KHC 141 - Brian Deegan

Brian Deegan - American freestyle motocross rider, X Games medalist, and off-road racer. Brian’s known for founding Metal Mulisha, landing the first 360 in FMX competition, and later winning championships in off-road and rallycross racing. He’s also the father of professional racers Hailie and Haiden Deegan. Join us for a conversation about Motocross, dangers in the sport, how Brian manages his business and social media channels to continue to grow, and more! Follow along: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cameronrhanes Twitter: https://twitter.com/cameronhanes Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/camhanes/ Website: https://www.cameronhanes.com Follow Brian: https://www.instagram.com/briandeegan38/ Thank you to our sponsors: MUD\WTR: https://mudwtr.com/cam use code CAM for 15% off Sig Sauer: https://www.sigsauer.com/ use code CAM10 for 10% off optics Ketone IQ: https://www.ketone.com/Cam use code CAM for 30% off your first subscription Hoyt: http://bit.ly/3Zdamyv use code CAM for 10% off MTN OPS Supplements: https://mtnops.com/ Use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% off and Free Shipping Black Rifle Coffee: https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/ Use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% your first order Timestamps: 00:00:00 Business and Social Media Presence 00:06:29 Credibility on Social Media 00:09:33 Taking Risks to Build the Deegan Empire 00:13:53 Forks in the Road: How Brian Almost Died 00:17:48 Any Regrets on the Edge of Death? 00:20:33 Brian’s Crash that Almost Killed Him 00:23:41 Being a Supportive Dad Through Kids Growth 00:36:52 An Avenue Out of Being Average 00:38:32 14 Years Old & Finding a Place to Train Year-Round 0041:44 Taking Risks as a Kid 00:47:55 Pressure from Travis Pastrana 00:50:48 Crusty Demons of Dirt 00:52:57 Metal Mullisha 00:56:11 Action Sports Vibe in the 90’s 00:57:25 Action Sports to Truck Racing 01:02:31 Providing Through Marketing & Licensing 01:04:58 Documentaries - Are the Deegans Bigger than Motocross? 01:06:54 Navigating Deals & Sponsors 01:10:34 Navigating Partnerships 01:18:44 Behind the Scenes - The Side You Don’t See 01:23:07 The Dangers of Motocross 01:29:19 Long Term Healthcare in Motocross & Supercross 01:34:47 What Makes the Best Riders, the Best 01:41:10 Raising Tough Kids 01:45:20 The Effect of Bodyweight in Racing 01:50:14 Difficulty of Riding Through Shadows 01:51:59 Is Haiden Deegan Ready to Race 450? 01:53:20 Training Motocross Kids to be the Best 01:59:22 The Secret to Success: Having Goals 02:02:42 F#$k, Marry, Kill: Motocross, Freestyle, & Truck Racing 02:06:03 Outro Badass Raptor Giveaway:https://cameronhanes.com/pages/hennesseyraptor

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:15Cameron Hanes?

  All right, we are with Brian Deegan on the Keep Hammer Collective. Dude, I cannot believe you're here.

• 0:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's been a few years in the making. When did we start talking about this?

• 0:27Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, it's been a little while.

• 0:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:29Cameron Hanes?

  I mean, I've known of you forever.

• 0:31Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 0:31Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, but I never thought that you'd be here. You are like, because I always say, what I, who I have on the podcast is outliers. And you are like the definition of outlier. And now, now, you know, I'm still older than you, but you know, you've been around a while. And still, but still can shaking things up. How, how does that work?

• 0:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it's just keep reinventing myself and I feel like I've, I love marketing, I love business. And, you know, in the categories that I enjoy, you know, I've been pretty fortunate to ever have to do as much that I don't want to do as far as like categories. But yeah, I feel like nowadays it's, it's my category is more like mentoring my kids, I would say.

• 1:20Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:20Speaker 01

  And I find in my space, my niche, you know, but I had all my years of action sports, motocross, supercross, car racing, all that stuff. And now it's, I'd say I'm middle aged man. And also I have that going on. So, and there's always an audience for that. So it's good.

• 1:38Cameron Hanes?

  Well, I know now I've been to a couple of events and all I know is every time I'm around you, there's a million people yelling, Brian, Brian, Brian Deegan, Brian, Brian. It's like nonstop. People want picture, want some time, something. So, yeah, I mean, you say you're middle aged and like the dad thing, but man, you still got a presence out there.

• 2:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, and in our sport, such as I'll say, action sports and you know, motor sports. I grew up eh more the eighties, nineties, I'd say nineties was kind of my era. And so those guys from the nineties that were young teenagers that grew up in the my era, action sports militia, the whole vibe and and they are now their forties and fifties with kids. And their kids are now following my kids. And now kids are all watching, consuming their content through YouTube. So, and we started our YouTube channel over, man, it must have been, it's over 10 years ago now. We've been doing YouTube and we were one of the first ones in the motocross industry to do it.

• 2:43Speaker 01

  And we just stayed at it and it has built the craziest fan base. I mean, more than I could ever think of, you know, it's people following the journey of our kids from when they were younger racing. And they first started watching because of my ex-games and and action sports and car racing. And then they're watching the kids and I always felt like together was stronger, okay, like, like, instead of investing my time in, you know, a lot of other things, which I say, you have your stock value. Your name is your stock value to me.

• 3:21Cameron Hanes?

  You got one product.

• 3:22Speaker 01

  One product is your brand, right? And that's your name and that's your, you know, credibility. And so, and I am always invested back in my family and and I felt like that was important. And, and, you know, I definitely had pushback of like, oh, why would you expose your kids, your family on YouTube? And this and I thought, well, you know, I get your point, but we've always shown action, you know? We don't show too much personal, it's just like, okay, we're filming and showing what we're already doing, which is racing. You know, racing, action sports, flipping dirt bikes, you know, the fun stuff in the yard. That, you know, stuff people can relate to, and I feel like that journey has been something people have followed, you know, getting back to the point of nineties, you know, generation and I have people that have followed

• 4:06Speaker 01

  me, now their kids are following my kids. It has been a generational thing and now I think that's why the fan bases have gotten so big, you know?

• 4:14Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, it's a, that is, it's a delicate balance too, because people want all the information. They want all the behind the scenes, they want all, they love YouTube, they love seeing the racing, but. They want it all. They want to know everything. That gets tough sometimes, huh?

• 4:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, it does. And I think you have to be able to, you have to be able to draw a line, you know, and it's hard because social media will bait you and favor you to do things that sometimes you don't want to do. And the way I explain that is, you know, like, for example, my kids like, oh, they'll start posting something, it gets a lot of views, but it's not the right, morally the right thing, right? And I'm like, dude, like, you gotta be able to draw a line. But the problem is, they are good at what they do on social, these companies, so they can bait you into like, oh, views, views, views. So you, you know, girls are the best example of that, like, oh, show a little this, show that, get better views. And so at some point, yeah,

• 5:18Speaker 01

  yeah, okay, where's my line I'm drawing? Where's my morals? Where's? And I think that's a tough thing with social media, because it's a, it's a slippery slope, that you gotta stay in control of it. And anyway.

• 5:30Cameron Hanes?

  You get rewarded for this type of behavior, this type of content, and you like seeing that, those, those insights, the likes, the comments, you're like, and it's, even if you're not intentionally thinking about it, you're just naturally drawn to like, oh, they like this, because I remember this blew up, we'll do more of it.

• 5:49Speaker 01

  Do more of it. Yeah. And you gotta catch yourself. And, you know, fortunately, I've been able to have good partners and have lifelong sponsorships and, and, you know, good, good deals that I've had since I've ridden dirt bikes, you know, X Games, I, you know, I was there when Monster was, was Hanson's Energy, you know, back in the day. And then it turned into, you know, basically created Monster. So anyway, I've been there from the beginning with a lot of these guys. So I've had these relationships, I've carried on, and that has been a good, like, foundation for me with all my sports stuff. And, and it's carried on through my kids. So, social is awesome, but it's kind of the icing on the cake, I guess, you know?

• 6:29Cameron Hanes?

  So what's the cake than the performance?

• 6:32Speaker 01

  I would say, yeah, winning races, right? Like, and that's always has the value. That's the credibility. Yeah. Like, like I tell my kids, like, you can go out and be, the best way I could explain it, like with my daughter, I said, okay, what, what is your value in, in, um, I'd say in your career right now? You know, she said, well, I'm a race, a girl who races cars. Right. That, that's, yeah, okay. I go, that's, that's a great value, right? So that's rare.

• 7:00Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  I go with, with rarity comes value. And I said, so, all right, so you're a girl who races NASCAR. I go, all right, now, I know you're going down this path of social media and love the YouTube and all the other stuff. It's, it's quick, easy money. I go, but how many pretty girls do YouTube? I go, now, I'll say, now you're one of a million, right? So I go, well, you kind of got to decide which one you want to go down. And, and for me, that's my going back to racing, like it's a, it's rare for guys to be champions or girls to be champions in racing because it's hard.

• 7:34Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 7:34Speaker 01

  You know, and you look at people who do hard things, they carry credibility for life. I feel, you know, in social media, you have these YouTube sensations, you know, people that do big things on the internet and they come and go.

• 7:50Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 7:50Speaker 01

  Like, you know, I don't know, very rare to see ones like, for example, the, no, let's just say the, the Paul brothers or whatever. They, they, they started off on social YouTube. What did they have to do to, to really get the credibility?

• 8:03Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, they had to compete.

• 8:04Speaker 01

  Start fighting, right? Start like competing and becoming these athletes. And anyway, that's just my opinion on it.

• 8:12Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, I see that, you know, because my son's pretty heavy on social media too, one of them. And, um, there's a lot of like influencer, like people who are in shape. You can look good for, you know, a few photos, do things. And what I told him too is like, he stands out because he also gets on the starting line of races.

• 8:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:34Cameron Hanes?

  And competes and has good times and it's like, or sets a world record. And something, there's a lot of guys who can look good in a video for 30 seconds. And do this, this whole thing and probably get some views, but how long is that gonna last? Cause that's, that's a million guys out there are in shape. But the fact that he can line up and compete, put himself out there and say, no, I'm, I'm doing this race. And here's gonna be my time. People don't like that part of it. Cause that, that's like, that can expose. You know, if you don't have real talent, you're exposed. And then that's where you say, well, it's not gonna last.

• 9:07Speaker 01

  It doesn't last. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's a formula there, I think. And there's always a respect for things that are hard. Which, you know, I mean, it just, it's, you can't get around it.

• 9:18Cameron Hanes?

  People can talk shit, but at the end of the day, it's just like, what are they really gonna say? You know, if, if you're doing hard stuff.

• 9:25Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. It's hard to put down the guy who's doing things that you're not willing to do.

• 9:31Cameron Hanes?

  Right. That's a, yeah, I've seen so many great clips. I love your clips. Like when you get fired up. Or I shared that one. I remember from, I think it was from Gypsy Tales, a podcast. And, uh, yeah, you were going on about, uh, it reminded me of like the must be nice thing. And it's something about maybe your dad was just a pussy or something. Talking about these kids that didn't get the opportunities. Cause their dad didn't.

• 9:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:56Cameron Hanes?

  Didn't lay it out there in line when they could have.

• 9:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:58Cameron Hanes?

  You know?

• 9:58Speaker 01

  Yeah. That was a, yeah, every so often I guess I go on rants, but, and, and yeah, sometimes they are good. Sometimes not. They're a little ruthless, but I feel like, uh, I, I remember saying, cause we were getting some heat. Or Hayden was getting heat. My son, when he first came into motocross, supercross. Oh yeah. You're just good because your dad gave you everything, right? And, and I, and I get it. I get that part for sure. I, I was a young kid, you know, basically I had to have a paper route to get my first dirt bike. And I had to work for everything I had. And, and, uh, my dad did, you know, support me with what he could. He was a teacher. So, you know, like it wasn't, we come from a rich household. But he, you know, and like I said, they separate, my parents separated when I was probably 10 or 11.

• 10:43Speaker 01

  So my dad would take me to the races on the weekends. That was it. And he learned how to work on the dirt bike and. It was an effort for sure. I totally appreciate it, but we were nowhere near the guys at the races with the nice coach, the nice motorhome, all the bikes. Right. We were in the like pickup truck with, you know, old junky truck with a trailer and one bike, right? Yeah. Which was fine. It built my character and it made me, you know, appreciate things, work hard and, and I was able to, you know, take that work ethic, you know, move to the West Coast, chase my dreams and build this empire through action sports of, you know, winning medals and, and, and, uh,

• 11:23Speaker 01

  taking big risks, right? I, I, you know, three sixties on dirt bikes, backflips before there was foam pits, all this stuff. We took big risks. And with that came, you know, it was big, big views on TV. There wasn't really much internet at the time, but X Games came around every, you know, twice a year, whatever. And we would take over that whole ESPN deal. And it, and it blew up, but man, it was huge risk. A lot of, a lot of hospital stays, a lot of broken bones, a lot of near death experiences. And, um, I paid the, paved the way to, to have that life. And, and so I was able to hand it down for my kids, you know, and give them the things that I wish I had when I was younger. Right.

• 12:05Speaker 01

  Is that a bad thing? I, I guess, yeah, it can be, you know? And then there's also the times of like, okay, well, how do you teach a kid to appreciate those things? That's a battle. It is a battle. I get it. And, but, you know, somehow was able to go, okay, here's our foundation. Our foundation is, is faith, you know, family. And, and like I always say, faith, family, freedom. That's kind of describes our family, right? And so we have done that since, you know, the time the kids, you know, growing up, school, everything was about this foundation. And I feel like that stuck with them and they learned how to compete, how to work hard and how to not want to ever lose, not give up.

• 12:47Speaker 01

  And, and so that carried through. And getting back to the point where people are like, oh, Hayden's had everything. That's why he's winning. I'm like, okay, yeah, I get that, you know? And, and I go, so what are you mad at me? Are you mad at me? Cause I took risk and like broke bones to, to have this and give it to my kids? Could have died multiple. Multiple times, right? Yeah. And I, and I like almost did, like almost did die at one instance and, and, and, uh, so just to the point, like, and that's why I went on that rant of. Hey, don't get mad at me because your dad was a pussy and didn't take risk like I did. Yeah. And that's, I know it's a harsh way to put it, but that's the reality of the life I lived. Mm hmm.

• 13:29Speaker 01

  You know, I was like, hey, I took risks almost, you know, and I was able to give that to my kids and, and my kids took advantage of it. And, you know, and I, they, that's the most respect they could show me. You know, say, hey, we're gonna take what you gave us and multiply it and, and succeed. It's cool. So that formula's been great. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So anyhow, there's, there's that point touching on that where, uh, yeah, I, when I lost my kidney, it was back, did a backflip at Viva La Bam and the wind came up short. Handlebar went in my stomach. I blew up my kidney, my spleen. And there's no ambulance on the scene. I mean, a lot of people know this story in my, in my industry. But anyway, I go to the hospital, almost dying, bleeding out.

• 14:10Speaker 01

  And about almost, almost an hour until I got into surgery and I hadn't, like, no, like, pulse was real light. And the doctors were asking, like, rush, emergency surgery, got to the hospital and, you know, anything you want to tell your family, we don't know what's going on inside. We're gonna, they basically cut you all the way open, pull, pull your, you know, one organ out at a time. There's a procedure, it's called, where they start like looking inside. Yeah. And so they ended up, you know, intestines, I get to my kidney and it's shattered, like blown off the artery. So they end up sewing, like, taking the kidney out, sewing up the artery. So imagine having your artery severed for 45 minutes, you know? So my stomach was huge, just full of blood. And so, I, you know, I remember going to sleep, like, right before into surgery.

