

“I don’t plan on dying – but I’ll be happy if I die on a motorcycle. The only thing I’m afraid of is never seeing my family or friends again.

“I think God was with my father because he crashed so many times and lived.

“And I hope God will be around to watch over me.”

Father and son spectacularly fell out over their raging ambition. 

In 1968, Evel attempted to jump the fountain at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas — and landed in a coma for a month. In April 1989, when his son and fellow daredevil Robbie made the jump successfully, their split began. 

“He never wanted anyone to surpass him,” explained Robbie in an interview before his death. “For years, it seemed like my dad was pushing me off, like I was his competitor.” 

Suffering from an incurable lung ailment that kept him close to an oxygen tank, Evel completed his final leap of faith by burying the hatchet with Robbie.

“We are talking and that is more than we have done since he kicked me out of my home when I was a teenager,” revealed Robbie at the time.

Before that, there were years of arguments.

“I’d been jumping my bike since I was tiny, but he didn’t want me to follow in his footsteps,” he said.

But as Evel faced the final years of his life, he embraced good and reached out to his son. 

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