On The Pegs October 2019 -Volume 4 - Issue 10 | Page 81

On The Pegs Vol. 4 Issue 10 - October 2019 81 well. I know I was kind of in a league of my own in ’15, and this year it was definite- ly a little bit tougher. But a lot of the guys, like Thad, I was a little bit surprised. Not saying he wasn’t good, but I know Thad’s really fast and he’s capable of sprinting, but he just wasn’t quite as on point as I thought he would be. Strang was better than I expected him to be. So it’s hard to say from ’15 to now the level where we’re at now. You’ve raced for KTM since your XC2 days. How has that stability helped you with your career? It’s been huge because I’ve been around everybody on the team. Some people come and go, but for the most part everybody that’s there has been there for many years now. We all got a pretty good relationship. We developed the team. We’ve been able to develop the team and make it really strong. I had to switch it up and we just keep progressing. Each year Antti is able to add something new and get us a little bit more support somewhere. The team is in a league of its own, really. It’s nice to be on it because Antti goes above and beyond for everything. He thinks of everything and doesn’t leave any stone unturned when it comes to being successful. Do you have any interesting stories about other teams trying to lure you away? No, not really. I’ve had some offers and talks, but that’s been years ago. Since I signed in 2016, I was talking to a couple teams and even way before, back in my XC2 days, I think that was the only other time that I talked to any teams. It’s been a pretty solid home for me. I haven’t ever really felt the need to kind of go shop- ping, so it’s been pretty nice. Switching to ISDE, where does the ISDE fit into your year in terms of the importance of that event and your goals? It’s a huge event and it’s really tough, mentally and physically. My goals for it is definitely to try and win it one day. That’s kind of one of my last goals in racing is to try to win an overall at Six Days. Like I said, it all comes down to the terrain and where you’re at and how good you feel. I know those Euros, they do that stuff all the time. We only have a few races that are similar in that aspect of racing. It’s definitely harder for us to go over there and be successful, so as a team when we won in ’16 it was really awesome. In ’16 I don’t think any one of us that were on the team even raced a Sprint Enduro series that year. It was pretty cool to go and win.