• 14:54Speaker 01

  I was like, I remember that was a moment where I was like, please, God, let me live. You know, I'm about up to that point, I was a pretty rebel dude, you know? And I was like, you know, in and out of church and, you know, just kind of, I still hanging on to that, you know, the, the party lifestyle and stuff. And, and I just remember at that point, I already had my daughter Haley. And, um, and I just remember I was praying like, please God, please God, let me live through this. I go, cause I just was thinking, man, I have my daughter and my, you know, and my wife. And I was like, I'm gonna die. And I was like, this is like, the doctor's pretty much saying like, hey, we don't know what's going on. We're gonna look. And he's like, we're gonna do everything we can. And I just remember I was barely like, I remember I was chewing my lip and tongue, like trying to stay awake. And I was like, oh, man, this is crazy. Like, this is like real, you know?

• 15:36Speaker 01

  And so I just remember praying and then I just like, please God, let me live. And I remember waking up and doing like tubes everywhere. And I was just like, yes, I'm alive. And it was like a heavy moment. I was like, woke up and I was like, woke up and my wife was in the room, my dad was in the room and I was on the East Coast. They were on the West Coast when I went into surgery. That's how long I was under like in surgery. So I wake up and I'm like, oh, thanks. Thank God I'm alive. And, and um, so they were in the hospital for a few weeks, like recovery deal. Like it was pretty bad. And, and so I'm like, you know, skinny, pale, just like, I'm just barely hanging on and like recovering. And my wife got super sick in the hospital and I was like, man, what's going on?

• 16:20Speaker 01

  And she, and she ended up taking a pregnancy test and she was pregnant with Hayden. And, and I was like, gee, this is, this is crazy, you know? And, and I just think-

• 16:28Cameron Hanes?

  On the verge of death.

• 16:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:29Cameron Hanes?

  And instead here's new life.

• 16:30Speaker 01

  New life, right there. And so hey, we found out hey, she was pregnant with Hayden in the hospital. And I was like, man, it was a lot to take in, you know? I was like, what, what if, what if, you know, all these forks in the road, you know? All these second chances. And, and I was like, man, okay. I, I made my pact and I did, you know, said, I said, I'm changing my life and that was it. And from that point on, I went down the path of like, okay, we're gonna, we're gonna fight off all the bad, you know, things I had going on and try to go down the right path. And it was a tough road for sure. I mean, it's easier said than done.

• 17:05Cameron Hanes?

  Oh, yeah.

• 17:06Speaker 01

  To kind of weed out the good and the bad and then they get on track. And it took a while, but my focus changed to family at that point. And, and that was it. And, and yeah, you know, I definitely had my ups and downs and, you know, teeter totters and definitely not perfect. So, but it was, you know, a focus on family and a blessing for, you know, to have my son, like be there for my son being born and all that. So, yeah, it was, and I always think back to that. It's easy to get caught up in life and just be, oh, yeah, life's good. And you think about the forks in the road. I always say that there's forks in the road. You know, and there's think of how many times you made a decision.

• 17:45Cameron Hanes?

  Man.

• 17:45Speaker 01

  That could have been the end.

• 17:47Cameron Hanes?

  The wrong one.

• 17:48Speaker 01

  The wrong one.

• 17:49Cameron Hanes?

  Did, did you, when you were laying there, you know, biting your lip and your, and your tongue trying to stay awake? Did you have regrets? Did you regret?

• 17:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, oh yeah. I I just remember laying there going, man, I can't believe like I cause I I didn't think like I was probably, you know, how old was I? I was probably like late twenties, maybe, maybe thirty maybe at that point, but I was like, man, I can't believe I'm gonna die like this. Like went so fast. Like I'm like, this is so quick, you know, and and I remember going, man, I didn't really have a chance to like, to really live the life of past freestyle motocross. I'm like, yeah, this is it. I was like, damn, yeah, well, it would. We had a good run, but

• 18:33Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 18:33Speaker 01

  Not really what life's about, right?

• 18:36Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, it's.

• 18:37Speaker 01

  And so, yeah, no, I did. I can I say like, I always think that like, I'm one thought that I have a lot and because I've done a lot of soul searching the last so many years and I was like, man, what if if you could, if you got a choice, if so, if you said, okay, you get a choice to go back to like, say, ten years old or whatever. If you if someone gave you a shot right now to go back to ten years old and you could start over, would you do it? And I'm like, would you do it? Like, it's pretty crazy thought. Like, would you end up? Would you make the decisions you made? Would you end up with the person you ended up with? Would you like all this stuff like, and I think about it and I was crazy because I'm like,

• 19:15Cameron Hanes?

  life nuts.

• 19:15Speaker 01

  You're like, think it just happened for a reason, all of it?

• 19:18Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, no.

• 19:18Speaker 01

  No way. I'm like,

• 19:20Cameron Hanes?

  It's a plan.

• 19:21Speaker 01

  And and I feel like I can't say I regret. I mean, yes, I regret some dumb things I did, but like overall, like I can't say I would change much, you know?

• 19:31Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 19:31Speaker 01

  You know, I just feel like it was all learning lessons for me and and it

• 19:35Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 19:35Speaker 01

  Kind of forms you to who you are, you know?

• 19:38Cameron Hanes?

  Now I could see, I could see why you'd say, no, you wouldn't if you would have died and now would be twenty years after you died and you'd see your family, you'd probably be like, yeah, I probably would change if you, you know what I mean?

• 19:50Speaker 01

  Oh, yes.

• 19:52Cameron Hanes?

  If you could see that twenty years without of your kids not having a dad.

• 19:57Speaker 01

  Oh, geez.

• 19:57Cameron Hanes?

  You know what I mean?

• 19:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:58Cameron Hanes?

  So, yeah, I I totally get it.

• 20:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:01Cameron Hanes?

  Um, I remember watching that film when you got hurt and

• 20:08Cameron Hanes?

  Did you like, I know it was windy and when you crashed, did you, did you like, why did I try that?

• 20:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, because that day it was, uh, we're filming Viva La Bam, Guar was playing this heavy metal band. Uh, Bam was skating underneath the ramp.

• 20:26Cameron Hanes?

  Looked like a big party.

• 20:27Speaker 01

  Big party, kind of a fun, like one of those typical like jackass style shows. And, um, I had a ramp, a freestyle ramp over the skate ramp. And it was really, really windy that day, like crazy, like 40 mile per hour crosswinds. And, and I was riding with a couple buddies and they're like, dude, we ain't hitting that. Like, and I was like, dude, well, they're all expecting us to do this and they wanted me to backflip at the end of the show over Bam. And, and I remember telling the producer, I'm like, man, I don't know, dude, it's like super windy and sketchy. He's like, oh, kind of, I thought you guys, this is what you guys are here for. I thought you guys were the man, right? And I kind of threw that on me and of course, Young, Steve, I'm like, sorry dude, get ready, turn the cameras on.

• 21:10Speaker 01

  And I hit it and then just like under rotated and then I'm like, shit. And I come in short and I'm like, it wasn't even really that bad of a crash, but I endowed into the top of the jump. If I would have gone a little further, I would have made it to the landing. Under rotated, hit the top of the jump, the front wheel digs into the top of the jump. Handlebars go into my stomach, under my chest plate. And it was like a perfect impact under my rib cage with the curvature of the handlebars. And then it just exploded my kidney, fell to the ground and it felt like I just got shot with a gun in the stomach. It's super like fire in my stomach and I've never had that pain before. I've had bone pain like that, but not stomach and organs. So I knew it was, I was like, dude, this is bad. And so I'm laying there going, okay, maybe I just knocked the window on myself.

• 21:55Speaker 01

  And I was trying to catch my breath and it, and it just started getting, it kept getting worse and worse. And I was like, oh dude, this is bad. I was like, where's, I need an ambulance and they're like, there's no ambulance on site. Which I obviously should have thought of that before, but you're just young, you don't think about it. No ambulance, so they call an ambulance and literally they, I'm laying there, my stomach's growing and my skin's turning yellow, you know, and I'm like, oh dude. And I was like crazy looking at my buddy Ronnie Fies and I, and I was like, dude, I think I'm gonna die, dude. I go, look at my arms and skin, you know, that's, we're pretty tough, you know, we're like, we kind of tough out, like looking at broken, like we'd be looking at our broken arm, oh, I broke my arm. You know, and then I was like, this is not good. I'm like, dude, this is bad. And I'm like, we, I need to go to the hospital quick.

• 22:40Speaker 01

  And so they, a fire truck came in like those, um, ambulance looking fire trucks. And that's like, was it? And so that pulls in, I'm like, put me in the fire, dude, let's go, let's go to the ambulance. So they put me in the fire truck. Little ambulance looking thing and pinned it to the hospital and, and that was like, I just, I'll never forget that ride to the hospital. It was just like, oh dude, just like I said, chewing my lip and tongue like, cause I kept falling asleep, you know, and the doctors later told me like, like it was like a point zero something chance of survival. Once you fall asleep from bleeding out like that, you know? And I was like, dude, it was so like, so close, but I just knew in my mind, like, don't fall asleep. Like I know where this is headed, you know, I kind of just like, I know this is bad and man, it just was, it was a bad experience.

• 23:24Speaker 01

  And, and, um, anyhow, my point is it was, uh, it was turned out to be a blessing in the end, but I had to kind of go through unfortunate, you know, big slap in the face there, so.

• 23:37Cameron Hanes?

  Ah, that's rough. Well, it's, it, I did, uh, here's what can trick you into using too much chat GPT. I said, I said, what can I say for Brian Deegan's podcast episode? And they're fricking good.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  Really?

• 23:55Cameron Hanes?

  This, oh yeah, it's, it's not good if you get lazy and, and, but I didn't want to read this because I thought, hey, chat GPT did good on this one. So the episode title they suggested was Brian Deegan, Risk Rebellion and the Rise of an Outlier.

• 24:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:10Cameron Hanes?

  Pretty good right there, isn't it? So description, he's a motocross pioneer entrepreneur, father.

• 24:17Cameron Hanes?

  Hold on a sec. What? Okay. Um, Father and Straight Up Renegade. In this episode of Outliers, so they screwed up my podcast name, but I said it's about outliers. Brian Deegan opens up about the mindset that fueled his rise, the pain that shaped him, and what it means to lead a life on your own terms. From founding Metal Militia, from founding Metal Militia to mentoring his next gen racing kids, Deegan proves that outliers aren't born, they're built in the fire. Pretty good, isn't it?

• 24:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's good.

• 24:48Cameron Hanes?

  One thing that I was curious about, um, my wife has seen what I do like with endurance racing and doing all this, and now my son's doing it and she doesn't want him to do it. Because it's just like, it's never ending, as you said. It's just, this, it's, it's never over.

• 25:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:09Cameron Hanes?

  You gotta keep, if you wanna do like, I mean, I'm always like, I gotta keep producing. I gotta line up, I gotta do shit, I gotta, I gotta prove I am who I say I am. So she's seen this now for 30 years. She's like, I don't want Truitt to have to do that. And I'm like, so what do you think about that?

• 25:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, I feel like having, that's, honestly, that's a tough one, but I, cause I have to, I feel like the last five to 10 years of my life, I've been trying to put myself in the other side shoes. You know, where as, as a man, I, I've done so many years of like, well, this is how I feel, you know, and now, you know, being married for so long and, and being through so many different chapters and, and of life with a partner that I'm like, okay, well, how does she feel? You know, like, wonder what, what she's thinking right now, you know, and I try to do that a little more, like, give a little more like grace and patience and like, think about it and like, okay, I wonder, cause it's very easy

• 26:11Speaker 01

  for me to go, well, this is the way it is, you know, like, and, and I'm like, huh, so, so my point is, as a mom, like,

• 26:21Speaker 01

  I have always gone down the path of like, every kid has to be a champion. You know, like we, you know, in the story, you know, like whatever it takes and uh, and then I'm like, man.

• 26:33Cameron Hanes?

  If you're not a champion, you're a loser. I mean, that's the kind of shit I say. I always have told my kids, it's like, if you're average, you're a loser.

• 26:40Speaker 01

  You're a loser.

• 26:41Cameron Hanes?

  And then I'm just like, why would I, why would I have said that?

• 26:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:45Cameron Hanes?

  Because.

• 26:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's pretty funny. But that's, yeah, pretty much every man wants to say, I guess. The um, the, the point is with the, with the kids now, for example, Haley, I was like, okay, she was into, got into karting, you know, into car racing, chasing. I'm like, okay, girl racing, we're going NASCAR, top, top of the thing, let's go. And so we figured it out, we chased the dream, get her to NASCAR. And then next thing you know, she's like, okay, I gotta live in Charlotte and go race NASCAR. And I'm like, whoa, okay. That's crazy. Our daughter just is gone now. I'm like, and I'm like, would it have been better of her just to have a normal life and work the nine to five?

• 27:26Speaker 01

  And be able to see her every day and be a part of our family and have the normal family life. And so I have those thoughts, you know? And I'm like, okay, well, what we're chasing pulls apart, you know? And, and not, not in a bad way, but just in a, in a way of days gone, you know? And so now I look back at it, I'm like, okay. And I, and I deal with Hayden, he was, he had a, a, you know, talent for dirt bikes. Chased it, said, okay, bro, if you're in, I'm in, let's do it, let's fricking do it. And if you want to win, I'll help you and we'll do it as good as you can be. We're gonna do that, you know? And so, and that, that system has worked. And then with my youngest Hudson,

• 28:08Speaker 01

  he was more free spirit, funny, talkative, like, you know, more like, want to have fun all the time and,

• 28:13Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 28:14Speaker 01

  and a different character, different personality. And I was like, all right, cool. And then he wanted to race dirt bikes, want to do this, want to do that, kind of in and out of everything. And so I'm like, the one thing I know is dirt bikes. So I'm like, okay, dirt bikes, let's do this. And so we go down the path and he ends up having a bad crash, like a bad one. And, and I'm at a day practicing. Lands on his head and it shatters his thoracic spine, his upper spine, like four vertebrae, you know, and usually he was the kid crashes, oh, I'm hurt, I'm hurt. I'm like, get up, you're fine. Let's go, you know, and this day he was like, dude, my back, my back, my back. And I'm like, and I was right behind him when he fell. It wasn't a big crash, but he landed on his head and I'm like, dude, you all right? You all right? All right, let's go, let's get up, let's get, and he's like, no, no, no, no. And I was like, all right. So we, you know, did medics,

• 28:59Speaker 01

  the whole thing, went to the hospital and they went in there and they're like, his spine's crooked. They're like, and now I see hematoma is pushing on his spinal cord. And I was like, no way. And I was like, and then you start thinking, what have I done, dude? How old was he at this time? He was 12, I think. And so I'm like, what the frick am I doing? You know, like this is so stupid. Like, why am I pushing this freaking deal? You know, and then at that point, I kind of was like, you know what? Back off. You know, we, we got him through that. I mean, they wanted to put pins in his back and do this whole thing. And so I, you know, went to the doctors, you know, sports doctors, and they end up putting him in a brace. And they said, if this brace holds and, and does

• 29:43Speaker 01

  what it's supposed to do, then we won't do surgery. So we held off, held off, held off. And then, you know, my sports surgeon saw it after three months of the shell, the turtle shell, and they said, took it off, said, okay, it looks good. You know, he's gonna grow, he'll, he'll develop and this should be fine. You know, it's not perfect, but you know, it's no surgery. And I was like, okay, that's all I wanted to hear because pins in a kid's back is never a good story, right? And so that, that was kind of the moment I stepped back and go, man, what am I doing, dude? Like, I'm like, if you, if you're half in, half out, I'm all, dude, we can't see too gnarly of a sport, you know, to be half in, half out. And let's go ride. If you want to ride for fun, let's go ride fun. Let's go cruise around on a dirt bike, right? Let's, but as far as pushing you, pushing you to

• 30:28Speaker 01

  train and ride and do, and then, and let's go. And so anyway, that was a reality shock, you know, reality for me that I was like, whoa, this, this was close. And so we said, okay, what's next? What do you want to do? He's like, ah, this one, you know, like, you know, I like, he likes. He's a lot of golf, I like, you know, it was fishing, I like cooking, just things that are like, oh, cool. Let's do it. I'm like, okay, I'm supportive of it. Let's do it, you know? I'm like, how can I only be supportive of things I like?

