On The Pegs May 2020 - Volume 5 - Issue 5 | Page 71

On The Pegs
VOL. 5 ISSUE 5 - MAY 2020
71
you’re racing against that are beating you.
Were you always a Yamaha guy?
I’ve been Yamaha since 2000, but prior to that, actually growing up as a kid I
always rode Kawasaki. Our local dealership in Washington helped me out and they
were always Kawasaki. Then I went KTM for two years, ’97 and ’98. I would have
stayed KTM. I was real happy with them, but honestly what happened was I decid-
ed in ’99 to move to the east coast and give GNCC a try. Well KTM had Watts and
Lafferty. They wanted me to be a regional guy. “You stay in Washington. That’s
where we need you,” they said. I told them that I needed to go east. My local deal-
ership sold me a Kawasaki cheap and I loaded her up and came east.
I remember your dad, Darrell, really well and he wrenched for you. Did he
move down too?
No he flew in for each one. He’d work all week. He’d fly out on a Friday, meet me
at the track. Typically he show up to the track Saturday afternoon after I had bi-
cycled the track. Back then we didn’t have e-bikes. It took four hours to bicycle or
walk the track. So dad would meet me and we would go to the motel. We’d race
on Sunday. He’d drive the rental car back to the airport and he’d be home Monday
for work. That was in ’99, 2000, 2001 he did that. Once I got the ride with Randy
Hawkins in ’02 and I started winning races and stuff like that, that’s when he kind
of semi-retired and he moved back east to live with me. He was part of the group.
Tell me what kind of mentor Randy was to you?
It’s funny. Growing up as a kid and reading about him in the magazines, and my
dad remembers the first time I ever saw him. We were at an ISDE qualifier back in
’95. Those guys were on an absolutely different pedestal. Just looking up to them.
Me and Randy have a very weird relationship. In ’94 when everybody was qualify-
ing for the Oklahoma ISDE, Randy was about three minutes behind me and I was
fifteen years old. He would catch me every test. Well, one test I crashed my brains
out. Had a concussion. Don’t remember a thing. When I woke up, guess who was
there with me? Randy! At that time, we didn’t know each other. Then in ’99 at the
Kentucky GNCC, I was doing pretty good but my bike got stuck in gear. I was try-
ing to ride in third gear the whole track. I ended up hitting a bump under deceler-
ation. I couldn’t shift, so when I hit the bump it just kicked me. I splattered myself
on a tree. Same thing, big concussion. Randy lost the race. He sat there with me
the entire time. That was before we even knew each other. Then when I signed on