• 30:58Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 30:58Speaker 01

  So that's, that's the hard part, because it's fun. It's what we know. Anyhow, that's my polar opposite story of.

• 31:06Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 31:06Speaker 01

  The ball, yeah, I don't know if I didn't, probably didn't answer your question. But that's kind of what I've been through and I feel like after my third kid, I was kind of like, you know what, what do you, what do you want to do?

• 31:16Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 31:16Speaker 01

  You know, what do you want? Let's do it. If we're gonna do it, let's do it. Right?

• 31:19Cameron Hanes?

  I, I think that's, yeah, I mean, I, I, I totally get that. I mean, it's.

• 31:26Speaker 01

  That's a tough one.

• 31:27Cameron Hanes?

  I was always like, you know, I, I expected him to do good in school, but I was always like, the measurable is physical.

• 31:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:37Cameron Hanes?

  That's all that mattered.

• 31:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:39Cameron Hanes?

  Train, do this, do that. It's always fit, sports. It's just physical. And then I was just like, never miss. So I'm like, finally with my daughter, kind of like you, she's my last one. I'm like, you know what? Maybe I need to chill out. And it's a girl too. So it's a little bit different than the boys, because I just pushed the boys so hard. But um, yeah, you just kind of, I had that realization too, when, when my son joined the army, when he got deployed and I'm like, he had a good job and I told him that, I told him for so long that average was a failure. And now he's like, okay, well, I got more to offer this world. I'm gonna, I'm gonna be a ranger in the army. And then he gets deployed and I'm like, what if something happens to him?

• 32:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:20Cameron Hanes?

  It was me who said that he had, it, we need regular people doing regular jobs. And it's like, I, I, did I make him do this? And what if something happens to him?

• 32:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:32Cameron Hanes?

  And so now, I mean, I totally get what you're saying about your daughter, because. Like Truitt lives in Utah and he trains every day and has these big goals. Tanner, who is a Ranger, he lives right over here, not even like a couple of blocks away.

• 32:46Speaker 01

  That's cool.

• 32:46Cameron Hanes?

  We see him all the time.

• 32:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:49Cameron Hanes?

  Never see Truitt. So it's like, it's like what you're saying with your daughter, would have been better to have a regular job and just see him.

• 32:57Speaker 01

  I would see him all the time. Yeah.

• 32:58Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, it's but, but then when you see like your kids or like, you know, my kids, if they're inspiring this next generation and, and kids look up to them and it gives other kids this opportunity to dream big and chase it.

• 33:13Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 33:13Cameron Hanes?

  And that helps somehow helps society.

• 33:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, for sure.

• 33:18Cameron Hanes?

  And that's good too.

• 33:18Speaker 01

  I agree. Yeah, I agree. Yeah, it's good to have the kids thriving and, and, and, uh, yes, be in a position where they, they have good influence. I feel, yeah, I feel like my kids like that is one thing I do tell them. I'm like, you know, it's one of the reasons why we've continued to do our YouTube for so long. It's a, it's, it's a grind of like, hey, we're still influence, man. We're influencing people to hopefully follow what we stand for, you know? Which we believe is the right thing. I, I know there's a lot of crap on the internet. And I feel like there's a lot of parents that come to me and just like, hey dude, thanks for putting out like good PG content,

• 33:58Speaker 01

  dude, that we can watch. I'm not worried about my kids watching it. We, we don't think, we know nothing weird's gonna happen on it. And yeah, we dig that. I said, cool. So I feel like there is like, like you're saying, there is a, a value when your kids have a good influence on, on the next generation. Yeah, there's a big deal to that. I don't think people put enough credit on that. And I think it's, I think especially in this day and age, we can all cry about like what is getting, what the media does, what get posted, what, what people are, you know, pushing on, on Google or the Apple or whatever, you know? It's like, well, what are you doing? What's your part? What are you doing to combat it? You know? It's like, oh, you're complaining about it like.

• 34:40Cameron Hanes?

  Put something out, pause it, what you wanna see then?

• 34:42Speaker 01

  Just put out something that people might influence people to go, yeah, I like that, you know? Like I just, I feel like that's still, uh, there's still, the majority of America is good, good people. Yeah, I wanna do good things, you know? So they need some, some freaking role models, right?

• 35:00Cameron Hanes?

  I, I think so. You know, and like, I know you get a lot of parenting type questions because you've, you've run the gamut. You've been the crazy, young, wild guy, and now you're the dad, and trying to raise good kids. And it's like, I was having this conversation with my daughter too, because as I was saying, like with Truett, training like this, and is he missing that? And I told her, I said, everybody pays a price. What price do you want to pay? Is it is a price that you could have changed the world with your ability, but you didn't? Or is the price that, um, and then you missed out on family time? Or is the price that you stayed with your family and then you didn't do this thing?

• 35:44Cameron Hanes?

  Or, or, or usually it's untapped potential. People could have been amazing, but they, for whatever reason, didn't have, didn't, didn't believe in themselves, or didn't have whatever, so they didn't chase it. And who knows what it could have turned into? But I said, you're gonna pay a price no matter what.

• 36:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:02Cameron Hanes?

  What, what, what is it? What is that price gonna be?

• 36:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:05Cameron Hanes?

  But nobody gets out with nothing, without paying something.

• 36:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:09Cameron Hanes?

  And

• 36:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:10Cameron Hanes?

  It's just hard knowing what's the right decision sometimes.

• 36:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is. I mean, like I said, life's hard, no matter what, you know? So you want it to be, I want it to be hard. Uh, I always say, cause people, you know, resort life back to like, you know, your value or whatever. It's, uh, you know, I said, life's hard no matter what, dude. And you want to have a, a good life or a tough life? You know, as far as like, it's always, it's all hard. It's, it's hard to be rich. It's hard to be poor. It's hard to, you know? So I, I choose to want to have a good life and work hard and, and like, yeah, and be able to provide for my kids and, and give them the opportunities that I wish I had. And it's, it's all hard, dude, you know? I also had to take risk when I was younger, leaving Nebraska.

• 36:56Speaker 01

  I mean, I was gonna go to college in Nebraska when I graduated high school. My dad ended up being the superintendent of the school system in Nebraska, so education was a big deal to him.

• 37:05Cameron Hanes?

  What were you gonna take?

• 37:06Speaker 01

  It was like, uh, marketing and, you know, business stuff, you know?

• 37:10Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 37:10Speaker 01

  Probably end up in some sales. or something. I don't know. I just pictured myself like I was I was in I grew up in Bellevue, Nebraska, a very small town. I'd always kind of ride my bike downtown. There's these local bars where people would just end up at, you know, and I'm just like, man, I don't so want to do that. I just want to end up the guy at the bar hanging out, you know, going back and

• 37:30Cameron Hanes?

  telling high school stories.

• 37:31Speaker 01

  telling high school stories, dude. I like, damn, I just didn't couldn't see myself doing that. Fortunately for me, dirt bikes was my avenue out. That showed me like, hey, I traveled to the United States that way. Got to meet all these kids from California, from Florida. I'm like, man, these kids are cool. Like, I just want to be where they're at, like, what they're doing, man. I go that, that I was always attracted to that growing up. There was a little skate shop in town, and I always would go hang out there and kind of look at the new stuff. And I remember it was like, you know, it was Tony Hawk and Pau Peralta, all that back in their era. And I was big into skateboards and all that stuff. And I just didn't felt like I just didn't belong in Nebraska. Nebraska was cornhusker football, you know, and I was like, that was just not my thing, you know, which is fine. I just

• 38:15Speaker 01

  anyway, my dirt bike was my avenue out. I took risks. This is scary, you know, leaving home at 18 with the no money, you know, on a pickup, old pickup truck on my dirt bike and driving to California. And I mean, it's, it was scary for sure.

• 38:29Cameron Hanes?

  Who talked you into that?

• 38:30Speaker 01

  Um, it was, I had a friend in California that was like, hey, come stay with me. And it all started when I was about 14. I was racing. I started winning locally. And I knew I it snowed in the winters, obviously, in Nebraska. So I knew to be a champion, I had to train year round. So I had kids from California that I met at the local nationals, or at the nationals at Florida Linds and the big amateur nationals. Hey, come stay with us. And I said, okay. So I hitched a ride with this guy, Jeff Ewing. He was a champion back in the day. When he was younger, he was 16, and back when the mini trucks were cool, lowered mini trucks. He came and picked picked me up and threw my dirt bike in the back. I was like, 14, 15. And he literally drove me to California. I remember

• 39:13Speaker 01

  it was when Guns N' Roses came out Appetite for Distraction. We listened to that tape the whole way. And he dropped me off at the exit where my friend Lives and it was like Glenn Helen motocross track gigs. I'll never forget with my bag and my dirt bike. And I know cell phones and and my and my buddy's dad came and picked me up and and he brought me to their house and and I and I was like, all right, go to high school and they I went to transfer because I had to go to school still. So so I went to my first day of Cajon High, which is the gnarliest gang school in California, like Riverside High. I remember this little white kid coming in from Nebraska. The first day of school, I it was mid school year. And I come in, I'm like, bro, this is gnarly. And I was sitting there and then all of a sudden these gang fights break out, dude.

• 39:58Speaker 01

  It was like, and I was like, this is crazy. Yes, probably fourteen, fifteen, I think ninth or 10th grade or something. And and anyhow, I remember like just I was tripping out. I was like, dude, this is crazy. But it was such an experience. Imagine a kid. You know, I was growing up fast.

• 40:13Cameron Hanes?

  Whole different world.

• 40:14Speaker 01

  Whole different world. And so and we would ride every week after school would go right up in the hills and I just thought it was the coolest thing because I'm like at home is winter. I couldn't ride at all. Like so I was like working on my dirt bike. I just loved. I was so happy to be there.

• 40:27Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 40:28Speaker 01

  I would just remember I couldn't like I was just like couldn't believe I was there.

• 40:32Cameron Hanes?

  And your dad was good with you just moving to California?

• 40:35Speaker 01

  Which is crazy. Like I would never let my kid do that.

• 40:38Cameron Hanes?

  I know fourteen or fifteen.

• 40:39Speaker 01

  Like later.

• 40:40Cameron Hanes?

  See you dad.

• 40:40Speaker 01

  See ya. No cell phone.

• 40:43Cameron Hanes?

  That is nuts. Then how did you get money for gas even for riding your bike?

• 40:47Speaker 01

  So I had a I had a credit card with like and it had like 500 bucks or thousand bucks on it. And my dad was like, okay, you have to make money. So I always had to have little jobs and in California, I actually was good enough to win Kawasaki contingency money. When I raced the local Transcal Series or whatever, and it was like three or 400 bucks a weekend. And it was enough to like live off.

• 41:13Cameron Hanes?

  Fund you.

• 41:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I was like a super low budget, dude, like I like.

• 41:17Cameron Hanes?

  Low overhead.

• 41:18Speaker 01

  Low budget and but just enough to buy food.

• 41:21Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 41:22Speaker 01

  You know, and my buddies were cool, like their parents were cool to like let me stay there.

• 41:26Cameron Hanes?

  But that's amazing that at that age you were providing for yourself essentially.

• 41:30Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Yeah. Like if my bike. Broke, I had to figure it out. Like it wasn't like someone wasn't fixing it for me. Like I had to go to the local shop and buy a part, put it on. And but I didn't care. I was like, see, I was so stoked just to be there. Yeah.

• 41:43Cameron Hanes?

  But how do you, that's, that's always the, the challenge with a parent who had to grind it out. And then the kids don't have to, making them tough, like making them, how do you, cause you, that gave you an edge.

• 41:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:57Cameron Hanes?

  Your edge is why you had the balls to do these fucking big tricks and make this name for yourself. Without that edge, you'd be a marketing guy.

• 42:06Speaker 01

  Average guy, average guy.

• 42:08Cameron Hanes?

  Average loser.

• 42:10Speaker 01

  So they, yeah, I know they, I feel like that, and there's something was in me too. Like there, I just had a wild side in me that I was willing to like, do, like take big risks to, to, not just make money, but get attention. I was that kid that wanted to get attention, you know? Like I'll backflip this dirt bike and you know, this will be cool, right?

• 42:29Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 42:29Speaker 01

  And, and, uh, and anyhow, I've, and I surrounded myself with guys like that, that we, oh man, it became. When we, when I, and I raced Supercross and Motocross and, and I, you know, I never got a factory ride. I was like a fifth to 10th place guy, you know, where nowadays that is a factory ride. But back then there was only one factory ride per team. It was very, very tough. And so anyhow, I, I just missed that mark. And so, and I ended up winning a Supercross, but I was, I kind of went, you know, F you to the sport and couldn't get the ride. So I went rebel kid and, and I ghost rode my bike over there and won the Supercross, ghost rode my bike over there. And it's, it's kind of like a big F you deal. And it was almost like, yeah, I, I don't know.

• 43:10Speaker 01

  I looked back at it, it was pretty rebel and, and I mean, no one's like, no one's done anything like that to this day, you know? So, but either way, that was kind of like me, my exit of the sport. Action Sports was starting and I fortunately right placed the right time. And I took, see, I went full steam ahead. I said, okay, this is my shot. I'm going to Action Sports. I'm taking over. We're the rebel guys and spikes and heavy metal. And Travis Pastrana was the good guy. We were the bad guys and we let's go. And it just took off. It was ESPN, ESPN ate it up and it was badass.

• 43:44Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, it's, it's, I, I related a little bit to, uh, Kind of, I don't know. I don't know if it's the same or not, but like with archery, there's target archery and that's, it's very like, did you win this tournament? How did you shoot for second, third? It's very like, you don't even have to know anything to know who's good.

• 44:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:05Cameron Hanes?

  And then there's bow hunting. And then it's, it's all, to me, it reminds me of like the factory ride and then the freestyle.

• 44:11Speaker 01

  Freestyle, yeah.

• 44:12Cameron Hanes?

  It's just like, you can't, how do you, how do you gauge whether you're good at freestyle? You know, there is no real measurable.

• 44:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:20Cameron Hanes?

  But it's, so that was kind of a risk, wasn't it?

• 44:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, big risk. It was like kinda-

• 44:24Cameron Hanes?

  It was safer to be just a factory guy, just do races and if you win, you make a name for yourself.

• 44:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:30Cameron Hanes?

  But-

• 44:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, and if you don't win, say you run fifth through 10th, you're still making enough money to, to be the cool guy with the dirt bike in town and, and go, you know, go to the track and, that's a whole nother story I won't get into, but, but like,

• 44:43Cameron Hanes?

  What's that?

• 44:44Speaker 01

  As far as like, you have a passion, you love riding dirt bikes, you know, you're not making enough money to retire on it. But you stay in it because you love it and you don't really have anything else to do. You're like, I'm not qualified to do much other, so I'm gonna continue to ride this dirt bike at fifth to 10th place or 20th place.

• 45:02Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 45:02Speaker 01

  And continue to just make enough just to get by.

• 45:05Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 45:06Speaker 01

  And then when I'm 30, I don't know what I'm gonna do, right? And I didn't want to do that. I was kinda like, I knew I wasn't gonna factory ride. I wanted to be the man. I wanted to make money. I want to be successful. And that's when I said, I'm, alright, I'm walking away from racing, which was a big move for me, because my, my dad put a lot of time into that and I felt bad. Like, my dad was like, you're not gonna race anymore?

• 45:24Cameron Hanes?

  And it was right after you won the Supercross?

• 45:26Speaker 01

  I won the Supercross and then I did like another season, but what, I, I felt like I should've got a factory ride that year. You know, I was good enough to get a ride and, and I didn't get it that next year and I just was kinda like that, I'm not getting a ride.

• 45:38Cameron Hanes?

  Why, why do you think you didn't get it?

• 45:40Speaker 01

  Just 100% was not, was my attitude, you know, I just was like, I-

• 45:45Cameron Hanes?

  But you, you had a chip on your shoulder. I'm sure you said, no, they're fucking me.

• 45:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 45:49Cameron Hanes?

  Right?

• 45:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 45:50Cameron Hanes?

  You didn't take, you didn't say, oh, it's me for being, I'm kinda too crazy for this.

• 45:54Speaker 01

  I wasn't that smart.

• 45:55Cameron Hanes?

  No, no, yeah.

• 45:56Speaker 01

  I had to learn my lesson.

• 45:57Cameron Hanes?

  I just know how young- Men are and that's that's just how it works.

• 46:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:01Cameron Hanes?

  It's never your fault.

• 46:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I know, yeah, and I live that life for a long time and if if I wanted to get a factory ride, I should have played the game. I should have played the corporate game. I should have went to the guys who mattered that called the shots. Hey, what's up, buddy? I'm Brian Deegan. Nice to meet you. I'm working hard. Can you give me a shot? You know, instead I was like, you guys, right? Like, you guys, I'm winning. You should like, I've won, like, what? Why are you not giving me a ride?

• 46:26Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 46:27Speaker 01

  You know, and that was not the right attitude. I don't care what I mean, you gotta be a bad motherfucker to play that game. Yeah, you gotta be like.

• 46:35Cameron Hanes?

  Just be like barely, I should have got this or maybe not, because they're gonna say no.

• 46:39Speaker 01

  No, I want the guy who's gonna listen and be cool and respectful and.

• 46:43Cameron Hanes?

  But you know, it's, you know, do you know who JB Mooney is, the bull rider?

• 46:47Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 46:48Cameron Hanes?

  So he says something like, there's, there's, there's bull riders who just wanna be known as a bull rider. And then there's guys who wanna be the best.

• 46:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:58Cameron Hanes?

  You know, so it reminds me of like, those guys, there's some guys who just like, it's just good enough, just, you know, being the motocross guy, showing up to races, having the bike, but they're gonna be like the, you know, not really make the, I don't know, the podium, I guess.

• 47:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 47:14Cameron Hanes?

  I don't know. So I mean, there are people who, they're okay with that, I guess.

• 47:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:18Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 47:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, and there's still, you still get the benefits from that. There's still like, you're, you're still, like I say, you're still on that, that, on the, the side of the fence where the action is.

• 47:29Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 47:30Speaker 01

  Not, not the fan side of the fence. You're on the other side of the fence, right?

• 47:33Cameron Hanes?

  You're out there.

• 47:34Speaker 01

  You're still in the scene and you still get the little benefits of that, but I never wanted to do that. I always wanted to make the most of it and be like, okay, like, how do we, if, if it's, if it's TV, I wanna get the, wanna be the most there. If it's, you know, action sports, wanna be the most there. And unfortunately, action sports, to be the man, you gotta take big risks, you know, and that was the game. And so we, you know, we did. You know, Travis was badass, you know, but Strana just was on another level, you know, and so he, I mean, he helped the sport a ton and he helped like, just, you know, car racing, get into X Games, which helped me transition out of freestyle motocross, because there came a point when he did that double backflip that night and I was standing there watching and I was like, I was in that, in that event against him and I was like, there's no fucking way I'm doing that.

• 48:20Speaker 01

  I was just like, bro, and I told him, I was like, damn, I remember talking to him back in the locker room like, you're gonna do a double backflip dude, I go, that's fricking gnarly dude. And he was like, yeah, I think I'm good. I think I got it. And I think he got it. I'm like, he knew he had it. Like, he was just that gnarly, you know, and, and he was like 10 years old, younger than me, you know.

• 48:40Cameron Hanes?

  Oh, was he?

• 48:41Speaker 01

  Um, so anyway, it was kind of that moment where I was probably in thirties, you know, young 30 years when I was like, you know what, I've survived it this long. Car racing was coming and I had some other opportunities and it's parlayed out of it, you know? And fortunately, I was able to carry my sponsors out of that into car racing and, which is a whole nother story, but that was another difficult move, but I had to go work my ass off, figure it out, figure out how to win. Never raced a car in my life, you know, figured out within a year was winning championships. But that was hard work and studying and in the studying the sport, you know, I love that part. I love studying things and figuring it out. I love figuring out how to fricking win things that I haven't done before. Travis was the king of that. He, he, man, that dude won it so many things.

• 49:23Speaker 01

  And he walked away from racing as a young kid, which was unheard of. Like, if you've got a factory ride and you're winning championships, that's all you do. Like, if you were like, hey, no, I'm good. I'm gonna go do freestyle over here. People were like, what? Like, that'd be like Hayden going, hey, later, I'm gonna go hit ramps. People were like,

• 49:41Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 49:42Speaker 01

  huh? You know, like, so he's a dude, he's a rebel dude. Like, so anyway, he paved the way.

• 49:46Cameron Hanes?

  He wasn't known necessarily as a rebel like you were.

• 49:50Speaker 01

  No, he was more giddy two shoe guy, like, clean cut, like, but he was like, as far as like going against the grain and paving the way, he was a trailblazing dude, you know?

• 50:01Cameron Hanes?

  Did, uh, did his persona being the, the giddy two shoe guy, did, did that push you to be, like, the bad guy even more?

• 50:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:11Cameron Hanes?

  To be like, even crazier?

• 50:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'd say he, we, we were polar opposites as far as like our personalities and our images at least.

• 50:21Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 50:21Speaker 01

  And when we got on dirt bikes, we were pretty much, you know, we're the same wavelength, right? Like, we thought, you know, we're both competitors there. But yeah, he was the giddy guy and I, like, we were like, okay, yeah, we were turned up the bad boy thing times 10.

• 50:35Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 50:36Speaker 01

  So it was, it was totally opposites, you know? And then eventually he got older and, he got into his wild times and this, that, and it was like, yeah, cool, whatever, dude. You know, everyone goes through those moments and it's all good.

• 50:48Cameron Hanes?

  Was there a, wasn't there like a dirt demons or what?

• 50:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, crusty dirt, crusty demons of dirt.

• 50:55Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. What was that?

• 50:56Speaker 01

  That was the original freestyle motocross movies. That's what started, helped start the action sport movement of freestyle motocross. So they were big into snowboarding. So snowboarding had its competition guys and then the free ride guys that went out and just the, you know, free riding the mountains and the powder and they do videos and these dudes were wild dudes. So they, they, they showed their partying along with their snowboarding, snowboarding in the backcountry and, and then they do skits, these funny ass skits. And we never even like heard of that, right? And they're, they're doing these like act, they're doing these acting parts. And I was like, you know, nowadays the skits, you know, on the internet are like, if it ain't real, it's cheesy, right?

• 51:37Speaker 01

  But back then it was freaking funny. Like we're like, dude, these guys were reenacting like, like 007 and doing these skits. And we just thought it was the coolest thing. So anyway, those guys who edited the snowboarding thing came into freestyle motocross when it first started. And they took that formula of storytelling of the, of behind the scenes into freestyle motocross. It helped like the sport. I mean, it was probably the biggest movement for freestyle motocross.

• 52:04Cameron Hanes?

  It was the same guys that did the snowboard stuff?

• 52:06Speaker 01

  Same guys, John and Dana, uh, John and Dana from, uh, Fleshwin Films. They were the ones who created crusty demons and crusty demons one, which I had a small part in. I just, that's when I was still racing dirt bikes. Was like, it blew up. Like the motocross industry like went up like said, like 20, 30% dirt bike sales just from those movies. Because people were buying dirt bikes to go ride for fun. They weren't racing them. They were just going to ride them for fun. And I was like, whoa, this is pretty cool.

• 52:36Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 52:37Speaker 01

  Right? It's like people just going, okay, I don't care about the racing. I'm just going to go free ride. And it was a cool, it was a massive era, dude. Like massive. Like you know where everyone was wearing the flat bill hats?

• 52:46Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 52:47Speaker 01

  Black socks pulled out, long dicky shorts, a wife beaters, like that whole look and movement, you know? I feel like we were just like a big part of that. And yeah, that's cool. I mean, that's a cool era.

• 52:58Cameron Hanes?

  And then that went into metal militia?

• 53:00Speaker 01

  Yeah. So that, and that was when freestyle motocross was starting. We had the first freestyle park at our, um, our buddy's houses. Uh, buddy Larry had a bunch of land. So he, we built this. Or they built a massive freestyle park. It was like a all dirt, you know, big John looked like it looked like a big BMX park, but like a hundred times bigger. And so that's where it started. And then they basically said, hey, X Games, check this out. And I was actually a guy, Mickey Diamond, ex racer who created all this stuff and and um, brought it to X Games and they showed them. They said, yeah, let's make this an event and that's kind of how it kicked off and and Krusty was around a few years before freestyle ever went to X Games.

• 53:44Speaker 01

  You know, it it helped birth the sport, but X Games is what legitimized it into a moneymaker.

• 53:50Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 53:50Speaker 01

  You know, that's what made it the corporate deal.

• 53:53Cameron Hanes?

  And and you saw, did you see that immediately immediately like that was a huge opportunity if you could get to X Games?

• 54:00Speaker 01

  Oh, it was huge. Yeah, cuz I I was still racing, like kind of just getting almost like kind of out of racing. Uh, in ninety eight, ninety nine, and that's when X Games started was ninety nine. So I was still racing like a little bit, but doing freestyle and I was doing these videos and the Crusty Demons, Moto Triple X. And I was getting paid by companies to do them like Etny Shoes was paying me a salary monthly just to do free ride videos and that was unheard of. And so I started getting paid. I was, you know, with Volcom when it just started. Me and Mike Metzger, one of the guys who helped start the sport. And um, we were wearing Volcom clothes, riding dirt bikes instead of gear. And uh, so that I just remember and Black Fly's shades were be like big back then.

• 54:44Speaker 01

  And a lot of these companies that were like edgy, like built on a lot of some of these companies built on drug money like it was like a edgy time, you know, and and everyone was like wild parties and the pimpin' hoe parties and all that like this, all the shit that was kicking off, right?

• 55:00Cameron Hanes?

  What's a pimpin' hoe parties?

• 55:03Cameron Hanes?

  No, I haven't. What is it?

• 55:05Speaker 01

  So that was in like Huntington Beach where like they would have these big parties and and guys would dress up as pimps and the girls would come and it's mainly strippers, you know?

• 55:14Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 55:14Speaker 01

  They come to these, you know, clubs and there's be like dude, hundreds and hundreds of people.

• 55:18Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 55:19Speaker 01

  And then, you know, dance club, pit clubs and they put on these parties.

• 55:22Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 55:22Speaker 01

  And it was basically action sport guys and and snowboard and all the action sport scene. And back when it was pretty loose, you know?

• 55:29Cameron Hanes?

  I'm pretty chill, guys.

• 55:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, right. But no, there was the company supporting that, which is crazy. So you had companies that were like, they're throwing these parties. And so if you're these athletes, like for these ride for these top companies, you're the shit, right? And you go to these events and it was, I mean, it was like what you saw in the movies. And I was this kid from Nebraska. And I come out like pro dirt bike in Nebraska. People are like, yeah, cool, dude. Like you pro dirt bike in SoCal? Okay, now we're getting shit done, right? So anyhow, I mean, it was definitely a cool era to live in, you know, as far as the 90s and stuff.

• 56:07Speaker 01

  But yeah, that only lasted so long, but we, we were able to, action sports was able to create its own vibe when it started. We were like, okay, we're gonna all have fun, you know, all this kind of fast paced scene. Corporate money was there. They did it our way. There was big companies that were paying big money that were the party companies that were edgy companies. And those over time got weeded out, but at the time is like, what company could I ride for that was gonna pay me a bunch of money, but had a cool image?

• 56:38Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 56:39Speaker 01

  And they were, it was so image driven back then. You're like, who, who, who had the coolest athletes? That was it. Who had the coolest team, you know? And that was just the vibe back then with all the companies. And like, and it's like, it was Vulcan, Black Flies, and you know, you had Etny Shoes. That were just like, certain brands were just like the shit if you had those brands.

• 57:00Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 57:01Speaker 01

  You know, DC, like, ah, there was just, it was just a time, you know, era that, that was so image driven.

• 57:09Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 57:09Speaker 01

  So, yeah.

• 57:10Cameron Hanes?

  Probably, probably fun for you.

• 57:11Speaker 01

  It was fun, yeah. And like I said, being a kid from Nebraska, I'm like, I ate it up, dude. I was like, this is like shit I saw in the movies, dude.

• 57:19Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, sounds nuts.

• 57:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:21Cameron Hanes?

  Well, in the, okay, so. That, I guess that got phased out as you got older, you didn't want to start taking the risk. So then you got into, or I mean, the risk, all of a sudden, there's a risk reward thing. Like, is this worth it? This big risk is now you're starting a family, things like that. So then you got into the racing, car racing, right?

• 57:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, so you know, the, the, yeah, definitely went from racing dirt bikes, supercross, motocross, into action sports, freestyle motocross. And that era lasted from like 97, 99 X Games to about 2009 was my run. And as you know, Travis double backflip, sport was evolving, younger guys coming in, foam pits, all the stuff, the sport was going quick.

• 58:05Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 58:06Speaker 01

  And I'm like, I saw there's come a point, as any man does in sport, you're like, okay, I'm kind of becoming the relic here and I don't want to take the risk. I started getting to the point where I was dropping in for X Games, like, you know, they're like, okay, go, you're live TV, boom, getting ready to drop in down the ramp and hit the ramp. And I was nervous. I was like getting to the point of like, dude, I don't want to, like, I'm getting scared.

• 58:26Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 58:27Speaker 01

  And I'm like, you used to be like, I can't wait, you know, freaking can't, I'm gonna send it and I'm gonna freaking, if I crash, so what? I don't care. I'm just like, the medics are there, I'm good, like. And then I got to the point where I'm like, man, I don't want to crash, you know? Like, I'm like, been through so many injuries, so many broken bones, so much surgery. And I thought, okay, dude, I gotta find something else. It's not fun, you know? I'd sit up at night before the event nervous and like, cause it's fine, it's a 50 50 the next day. If you're going.

• 58:51Cameron Hanes?

  Getting older.

• 58:52Speaker 01

  Going in.

• 58:53Cameron Hanes?

  You're mortal.

• 58:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 58:54Cameron Hanes?

  Start thinking, yeah, the key is like, I think you're at your best when you think you're immortal.

• 58:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:59Cameron Hanes?

  I can't be hurt. I can be hurt, maybe I'll be fine. But yeah, when you know that maybe I won't be okay.

• 59:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:06Cameron Hanes?

  That changes.

• 59:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I, so then I'm like, what can I carry on with all these relationships and partnerships I have, where can I go? And that was car racing. I'm like, cause you're in a roll cage and it is much safer. And so fortunately at the time I had, I was with Rockstar at the time and they said, hey, why don't you come over and check out this truck racing? So they took me to the short course racing and showed me this truck racing with the Ladukes and, um, which is a family that raced and they, they were with Rockstar and I went, watched, I'm like, dude, this is like motocross in a race truck with a roll cage on me. It's pretty cool.

• 59:40Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 59:40Speaker 01

  So they, they said, all right, we'll help you. They put me in a race truck, I got a race, I got smoked. I'm like, frick dude, I'm fucking this thing and and uh and then I'm like, you know what though? This is my avenue out of freestyle. Like this is kind of almost a sink or swim. Like if you're gonna keep staying freestyle for sure, you're just kidding. Who knows when the next? Yeah. You know, when when the Could be one more day. Yeah. So got into car racing. I said, okay, I went and bought old junky race truck. And so I'm gonna practice every day. I'm gonna figure out how to race these things and I studied the best. And and uh so I went into that and within a a season, I was like fifteenth, tenth, eighth, sixth, you know, each race.

• 1:00:20Speaker 01

  And I finally got on the podium and I'm like, okay, then I started winning races and then then I got a good, good equipment. Proved who I was. Rockstar took a chance on me and then I started getting sponsors to pay for me. I had to come out of pocket the first few years quite a bit. And then I was like, okay, I'm gonna invest in myself like, cause I know I'm gonna believe in myself and I invested and it worked and I boom. Started getting endorsement deals, you know, millions of dollars coming in for truck racing. And I mean, it was a, I was at the pinnacle of off-road racing, you know, where I was racing pro two, pro four, which is four-wheel drive, two-wheel drive. Thousand horsepower engines, had like five of them in my shop, these engines at like seventy grand a engine. Like we were building race trucks out of my shop. I had semi trucks and and all these employees and it was like,

• 1:01:05Speaker 01

  it was gnarly. It was intense and we won a lot of championships. I had a lot of fun. And that way, and my daughter was able to come up and learn that a kids race during the pro racing in the morning. So I put my daughter in the kids, kids class and I was able to groom her into car racing and actually Hayden started, Hayden and Hudson both raced go-karts and raced karting. I thought that's what they were gonna do. I go, I don't wanna race dirt bikes, dude. It's gnarly. So we tried to put them in car racing and eventually they veered into dirt bikes, you know, but a lot of people don't know that story, but uh so I did the car racing for, I was almost ten years of off-road and was able to keep my sponsors and all my endorsement deals. X Games brought in rally car.

• 1:01:45Speaker 01

  So I got to race rally cars at X Games and still be at, I was still at X Games, which is cool. And that was thanks to Pastrana. He's the one who brought it in. And I end up winning X Games Gold in a rally car in LA and I think 2011 or something. And I mean, which against some of the best rally car drivers, you know, and which was freaking hard, dude. There's no better driver than a rally car driver. They're the shit. Like, there is no better driver. So, so I, you know, did that, truck racing, car racing, and then about the point when that started winding down, you know, I had my own off-road tires, Deegan tires, we had all these licensing deals with all these car products. And, um, man, I just felt like we kicked ass. Like, we, we'd go to SEMA, every year SEMA Car Show and get all these sponsorships,

• 1:02:28Speaker 01

  had all these partnerships and, and, uh, I've, I mean, just the, what I could talk about in marketing and business and licensing is crazy. Like, I mean, any contracts I've read, like, how many deals I've done, and if you don't see that part of it, you know? And that, that is, if I could say, my forte in business would be marketing and licensing. Like, I've just done so much of it.

• 1:02:50Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:50Speaker 01

  And it's trial and error. I feel like, like I tell my kids, don't take advice from anyone that hasn't been there and done it.

• 1:02:56Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. I was gonna say, who, like, who has done what you've done? Has anybody?

• 1:03:02Speaker 01

  I'd say, uh, you know, the guys I think of is, oh, man, guys that have made money from the sports that I've been in is probably only really Pastrana is the only one, other business guy that has a lot of business going on, you know, with his Nitro Circus. And he's part, when I say business, I mean, creating jobs for your friends and other people in your community. You know, that's business, you know? And so, and I was able to do that with, with Metal Militia. I was able to create jobs and opportunity and pay the riders and, and, uh, it, it created business. And I, and I give credit to Travis for doing that, but I look at providing for more, more people than just himself. But there was, probably, probably count the guys on one hand that have made, that have parlayed out of the sport.

• 1:03:47Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:47Speaker 01

  I don't know. People just seem to get stuck in that rut and ride it till the, till the wheels fall off and then where do, then it's done.

• 1:03:55Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:55Speaker 01

  I see that happen so much and I could be a whole nother talk of subject, but I'm. Yeah.

• 1:04:00Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:01Speaker 01

  It's like a negative subject I don't want to touch on.

• 1:04:04Cameron Hanes?

  I, I, I totally like admire that your journey and it's like, it's what I've tried to do. I like hiring people. I like, I want to sponsor athletes, you know, there's this track athlete I'm, I'm, you know, working on a sponsorship for. So I, same thing. I want to do it. And it's like, it's not normal because no, people normally in my industry are, if you can get a few pro contracts, just a little bit of money. It's like, oh my God, I'm, I'm, you know, there's not really a professional bow hunter, but if you're sponsored, that's like being a factory writer. You know what I mean? And then if you ever had like your, a bow with your name on it, you know, that's like, it doesn't get any better.

• 1:04:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. So you gotta break some barriers down.

• 1:04:44Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. So it's, it's tough, but that next level, like what you're talking about with that, being able to provide and like the big vision and making it happen. I, I love that about your journey because you came up. That is your stories. I mean, has there been a movie on your story?

• 1:05:03Speaker 01

  So they, they did a documentary.

• 1:05:05Cameron Hanes?

  But it was years ago, right?

• 1:05:06Speaker 01

  Years ago. Yeah. It's called Bloodline and it was done by Paul Tobler, who did, he's done a lot of documentaries. He's good at documentaries. He did one called Unchained, the story of freestyle motocross. It's just a great, I love documentaries.

• 1:05:18Cameron Hanes?

  Me too.

• 1:05:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. I, I prefer to watch those over everything. I've watched every documentary and F1 and car racing. I love it, but I feel like we have chapters. The last chapter was when I think Haley was probably around 17, 18. So the last documentary we did was probably five years ago or so. I think it's probably time for an updated one, right? Like, yeah, it'd be cool. Yeah. So I tell people, if you really want to understand who we are, you can watch that documentary, Bloodline. It's on, it's on YouTube or whatever. And it tells, it really tells our story of who we are. Up, up until like four or five years ago, but uh, yeah. I mean, it's, it's, yeah, it's a small town kid's story.

• 1:05:57Cameron Hanes?

  But like to me, what I see now, so maybe like in the last five years, so if that was stopped five years short, what I see is like, you, I don't know if you'd say this, but is, are, are you bigger than the sport, your name?

• 1:06:13Speaker 01

  What sport?

• 1:06:15Cameron Hanes?

  Motocross.

• 1:06:15Speaker 01

  Motocross, um.

• 1:06:18Cameron Hanes?

  I mean.

• 1:06:19Speaker 01

  I would say because we because I'm in many different sports, I would say, yeah, because I'm into car racing, you know, uh, in the motocross, supercross, freestyle motocross, you know, uh, off-road trucks, rally cars, uh, you know, it's, I would think, you know, I have an audience outside of motocross. Yeah. And that's when I think of, yeah, bigger than the sport. And you can see that in a negative way. No, but I, I feel like have I reached outside of the sport and have an audience outside the sport of motocross? Yes, like.

• 1:06:54Cameron Hanes?

  So how do you navigate your deals when, when you're arguably, maybe people, maybe the sport would say, no, we call the shots. You're just personality, whatever. But how do you navigate deals when you have that much power?

• 1:07:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'd say the, the deals, like I try to navigate deals around what I'm doing. I, I say, hey, we are a family that races, you know, right now I'm focused on my kids racing and supporting them. I still race myself. I still race at Can Am's and go race King of the Hammers, which is a very tough, brutal race through the rocks in California. And I still race off-road. I'll go to Cranston this year and race the biggest, the biggest race of the year in short course, getting in like a, you know, six, 700 horsepower race truck and go 100 miles per hour, 20 deep through the first turn with 20 other trucks. You know, it's, it gets your heart racing. So I'll still do that stuff because I still have, you know, endorsement deals with car products and, and manufacturers

• 1:07:54Speaker 01

  and all this stuff. So I touch on that, but a lot of people know, like my story is a family story at this point with YouTube. And, um, so I feel like the partnerships have to be men mesh with that, you know, if I'm. Trying to do a partnership, I'm like, and you want me to go do something off the wall? That's not on what we're doing. Everything I partner with now, it goes with with our brand and where we're headed. You know, we don't script what we do. We just film what we do naturally and show people. Like, hey, this is what we do at the races. This was our race weekend. These are the people we met. This is the funny stuff we saw.

• 1:08:33Speaker 01

  And and we show people that and the sponsors like, hey, we like, we like that story. So, you know, wear our hat, wear our shirt. Maybe plug our product in your video. But like me standing there and going, hey, buy this product. Like, you know, just like, I'm not doing that. And I feel like, I feel like even bad, like tagging things that are like, hey, buy this sale right now. Like, and I get companies that want you to do that. Cause like, hey, but I'm like, if you can save my my audience money on a product, cool, let's do it. You know, but if it's, you know, salesy, pitchy, I try to, you know, you know what I'm saying?

• 1:09:11Cameron Hanes?

  I don't tag, I don't tag any of my sponsors. I'm like, if people want to know what I use, I mean, they know. Yeah, they they see what I'm using. So it's like, I'm, yeah, I I know there's other people in my industry who tag, like even has nothing to do with what they're doing. But it's a sponsor, they tag it. And I just think that it loses its value. Yeah, you know, so so I'm like, no, they'll they'll figure it out. But it's for me, it's been, uh,

• 1:09:41Cameron Hanes?

  you know, I mean, like the industry in the industry gets so used to like, this is what we do. This is a formula that works like, like if I have a sponsor, they say, well, there's these 3D shoots where like what we did today. Yeah. And there's these big 3D shoots where the whole everybody's at. And I'm like, they say, we want you to go to the shoot. And I go, all those people already know me. Yeah. And either like me or hate me. Hmm. Why don't I go to Washougal and shoot bows in front of a whole new crowd?

• 1:10:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:11Cameron Hanes?

  And just convincing them that, oh, that's a good idea because it's a new market. That is hard.

• 1:10:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:18Cameron Hanes?

  Because. You're so used to the, no, no, this is what, this is a formula that works. This is what we've always done.

• 1:10:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:10:24Cameron Hanes?

  And that like the magazine and the TV contracts, those all were, they did it for so long. It's hard to get out of that. That's why I was wondering like with you, you know, with your name, it's like when you're bigger than the sport. How does a sport deal with you and like dealing or and how do you navigate, you know, your business dealings or your partnerships?

• 1:10:46Speaker 01

  I feel like you, I get what you're saying. When I say, and I will, I guess, make it clear, like when I say, our, our web goes out further than the sport.

• 1:10:58Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, right.

• 1:10:58Speaker 01

  So our tentacles go much further than just motocross.

• 1:11:01Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:01Speaker 01

  But obviously that's what people are focused on right now. So that's

• 1:11:04Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:04Speaker 01

  We're the most attention because there's a ceiling on, like I, we, me and the guys that help manage, guys that I work with that help manage us, we've been with forever. They, we grew up in the same town. They're just buddies and I would trust them, you know, trust us. A good relationship, but my point is there's a ceiling, you know, like there's a ceiling in your, you know, I'm sure there's a ceiling in your sports. There's a ceiling in motocross. There's only so much that these companies are going to pay.

• 1:11:31Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:11:32Speaker 01

  You know what I'm saying? So you're not going to get the multi, multi million dollar deal out of some motocross company that, you know, only going to pay so much. So that's up to you and your sponsors and your, your, your marketing machine to reach out. I, dude, I send so many DMs to companies that I wanted like, like, I'm like, hey, what's up, dude? I'm so and so like you. I, we pitch, like we, we work it, you know what I'm saying? Why not? There's a, there's windows, right? And we have a value. So let's get it out there. And most people are like, hey, I didn't, didn't think of that. You guys have a cool story. Yeah, let's talk, you know, and I love it. I love that part of it. So let's get on the phone. I love the negotiations and talking. It's cool. I'll enjoy, enjoy that part. Yeah.

• 1:12:13Cameron Hanes?

  Exciting. It's like what I, so I'm curious on your opinion on this. So a lot of times you're with a sponsor for a long time. Like say 20 years and they kind of take the relationship for granted a little bit. Maybe another sponsor comes in and says, hey, what if we paid you this? Would you come over? And it's double what they got, the outfit you've been with forever would pay.

• 1:12:37Speaker 01

  Yeah. So then that's happened and.

• 1:12:42Speaker 01

  Man, that, that, that's getting me into a long story, but long story short, I was with Monster. It was Hanson's Energy first. I was, you know, friends with Mark Hall, the guy who created it. We were test testing Monster before it even started. We were doing taste testing in his office and logo drawings. I had the first Monster logo on my dirt bike for X Games printed off a printer. Like, so I was there from the start, right? So me and my buddies were blowing up the militia thing with X Games and so be No Fear came to us like, name your price. And we're like, shit, we're young. We're like, yeah, bro, that's a six-figure contracts. We're like, no way, you know? And I went back to Monster. I'm like, hey, can we, let's do the Monster militia. Let's get the whole crew and this will be cool.

• 1:13:26Speaker 01

  And they were listening. They thought, yeah, they're, we're just not ready for that. Like, we don't have budget to get all your guys. And, and I'm like, young dude, look at No Fear. I'm like, bro, they're gonna pay us those that much money. And so we left and we went into No Fear and we had a good run, you know? We had, and they did all No Fear gear. The crew looked cool. We had, you know, a good run with merch. And then the checks quit coming. The checks started bouncing. I went down to the office. I'm like, what the hell, dude? You need to pay us, like, you know? And I, and it fricking crumbled. And what a fricking reality check, dude. And, and then at that point, we had a lot of value. So Rockstar jumped on us. Boom. We had Rockstar militia. We helped them a lot. They helped us a lot. We, it blew up.

• 1:14:08Speaker 01

  And we ran that kind of rebel Rockstar thing for, for many years and, and they get, dude, they supported us big time. And, and, but there came a point where they started trying to sell the Pepsi or trying to sell their company and things started getting a little sideways. And I'm like, kind of going, okay, what's happening here? And, and the good thing is I always keep relationships. Like, I never, never burned the bridge. And I learned that from a young age when I did burn bridges. You know, like God taught me, don't do that. And so if I can give you any advice, don't burn the bridges as much as you want to, much as you want to fricking, you know, like get them. And you just don't. Cause you know what? I was able to call, talk back to Monster, my dude. And Mark can say, hey dude, there's an opening right now. You know, Rockstar is kind of calling my bluff right now.

• 1:14:52Speaker 01

  Saying, well, if you don't take this deal, you ain't getting shit, you know? And I'm like, I have a window right now. I go, I can go do another deal right now. There's a gap. And they said, all right, cool. Right there. Boom. Send a contract that day over. And I was like, damn, all right, here we go. And I went to Rockstar, walked back in and said, guys, I got another deal and they're like, they like couldn't, you know, couldn't really believe it. They're like, okay, that was quick. And why did that deal happen? It happened because of a relationship I kept.

• 1:15:21Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:22Speaker 01

  And I said, hey, Mark, even when I left, I said, hey, they're gonna pay us this much money. We're young guys having fun. He said, dude, take the money then.

• 1:15:29Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:29Speaker 01

  He was like, I'm not mad. I said, yeah, thank you for everything you've done. And I said, thank you.

• 1:15:33Cameron Hanes?

  But that's rare because you know, even companies have egos.

• 1:15:36Speaker 01

  Yes, that's rare. You're right. You're right. That's a kind of dream scenario, but they ended up taking me back. But it taught me, it depends what the company is, right? If a company is gonna keep you at a certain number forever and you're worth more and you're worth more and worth more. And if there's another company coming in that has bigger visions, you know, they're gonna be around for the long haul. Hey, that's business, dude. You know what I'm saying? It just, it is. And the company, you, if you've come in like Monster did to me, they said, hey dude, that's a good offer, dude. Take it. That's a lot of money. And that's what good sponsors do.

• 1:16:13Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:16:14Speaker 01

  You know what I'm saying? And I've had that happen multiple times where companies like, bro, we cannot match that. That is freaking good. Like you should take that.

• 1:16:21Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:21Speaker 01

  And you kind of feel like, oh, well, fuck you, dude. Like you don't really, you don't want to pay this? Like, it's a weird.

• 1:16:26Cameron Hanes?

  It is weird.

• 1:16:27Speaker 01

  But it's a respectful thing. Them going, you know what? You have good value. Get your value. You know, and, and most companies aren't like, hey, we'll be here when you come back. Nah, it doesn't always happen.

• 1:16:37Cameron Hanes?

  Well, yeah. And then here's what the problem I have is companies, they're, they're quick to say, hey, budget cuts. We gotta cut you back. They're not quick to say, you know what? You've been kicking so much ass. Here's more, we want to up your contract.

• 1:16:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:16:53Cameron Hanes?

  Why, why is it never, why is it like that? Why can't they recognize value before you want to go shop and say, you know what? These guys, I'm kicking ass.

• 1:17:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:17:04Cameron Hanes?

  I deserve more.

• 1:17:05Speaker 01

  So the way that I've done that is with companies like, hey, so and so is paying me this. I, I feel like we're doing really good right now. We're gonna go on this film trip or we're gonna do this project. And this project, man, I could use, I could really use an extra hundred grand or a couple hundred grand, whatever. Like, like call them, hey, man, I got this project in line where we really want to do this thing. Can you support it? Yeah, cool. Yeah, all right. Yeah, we'll cut you a check for that. You guys are kicking ass. Boom. It's not like, hey, pay me more. It's like, I'm gonna provide you this thing that's pretty cool. It's gonna shit ton of views. It it's may cost us 25 grand, but I'm gonna charge you 50 and you guys know that, right? Cause that's gonna, you're gonna put it to the board.

• 1:17:47Cameron Hanes?

  Here's a line item you use for marketing.

• 1:17:49Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. Go get this out of the budget that's already there.

• 1:17:52Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:17:52Speaker 01

  And where everyone's checking their boxes. Everyone's happy and let's go. And that's the way we've been able to grow deals. You know, I especially with social media now, like, hey, I got this idea. We want to do this one off, you know? I got this trip we're going on. We're gonna cover it, you know, so and so is gonna be there. We're all gonna share the post. That's the way that I've been able to get more money, you know?

• 1:18:13Cameron Hanes?

  You got your personal sponsorships and you got your film projects and you got your whatever else.

• 1:18:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, nowadays, you know, you podcast, you got, you got, you know, it's like coming out and just doing special events, you know? Holidays, like, there's so many reasons to do one off. Cool things, you know, like a releases of new products. There's so many things you can use.

• 1:18:34Cameron Hanes?

  And you have to, because with social media, you have to keep it fresh.

• 1:18:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:38Cameron Hanes?

  You can, you can have your anchor items, but there has to be other stuff too.

• 1:18:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:43Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. Yeah, God, that would, that reminded me. Oh, here's what, so do you, you don't do a podcast?

• 1:18:50Speaker 01

  I used to do a podcast, yeah.

• 1:18:52Cameron Hanes?

  So we're, we're talking about this because we've kind of fell behind, but we'd been doing like a shit talkers weekly.

• 1:18:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:58Cameron Hanes?

  And like, if you did, you know, after the race weekend.

• 1:19:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:04Cameron Hanes?

  Like a, just like behind, like what happened? That would blow up.

• 1:19:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. God, yeah.

• 1:19:10Cameron Hanes?

  It'd be kind of like the shit talkers weekly.

• 1:19:12Speaker 01

  You're saying it would be shit talkers weekly, like telling, telling the behind the scenes or combating the shit talkers?

• 1:19:19Cameron Hanes?

  I don't know. It could be anything. We, we do it. We talk about all sorts of crazy stuff, but people like, they, you know, I have the guests on, I have outliers, like this is gonna be a huge podcast, but people say, we also love shit talkers weekly.

• 1:19:33Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:19:33Cameron Hanes?

  You know what I mean?

• 1:19:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:34Cameron Hanes?

  So you can have, you can have, it's just different because when you're with a guest, you're. More uh it's just more structured.

• 1:19:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:43Cameron Hanes?

  I'm asking you questions about you, but when you're just bullshitting, it's just different.

• 1:19:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:19:49Cameron Hanes?

  So sometimes people listen to podcasts because they want to hear what you have to say. Sometimes you just want to turn it on and go on a run and just not have to.

• 1:19:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:58Cameron Hanes?

  Think too much, just kind of laugh.

• 1:19:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, I agree. And that's I feel this idea, trust me, I have so many ideas go through my head all the time. And with like after the race weekend, we could do the funniest like like narrate our weekend like like Hayden's whole, maybe his whole side of the weekend, what he thought, right? Because he had some close calls this weekend.

• 1:20:18Cameron Hanes?

  He did.

• 1:20:18Speaker 01

  Colliding in the air with other riders.

• 1:20:20Cameron Hanes?

  I know.

• 1:20:20Speaker 01

  In his mind, he has his side of like, hey, this is what I was thinking in the air.

• 1:20:24Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:24Speaker 01

  And this stuff people are never going to get to hear.

• 1:20:27Cameron Hanes?

  People would love that, dude.

• 1:20:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. And I agree. There's so many sides that so many things that we see. That's why I did a post on my Instagram today that kind of showed some of the behind the scenes stuff. Like, we get a lot of fans that come over and a lot of little kids who like this one little girl came over this weekend, drew a picture of Hayden and had I love Hayden shirt like she made. And I'm like, she's, you know, in the crowd. They only give the riders 20 minutes a weekend to sign. It's dude, the lines, thousand people around the motor, around the couch, like only about 100 people get actually get something. And um so I feel bad, you know, we all feel bad, but like I tell the fans, we are there for first and foremost to win this race.

• 1:21:06Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:06Speaker 01

  You know, and there's only one guy gonna do that, you know, and we want to be that guy. So but we respect the, you know, the the crowd we've built. And so like I said, there was this girl drew this picture. She's probably six, seven years old. I'm like, oh, man, I like Hayden's inside studying tape, eating lunch. And I and we've kind of made a pact. Like when he's locked in focusing and working on stuff, we just don't like let him do his thing. Right? You know, let him focus. And I said, oh, this kid, I grabbed the girls, let's go. And I walked her into the holler and and she gave Hayden her picture and you could tell she was nervous, like, you know, fixing her hair, clothes like and Hayden's like, hey, what's up? You know, let me sign it. Thanks for doing that.

• 1:21:46Speaker 01

  And and signs her hat and her picture and she and her mom walking, her mom's crying in tears, you know? And I and I'm like. Okay, and I was like, people don't see that.

• 1:21:56Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:21:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, and so I, and I posted that. And I said, this is stuff that happens during the races that people don't see, you know, and, and, um, and, uh, the media is good at posting the, the bad gnarly stuff, the funny goofy stuff he says online just because it gets views.

• 1:22:11Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:11Speaker 01

  Okay, then I'd say the media is media vultures, right? That's just what they do. And, and it is what it is, like, like, like it or hate it, whatever. So, um, that's why we tell our side of the story through social, but like, I agree with what you say, there's a lot of stuff behind the scenes that people aren't seeing.

• 1:22:28Cameron Hanes?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:22:29Speaker 01

  And I feel like that is something that I would like to start pushing out more and more. Cause right now we push out a lot of content, but it's basically like, uh, it's racing.

• 1:22:38Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:38Speaker 01

  The competition and it's kind of the base.

• 1:22:41Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, it's, uh, I just know, um, e- even like having, uh, Garrett and Eli out there shooting the bows. People just don't, they never see that side of, they don't see those guys high fiving each other because of a bow shot.

• 1:22:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:55Cameron Hanes?

  You know what I mean? So the crowd was just like, this is amazing.

• 1:22:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:59Cameron Hanes?

  You know, they saw these people like be human.

• 1:23:02Speaker 01

  Human, yeah.

• 1:23:02Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. And, um, yeah, it's just, I don't know, I was, I was curious about that. Well, uh, so I'm going to switch gears a little bit because I was wondering about this as, as you know, you being a parent, but it is a dangerous sport. It's like, isn't that like kids die every year doing this?

• 1:23:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:21Cameron Hanes?

  What, how do you?

• 1:23:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:23Cameron Hanes?

  Well, how do you think about that?

• 1:23:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, especially recently, you know, our sport.

• 1:23:27Cameron Hanes?

  Are they getting faster, more aggressive, every, more gnarly tracks? What's going on?

• 1:23:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, the sport, the sport has always been dangerous, right? There's always been deaths in our sport. There's, it's always been like, the thing about this sport is, you know, you break bones frequently. And it's like, oh, so and so broke a femur today. Oh, that's like, how many months? Two, three months he'll be out. And imagine if that, like, when a guy breaks a leg in the UFC, it's like everywhere. Like, it's a huge deal, right? Like, highlight clips over and over. Motocross is like, oh, no big deal. That is, it gets annoying to me, right? And, and I'm like, man, it's, it's, the sport is. So gnarly and these guys push so hard on the weekends and during the week that people don't see.

• 1:24:12Speaker 01

  And uh, so yeah, that that dude, I'm so nervous. You know, I watching my kid like every weekend mainly nervous on the start when they take off. Cause that's so crazy. Forty guys going through the first turn hauling ass, fighting for a little piece of real estate. And I mean, the whole day I'm just like, dude, it's a whole day. I'm so nervous and.

• 1:24:31Cameron Hanes?

  I know.

• 1:24:31Speaker 01

  I know it's never gonna go away.

• 1:24:33Cameron Hanes?

  I'm watching the time even as just a spectator and like every minute.

• 1:24:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:39Cameron Hanes?

  It's risky.

• 1:24:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:40Cameron Hanes?

  Every second.

• 1:24:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, every second.

• 1:24:42Cameron Hanes?

  You never know. Cause also it's like, even if you're the greatest writer out there, you're out there with a bunch of other writers.

• 1:24:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:48Cameron Hanes?

  And when you start lapping people, it seemed like that would get pretty intense.

• 1:24:52Speaker 01

  Yes. And that's, you know, Hayden was racing a year ago and a guy, a lap rider who were very dangerous. A lap rider fell on a landing and he comes around, he comes down the hill. I'm like, no way. I was in the tower watching. I wanted to tell him like, dude, don't hit the jump. Don't hit the jump. And I watched it all go down. He had like five seconds before he jumped. He come down the hill, turns, burr up, hits this big jump and the rider's bike's on the landing. He freaking lands right on it. Boom. Flips in the air, lands right on his back. Fortunately, he's tough and gets up, runs back to the bike. I'm like, no freaking way, dude.

• 1:25:27Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:27Speaker 01

  And I'm like, how do we fix this? And I'm like, bro, I've been racing cars for a long time. We would never race without communication, without radio.

• 1:25:35Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. So they don't have, do the riders not have anything?

• 1:25:38Speaker 01

  Nothing. Yeah. And nothing. And I'm like, they, comms exist. We use them for coaching during the week at times.

• 1:25:45Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:46Speaker 01

  I'm like, I've talked to AMA, I've talked to the series. I'm like, guys, please get comms on these guys. I go, it is a safety concern.

• 1:25:54Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:54Speaker 01

  And I get a lot of guys like, I don't want people talking to me. Okay, cool. Then choose not to run your calm, dude. You don't have to like. And maybe the comms only for the, the, when the pit board area, when you go by and down that straight away, maybe that's the only time you can, your, your mechanic can talk to you. You know, you can't talk back to him. Who knows? Maybe there's regulations at first, but there should be a point where so and so's down on the triple. Don't jump the triple. Like, obviously quicker than that. Hey, don't jump, you know? Where I feel like if if I had a calm with Rahedon when he's coming down that hill, all of it says Hayden, don't jump.

• 1:26:27Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:27Speaker 01

  And that's all you know. And we would know before, hey, these are our code words. And and when I say don't jump, it's because something something bad's on the other side. So trust me, just roll it and go. And I just, it's a safety thing and I and I would love if they would introduce it. But anyhow, my goal is, like I said, you always try to limit the risks, but to your race in a dirt bike, the bikes are getting faster and faster. Two fifty now has fifty some horsepower at two fifty, which when I grew up racing, you'd go from eighty cc to one twenty five cc. A one twenty five cc had like thirty five horsepower. And that's where you'd learn. And then you go to a two, uh, one twenty five pro and then two fifty pro was like the four fifty class.

• 1:27:09Speaker 01

  And then it now it's switched to these two fifty two strokes that are super fast. Kids are getting off mini bikes and going straight to these two fifty Fs that are like crazy fast. And you would never do that back in the day. It's double the power than the bikes we had to learn on big bikes.

• 1:27:24Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:24Speaker 01

  And, uh, and dudes with like Carmichael, we've had these discussions. I said, with speed comes more danger.

• 1:27:30Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:30Speaker 01

  That's it. Faster bikes, more danger. It is what it is. And so how do you limit that? How do you protect that? I just feel like the OEM should have had a discussion with the riders and the OEM should have been like, hey, how fast do we need to make these dirt bikes? You know, like they don't need to be that fast. The four fifties are too fast. Way too fast. But, um, anyway, there's good racing. You get a good racing without that speed, I feel, but

• 1:27:53Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:53Speaker 01

  You know, that's my opinion on it.

• 1:27:55Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, cuz I cuz I thought I heard like the there's a kid that died about maybe a month ago, but didn't people land on him?

• 1:28:03Speaker 01

  Yeah. So from what I understand, uh, it was a kid, actually my son knew same same age, uh, probably around fifteen. Young prodigy fast kid, you know, crashes and sounds like he got hit from another dirt bike when it went into him and ended up, you know, instantly killing him. And I don't know if there's any fixing that, you know, who know, it sound like it happened pretty fast. I don't know the exact stories. It's hard to comment on it because there is instances that happen so quick.

• 1:28:29Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:30Speaker 01

  There's no, no one could do anything about it.

• 1:28:32Cameron Hanes?

  Of course.

• 1:28:32Speaker 01

  And, um, but yeah, like learning from that, you're like, okay, what do you do to fix that? And I have, I have a list of ideas.

• 1:28:40Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:40Speaker 01

  I feel like there's a list of ideas for the sport to get better, but man, it's always such a hurdle to get stuff.

• 1:28:47Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:47Speaker 01

  Like people just don't want to change, you know?

• 1:28:49Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:49Speaker 01

  People want to keep it to the old ways. And I'm like, dude, the bikes have changed. So, you know, time for the safety to change too, but.

• 1:28:57Cameron Hanes?

  Well, I mean, you know, NFL has changed with their helmets and concussion protocols and different things like that. So because athletes are getting faster, stronger, you know, the big hits have always been what people want to see. Same with the racing, like intense racing and bumping into each other and aggressive. If that's what sells kinda.

• 1:29:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:19Cameron Hanes?

  But yeah, you gotta take care of your athletes.

• 1:29:21Speaker 01

  Yes. And, and the sport has gotten better. If you get a concussion, they do make you sit out so you can pass a test, which is good. Like the kid that crashed this weekend, he crashed, was knocked out, gets up, he's still racing around the track. They did black flag him, which is probably the right thing to do there. But, um, for me, for the sport to advance, it needs to go down the path of the most advanced sport in America. NFL, right? NFL, you got basketball, baseball, there, there are leagues. They, they have leagues, they have doctor, they have, uh, basically doctors that look after the athletes, right? And there's protocols that they have to follow and it protects the athletes for the long-term.

• 1:30:00Speaker 01

  You know, there's life after sports and, uh, I feel like that is a number one thing we need to get the sport into. Cause now it's blowing up, sports getting huge, dude.

• 1:30:09Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:10Speaker 01

  So it's time for that. We need, we need our leagues. We need the protection of the riders. The riders need insurance. They need disability insurance. They need to be taken care of. And for me, the whole nother thing, and I'll fricking gonna start a nuclear war right now, but like basically, how many people come to those races buying a ticket because they want to see Jet, they want to see Eli, they want to see Hayden? They want to see their stars. Okay, boom. Shacks are getting, I don't know, forty, fifty thousand ticket sales. And you're sitting there and these riders are getting literally not one dollar of ticket. Well, not one dollar, you know? So I'm like, dude, come on. Like, at the end of the day, the teams are paying to be there. The OEMs are paying the teams. It's a system. It works. I mean, I it's hard for me to say anything because I have kids at the top, making good money. But dude,

• 1:30:54Speaker 01

  I was a privateer. I was one of those guys that was like, struggling. So I get it. I have a heart for that. And in the end, I just want to see it fair. You know, I want to see it fair for the riders. And I want to see riders be able to make a good living and not be like, beat up, broke up at the end of their career with with not enough money to like, make their next move, you know? And and I think it's easy to say, but how do we fix it? You know, we're all in. We're trying to sell as many tickets as we can for you guys. Like, like, we're doing our part. We're doing YouTube social. We're doing three videos a week. We're post every day. Yeah, it helps our partnerships, but it also helps sell tickets. Yeah, you know, and and we can we can go overseas and get paid two, three hundred grand a race to show up. Cut, you know, why is it not happening here, dude?

• 1:31:36Speaker 01

  You know? Well, I don't know. Like, that's gonna blow up, you know? There's more to it.

• 1:31:42Cameron Hanes?

  There's a like, even the UFC kind of gets beat up for not, if you look at the revenue and what the fighters get, it's, you know, twenty percent or something like that. But it's zero. Sounds like for motocross.

• 1:31:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, there is a payout. There is a payout for the riders. But like, I think it's for like, Hayden won a Supercross. I think it might have been five grand for him to win that.

• 1:32:04Cameron Hanes?

  Who pays that?

• 1:32:05Speaker 01

  So that is paid by, I think it's paid by the AMA. So you pay a fee to race. You pay for membership and you pay an entry fee. And that goes to like, a purse that goes that pays out to the riders. And it's been the same for many years. Like, so at the end of the day, there's a very, very small payout that goes to the riders. And it's just enough for like, guys to get gas money, get to the next race. So that is their purse, right? The only one that really pays is the SMX series at the at the end, is the playoffs, the three rounds. It's a million dollar prize to win the four fifty purse money. 500 grand to win the lights class, but the caveat to that is usually the OEMs pay that fee.

• 1:32:47Speaker 01

  They don't pay that fee for those three rounds. So you're still getting your chance to win it, but it's paid by the series. Which man, imagine if both paid.

• 1:32:57Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:58Speaker 01

  That'd be a great job for these guys making decent money for what they're doing.

• 1:33:01Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:02Speaker 01

  You know, I, I mean, I'm not saying the money's there, it's not there. I don't, I don't know. You know, I don't study the books, but I just know the tickets, they're selling a lot of tickets, you know, the, the stands are full, which is good for everyone. That's a good thing. It's not a bad thing.

• 1:33:15Cameron Hanes?

  It is great.

• 1:33:16Speaker 01

  Right? So like everyone's doing their job. So it's just my opinion on it, you know?

• 1:33:21Cameron Hanes?

  You can have it. Yeah. I did, I did want to say, it's like what a tragedy that young man who just died was that we were talking about and and it's just, man, I just was like, as an outsider, how could that be avoided? Of course you can't avoid all risk. You know, there's going to be risk, but um, yeah, I like your ideas on, on safety just because these kids are. Man, it is gnarly.

• 1:33:44Speaker 01

  It's gnarly.

• 1:33:45Cameron Hanes?

  It's dangerous.

• 1:33:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, it's super, super crazy, but like people know, like you know, like it's, you know, when you go bow hunting bears, you know, the risk, right?

• 1:33:56Cameron Hanes?

  There's risk.

• 1:33:56Speaker 01

  There's risk. Like you do it, you know, it sucks, but it's life, right? It's.

• 1:34:01Cameron Hanes?

  Weird. It's like. It's the more risk, the better I'm, you know?

• 1:34:07Speaker 01

  More exciting.

• 1:34:07Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, the more excited, the higher the stakes. That's what we want.

• 1:34:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:12Cameron Hanes?

  So yeah, I mean, you can't. We don't want it all gone.

• 1:34:16Speaker 01

  No, no. Yeah. And so, yeah, I, I agree. You can be on both sides of the fence there. Without that, I mean, is, is there excitement there if it isn't that risky, right? I people watch UFC for, hey, they want to see a knockout.

• 1:34:28Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:34:29Speaker 01

  Unfortunately, and what's that for? Some guys getting knocked out, right? You want to see the slap competition? It's only cool when one dude gets knocked out, right?

• 1:34:36Cameron Hanes?

  I know.

• 1:34:36Speaker 01

  Isn't that weird? Like, okay, dude, just fricking brain just got shocked, God. Like, yeah, yeah.

• 1:34:44Cameron Hanes?

  I know, it's nuts.

• 1:34:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:46Cameron Hanes?

  It's a, I do want to get your opinion though, because you've had such a long career, been involved so long. What?

• 1:34:55Cameron Hanes?

  How do you get be the best? Like what today? What makes? Why is Hayden the best 250 rider? Why is, is it Jet Lauren? Who's, who's the number one 450? But what makes them the best today? Cause I've heard you say like it's these, these teams that have to get together and have to train every day. Is that mandatory?

• 1:35:18Speaker 01

  Uh, the, the OG way and like the, the kid who crashed was Aiden Zing.

• 1:35:25Cameron Hanes?

  Right. Yes, I read that.

• 1:35:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was to honor and give respect. That isn't just some kid who crashes.

• 1:35:31Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:35:32Speaker 01

  This kid Aiden Zing was an awesome young talent coming up and good family from what I see. And I talked to a buddy who's close to them. He said, dude, it's like, it's, I mean, they're just good people, you know, it's a heavy situation, dude. And so, you know, that, that, that sport, this, you know, that's why I get so like emotional with the sport, like when it's, when they don't recognize the, the dangers of the sport. And that's why I feel like, okay, if, if the sport's doing well, you gotta pay these gladiators for what they're doing. So, but to, you know, if you're, the question I've been asked many times is like, how, well, how, why is Hayden the best kid in the

• 1:36:15Speaker 01

  lights class on, like to just say at his team on star and when they all get coached the same? They all get the same coaching program, which is think about that. So they all are, they're all are doing the same motos, the same gym workout, the same routine, which I kind of had a hard time with that for a while, but then I, then I, I tried something different and it didn't, actually didn't work. And, um, and, uh, and then we went back to the old.

• 1:36:37Cameron Hanes?

  You had a problem because you felt like you're taking away Hayden's advantage if everybody's doing the same thing?

• 1:36:43Speaker 01

  I felt like, why are we doing the same thing when Hayden needs, uh, he needs, he needs what he needs. He needs what he needs, right? We're going to focus on his weaknesses.

• 1:36:51Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:36:52Speaker 01

  And, um, and I, we kind of built a program around that, got away from our normal training program with the team and, and honestly went backwards. And I'm cool. I am, I can say that. I'm not scared to say is I don't always make the right decisions, dude. You know, like sometimes I'm willing to try and figure it out. If it doesn't work, cool. Try it. Move on. Let's go to the next thing, right? So why is Hayden the one that, you know, wins on the weekends? You know, it's it's comes down to, and you look at like, I can't totally speak for the Lawrences because I don't like, I'm not them, but I can see what they've their path, which is, you know, similarities to what we have done as a young age, we really focused

• 1:37:34Speaker 01

  on the foundation and we focused on how many skills can we get Hayden before he turns pro? And at our house, we had a skate park, BMX park, foam pit, trampoline, we had a, you know, freestyle park, motocross track with massive rhythm jumps, huge doubles, turn track, sand track, oval, flat track, you know, I can't do it. Must be nice. Yeah, must be nice. You know, who built all that shit? So he touched all this. And so his foundation, dude, like, and people are like, man, when he crashes, this dude rolls and gets up and runs back to the bike. I'm like, yeah, have you ever seen skateboarders crash down in LA in the city? Knowing how to fall.

• 1:38:19Speaker 01

  They know how to fall. They roll out of it and they're good. Like, how do you think that happens? Because they learned how to tumble. And that's something Hayden learned at a young age with trampolines and on mats. And we always had mats because we were always into jujitsu and always into the fight. We used to have backyard fights back in the day in our garage. So we've always had wrestling. In our office, we had a gym in our office and we'd have like fights in our office. But anyway, so Hayden grew up around, you know, tumbling and all that. So he had a foundation built. So when he got to train with the pro team, he, I feel like he had a better foundation. And he was raised in a household that was raised by winning championships. Like, that was what the vibe was in the house. Yeah.

• 1:39:04Speaker 01

  You know, you look at a lot of these kids are just Ricky Carmichael, Chad Reed, one day told me, they're like, champions are born, they're not built, like in motocross. And I said, no, I don't believe that. You can build a champion. And I look at him like, damn, dude, are they right? Like, because like, why are certain kids just really good at the sport? Because there's certain kids that come from like, the dad's a plumber, the dad's a, you know, electrician, like he rode a little bit, and the kid's just really good. Like, but I feel like those guys, it's my opinion, those guys, when it comes to like championship level, multiple championships, being the grinder and like being the dog under pressure. They don't have that little extra.

• 1:39:48Cameron Hanes?

  Hmm.

• 1:39:48Speaker 01

  And I feel like that is that little extra comes from that the upbringing, the household of the the community he's grew up in of like, dude, it's win or nothing.

• 1:40:00Cameron Hanes?

  Hmm.

• 1:40:00Speaker 01

  You know, like you win at all costs, you know, and

• 1:40:03Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:03Speaker 01

  And whatever it takes, we, you know, if it, you know, if we got a freaking, like I tell my kid, if I had to drive to California tomorrow to get you something to help you win, you know, I'll do it.

• 1:40:12Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:13Speaker 01

  Like, like, we don't care, whatever it takes, dude, you know, and so, and they grew up on that, you know, and they saw me, they saw me build race teams, they saw me win in rallying trucks and dirt bikes and they saw, they grew up around that, right? So you don't think that rubs off on them?

• 1:40:29Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:29Speaker 01

  You know?

• 1:40:30Cameron Hanes?

  Well, it's, it's how you speak, it's how you walk around, it's how you carry yourself, it's how you, you know, whatever, it's like all that matters with the kid that's watching.

• 1:40:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:40Cameron Hanes?

  It's like, I, cause I thought about that, that, you know, I, I'm not saying that I always won, but I always wanted to win the handstand contest at school. I always won like the, the jog-a-thon. It's just like, so when you've been competing since you were five, and now I'm fifty seven, so say fifty years of competing.

• 1:41:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:41:02Cameron Hanes?

  That, people notice in your family.

• 1:41:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:41:05Cameron Hanes?

  They will notice that, what that means.

• 1:41:07Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:41:08Cameron Hanes?

  And you talk, when you look at things like you critique things you're watching on TV, the words you're using, that, the kids, it's gonna affect your kid.

• 1:41:16Speaker 01

  Oh, big time.

• 1:41:17Cameron Hanes?

  So it's like, no, we compete.

• 1:41:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:41:20Cameron Hanes?

  At everything. I think that, is that what you're kind of saying?

• 1:41:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, I feel like my kids grew up around a competition every weekend.

• 1:41:30Cameron Hanes?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:41:30Speaker 01

  You know, we were at the racetrack, we were at some X Games event, and not just competition, they grew up around cameras, around the media, you know, NBC, ESPN, they're always at the house doing features and

• 1:41:42Cameron Hanes?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:41:42Speaker 01

  And, uh, they grew up just around that. So when the cameras come around, they're

• 1:41:47Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:47Speaker 01

  super now, like, people like, your kids are good. I'm camp, yeah, they grew up around it, you know, so, um, yes, that the, the community or the atmosphere they grow up in is heavily weighs on who they become and how they compete and how they see winning and losing.

• 1:42:05Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:42:05Speaker 01

  And, and I'm not saying they go, what would dad do? They don't, they know what dad do, it's gonna be, right? They know, like, they know what mom. Another formula to success, which I ain't getting, let all my secrets out. I think for, for at least us, it was a mom and dad were aligned on, on um, the racing, winning and being tough. You know, like, like, so when, when they crash and fall, get up, you're fine. You know, like, oh, they couldn't run to mom and like, oh, mom, my arm, I don't, I don't think I can race. I don't think I can do, train today. I don't. She's like, dude, you're fine. Go, you know, like, and yeah, if it's broke and hurt, we're gonna fix it, right?

• 1:42:49Speaker 01

  We'll do her on it, right? We know, like, I've been through enough of that, that I can tell, like, when it's real or not. At least most of the time. Um, so anyway, my point is that together, you know, if you have one parent that's a little, like, can, can be the softer. You need a time for it, but if the softer, like, kids can run to them all the time and, and get that out, you're, it's gonna be a tough battle. Yeah. You know, that's gonna be a tough road to form a kid to a killer, right? Definitely, I get that. So, uh, anyhow, and there's two sides of that, like, people, like, they see the competitive kids and they say, but a big thing for us is like, if we're not at the racetrack, we really push to be at church on Sundays. You know, that's a thing for us, you know?

• 1:43:35Speaker 01

  And wherever we're at, you know, we go to chapel service on, at the racetrack, you know, we make a priority to do that. And, and I feel like that to us is, is, is important. It's a foundation, it shows responsibility, it, it's a, it's a guideline, it's, it's a manual for us, you know? And I think, like, would I be where I'm at without that? I don't think so. You know, I feel like I've leaned on that many times and, and dude, I'm a man. Things come through my mind all the time. You know, I'm like, okay, sinking this, that, this, that, well, what's right, what's wrong? Right. You know? And, and uh, That, that to me is trying to give that to my kids so they have a fighting chance.

• 1:44:14Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:15Speaker 01

  Man, it's a war right now. We don't need to go down that path, but it is a war with the internet.

• 1:44:20Cameron Hanes?

  I know what you're saying.

• 1:44:21Speaker 01

  It's a war, so.

• 1:44:22Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, so if you have that, that positive foundation and the, the family, the anchor and uh, yeah, you can build off that. Yeah, the competition, all that, the killer instinct, great, but it has to be built on the right foundation.

• 1:44:35Speaker 01

  I feel I do, you know, and, and I know it's easy for people to point fingers and easier people say, well, if you're, if you're a Christian, why are you guys doing this? Why are you doing that? Why is this? And I'm like, you know, like at the end of the day, we believe what we believe, we, we do the best we can. You know what I'm saying? We're not, I never said we're perfect, like nowhere near it, you know what I'm saying? We do our best to, to raise our kids in, in a certain way that we do it to give them the best shot at life. You know, like, you know, I feel like if we just say, eh, go do what you want, whatever you feel like doing is fine, you know, just have fun like. You know, we, I just don't feel like we'd be doing our jobs, you know?

• 1:45:16Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, so that, that's, yeah, I, I agree with that. Um, I, I'm curious on the training and uh, I was wondering how much body weight affects performance on the track? Like, how much do you, do you pay attention to every ounce? You know, cause what, what I do with the racing and the hunting, we're always looking at ounces, ounces matter.

• 1:45:42Cameron Hanes?

  And then fueling matters, like, you know, in these races, but how much are you guys looking at body weight?

• 1:45:47Speaker 01

  Uh, so the crazy thing about sports here is, are with, you know, certain sports, like look at basketball. You have to be tall, right?

• 1:45:56Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:45:56Speaker 01

  It might, man, not to get off on a different subject, but imagine if they had a rule in basketball where you had to have one guy that was, you know, say six foot five, one guy that's six foot, you have to have a guy that's five eight. You have to have a guy that says, you imagine how much more opportunity it would give people, like, you're right? You know, your kids want to play.

• 1:46:15Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:15Speaker 01

  You know, the big leagues will never can because of their size.

• 1:46:18Cameron Hanes?

  They're five seven.

• 1:46:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, like me on Nebraska football, I'm like, bro, I'm too, I'm too small to play football, I couldn't do it.

• 1:46:23Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:24Speaker 01

  So.

• 1:46:24Cameron Hanes?

  That's not fair.

• 1:46:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, but you know, so. Motocross.

• 1:46:29Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:46:29Speaker 01

  The bike is built for about a one sixty-five to one seventy-five pound rider. That's kind of what they're built for. About probably a five-ten, five-eleven rider is kind of what their bikes are built for. I'd, I'd say. It's not specific, but that's a range and you know, I hate him being on the shorter side, you know, and but he's stocky and strong, which is a good advantage.

• 1:46:51Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:52Speaker 01

  I feel the smaller riders have an advantage outdoors. I feel like their legs are shorter. They can lay it into the ruts. They don't, they don't get their legs caught up. You look at the best riders to ever ride a dirt bike. Ricky Carmichael is probably five-seven, you know, a hundred and fifty-five pounds, probably. Uh, next best guy or another one of the best guys, not next best, but uh, James Stewart is uh, five-seven, probably a hundred and fifty pounds, you know, like and, and so these guys are the best. Supercross is always changing. The jumps are changing. The whoops are getting bigger. The whoop section do cater to a taller leg guy. That does cater, but you can get it done shorter. You can get it done with good technique.

• 1:47:31Cameron Hanes?

  Well, how come? What does it cater to?

• 1:47:33Speaker 01

  Because the bikes uh, teeter tottering through a set of whoops and, and the bike is going whoop to whoop to whoop, like going back and forth. And that's just the, the pure science of, of distance.

• 1:47:44Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 1:47:45Speaker 01

  To your butt.

• 1:47:45Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:46Speaker 01

  This, the bike's not hitting you in the butt.

• 1:47:47Cameron Hanes?

  Oh, I see.

• 1:47:48Speaker 01

  Cause you're tall, you know, it's letting the bike work a little more. It is, it's, I mean, for that, for Supercross, yeah, tall, tall helps. And now guys are leaving their legs on more instead of sticking their legs out in the turn. So that's going to help tall riders also. But um, overall, I don't like, it's kind of an odd sport that you can have a kid who's five-seven, five-eight, a hundred and sixty pounds, battle a guy who's six foot, a hundred and eighty pounds. I figured Tomac's gotta be five-eleven, six foot, maybe I'm guessing a hundred and eighty, a hundred and ninety pounds.

• 1:48:19Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. I think he's small. I think he's a little smaller.

• 1:48:22Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:48:22Cameron Hanes?

  I think so, but I don't know.

• 1:48:24Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I mean, he, he looks like a big guy when he rides a dirt bike, like a big dude. And so like March Banks, big dude, you know? It, it hurts you on the starts, the weight, because your bike has to pull that weight.

• 1:48:35Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. If it's fifteen pounds from one fifty-five to one seventy, fifteen pounds has to matter.

• 1:48:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. It's like a lot of mud on your bike.

• 1:48:43Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:43Speaker 01

  You know, but uh, and you can get it, four fifty is a fast bike. You can get it done being heavy. That, that kind of is an equalizer. The two fifty class, the weight does matter because the bikes aren't as fast, but. What is the perfect size and weight? Ah, I don't know, you know?

• 1:48:59Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, I was just curious. I didn't know if it mattered. I was just wondering.

• 1:49:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, I would say Hayden was a little heavier in Supercross just because the training wasn't as hard.

• 1:49:07Cameron Hanes?

  Hmm.

• 1:49:08Speaker 01

  Motocross is harder than Supercross, end of story. Like, there's guys that will battle with Hayden. Like, when he goes and races Supercross, there's guys that will battle with him. Outdoors, they're not even close to him. He's dust them. Why?

• 1:49:22Cameron Hanes?

  There's more separation and talent.

• 1:49:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, more speeds. There's more obstacles on the track. In Supercross, if one section on the track can make or break the race, okay, then the rest of the track must be pretty easy. It's a whoop section that usually makes or breaks the race.

• 1:49:37Cameron Hanes?

  Hmm.

• 1:49:37Speaker 01

  And outdoors, it's not one section. It's like many sections that add up. So, I still, I'll stand behind that. Motocross is harder than Supercross, hands down. Like, it's just more risk, more... And I, yeah, I don't know. I wouldn't say more risk. It's just the speeds and this. I think, my opinion, that it's, it's a... To be a motocross, a good motocross guy that wins, I just feel like you still, deep down inside, the riders respect those guys the most.

• 1:50:06Cameron Hanes?

  Hmm.

• 1:50:06Speaker 01

  There's just more respect there. That's my, maybe I'm old, maybe I'm old school, but I just feel like the most respect comes to the guys who can rip a moto track.

• 1:50:14Cameron Hanes?

  Well, and how much, to me, looking at those shadows at Washougal in the trees, coming into the sun, to me, that seemed like a huge challenge.

• 1:50:23Speaker 01

  It's very difficult.

• 1:50:24Cameron Hanes?

  Is that? Okay.

• 1:50:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:50:25Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. And how do you get good at that?

• 1:50:28Speaker 01

  That, just knowing the track and knowing where the ruts are.

• 1:50:31Cameron Hanes?

  Doing homework or what?

• 1:50:32Speaker 01

  Uh, most of the time in the practice in the morning, the ruts shape up and that dirt's so hard there, like a rock, that once they shape up, they're there all day.

• 1:50:40Cameron Hanes?

  They're gonna stay.

• 1:50:40Speaker 01

  So, once you kind of know where they're at, you kind of aim for those. The worst-case scenario is they water before the races, because it keeps the dust down, and it's slick, and you don't know where those water puddles and pockets are. And you go in there and the front end washes out, the rear end washes out. That's the worst case, especially at that track. That track is like hard-packed.

• 1:50:58Cameron Hanes?

  I see.

• 1:50:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's super, the dirt's super hard.

• 1:51:01Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 1:51:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's a different technique, a different bike setup. There's much to winning that race. You know, Hayden's won it the last two years there. I mean, he's been 1-1 every time going there.

• 1:51:12Cameron Hanes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:51:12Speaker 01

  His rookie season, he won there. Uh, it kind of a breakout ride.

• 1:51:17Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 1:51:17Speaker 01

  You know, and, uh, this year, this year, I'm like, dude... Wanted to win the race again, you know, because if he and he knew it, he had that pressure on him from when we got there.

• 1:51:27Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:51:27Speaker 01

  He had the pressure of everyone, you you won one, you're gonna win, you're gonna win. And you're a kid, like, you're like, yeah, it's a pressure, dude, I don't care what people say, like, leading the points, you know, you're the points leader. Why is there only one points leader? Because it's fricking hard, dude, and it's pressure. You look at the guys he's battling, like, Joe Shimoda is awesome, dude, he's a great rider. But, um, you know, comes on strong at the end of the season and he's giving Hayden a run and that's great, please battle him, give him, like, let's keep pushing him. Right? I love it when it's tough.

• 1:51:57Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:57Speaker 01

  Love it.

• 1:51:58Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:58Speaker 01

  I love to see him push, because next year's gonna be very difficult, he's gonna have to race 450 class and dude, it is gonna be tough.

• 1:52:04Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:05Speaker 01

  We know that, so let's get ready, you know?

• 1:52:06Cameron Hanes?

  Right. Is he ready for it?

• 1:52:08Speaker 01

  I I would say, is he ready today? Hmm, there's, I feel like we all know there's little things we need to, like, fix, not fix, but little things we need to sharpen. Like, sharpen the sword a little bit, you know?

• 1:52:21Cameron Hanes?

  What's one thing?

• 1:52:22Speaker 01

  Well, I would say, perfect laps.

• 1:52:25Cameron Hanes?

  Like, what do you mean?

• 1:52:26Speaker 01

  Not making mistakes, minimizing the mistakes.

• 1:52:30Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 1:52:30Speaker 01

  Because he's more old school, likes to just twist the throttle and just go, like, lay it down, you know? And I, and it, he's more of a racer too, a lot of people get caught up in the qualifying and think, oh, he, you gotta qualify first. You get no points for that, there's nothing for it. You get for, you get gate pick, which helps at times.

• 1:52:47Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:47Speaker 01

  But in the end, there's dudes like Cooper Webb, who like, eh, qualify, you know, whatever, fifth, sixth, and go out and win the main event. Because he's the racer, dogs, racers.

• 1:52:56Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:57Speaker 01

  And that's Hayden, he's more, he'll figure it out when it's race time.

• 1:52:59Cameron Hanes?

  I see.

• 1:53:00Speaker 01

  You know, he's been qualifying first quite a bit this year, but like this last weekend, he didn't qualify that good, he's like, dude, he's, I'm fine. Like, I'm not a race dude.

• 1:53:08Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:08Speaker 01

  You know?

• 1:53:09Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:10Speaker 01

  I guess it's like sparring or something during the week, being lax and then, you know, go to the, in the, in the main event, you just kick ass, right?

• 1:53:17Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:17Speaker 01

  There's certain guys that are just gamers, you know?

• 1:53:20Cameron Hanes?

  How, I was curious too, we got, okay, we got a few more minutes, but, uh, we have eight minutes.

• 1:53:29Cameron Hanes?

  How much is like? Cause I think these kids, when they're very young, that are identified to have talent, do they have to ship off away from their family to train?

• 1:53:40Speaker 01

  It's it's tough.

• 1:53:41Cameron Hanes?

  To be the best?

• 1:53:43Speaker 01

  Hmm, I would say, I would say no. I think you could get it done on your own if you have a little bit of property and you built your own little track and you have a good coach. Nowadays, you have to have a good coach.

• 1:53:56Cameron Hanes?

  Like a coach?

• 1:53:57Speaker 01

  A coach.

• 1:53:58Cameron Hanes?

  Are you, are you Hayden's coach?

• 1:54:00Speaker 01

  I would say I've been his coach since he was a little kid. There's no question of that. You can say I'm the dad, whatever, but there's no one, like I leave no like stone unturned. You know, like we, do I, I've hired dozens of coaches for him.

• 1:54:15Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 1:54:15Speaker 01

  I, I love, more coaches, the better. I love, I love learning from everyone.

• 1:54:18Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:19Speaker 01

  I feel like if you can't listen and learn from people, I don't even want to be around you, dude.

• 1:54:24Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. I, I get that. I love that.

• 1:54:26Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I've listened, I've had.

• 1:54:29Cameron Hanes?

  That's the whole point to this podcast, so I can learn. That's why I do this.

• 1:54:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:54:34Cameron Hanes?

  I want to learn from the best. So I, I appreciate that.

• 1:54:36Speaker 01

  Yeah. And likewise, so I feel like I love taking in information and I, like Hayden has done like a ton of coaching, a ton of different coaches and uh, everyone has their, their little pieces, you know, to, to the puzzle, to, to build. And, and just get to your question, can a rider do it on his own? I feel like yes. There's one kid that kind of did do it on his own, with a track, like this kid Cole Davies is good. He was trained by Ben Townley. Ben Townley is a great, great coach, but he's in New Zealand. So it's hard to get it, kind of get a hold of and he, he caught him kind of in his backyard track and or their facility over there.

• 1:55:20Speaker 01

  I've never been there, I haven't seen it, but it was good.

• 1:55:22Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:55:23Speaker 01

  He coached them great and your kid turned out good. Like, so it can be done.

• 1:55:26Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:55:26Speaker 01

  The best scenario is though, yeah, your kid earns a factory ride at a young age because he's a good amateur. He gets on a team and the team builds him. That's the formula right now that, that's working, you know? But yeah, I think you can get it done on your own. I think we. Could have done it on our own with the right coaching, but you need good equipment, dude. You gotta have good equipment. Like we're star, the Star Yama team has a race shop, engine, suspension, techs. We go train there and they're on Hayden twenty four, like twenty four seven when he's there, they're dialing in his bike is everything. So that's the new formula, you know?

• 1:56:04Cameron Hanes?

  How much is training a part of that?

• 1:56:06Speaker 01

  They, they train, he gets back on a Sunday or Saturday usually, and then Sundays are recovery day. They're, they're on cycling Monday, training Monday, like gym stuff and then motos Tuesday, Wednesday, and they do gym after moto too. So, and then Thursday they're flying out for press day Friday.

• 1:56:24Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 1:56:25Speaker 01

  And that's every week. So, so they train every day, dude.

• 1:56:29Cameron Hanes?

  That's a grind.

• 1:56:30Speaker 01

  Now in the summer it's hot. So the, to get back to what we're talking about earlier, the old school mentality of the Ricky Carmichael's was like train, train, train, train, the heat of the day, we're going, we're gonna motos, tons of riding during the week. And then he is a machine on, he was a machine for many years, but I feel like that was so unsustainable, very tough.

• 1:56:50Cameron Hanes?

  Was he one of one?

• 1:56:51Speaker 01

  He was one of one. Yeah. And his mom is, it was very, and the mom was, was the driving force, not so much the dad in this scenario. But they were both supportive and, and the mom is still at start of this day, doing every lap of every rider on lap, lap times.

• 1:57:07Cameron Hanes?

  Just obsessed with it.

• 1:57:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. She's, she is a machine and I love picking her brain. She showed me every training day of Ricky's, every year by every month, every day on a piece of paper in a calendars. She had stacks of calendars. I go, could I see those? And I would like to read those. So I read them and I'm like, dude, they are gnarly. I'm like, this is the highest level stuff I've ever seen as far as like

• 1:57:30Cameron Hanes?

  Like tell me.

• 1:57:31Speaker 01

  Grinding. Like he, he wouldn't ride till middle of the day. They said like one o'clock, like

• 1:57:36Cameron Hanes?

  To make it?

• 1:57:36Speaker 01

  To get in the heat of the day.

• 1:57:38Cameron Hanes?

  To make it as challenging as possible?

• 1:57:40Speaker 01

  Challenging as possible. He'd do, he'd do, from what I understood, he would come back from the races, he'd be motoring Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. They, they didn't ride Thursday.

• 1:57:48Cameron Hanes?

  Is motoring on the track?

• 1:57:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. Doing motos, like training. And his motos where he would do like three from what I understand, three forty minute motos. Which is like now the guys do like one, one, one forty, one twenty, do a couple of sprints, some starts and that's a day, right? So um, he did trip like triple the work. But he would go on the weekends and smoke everyone. I'm like, dude, so you think, oh, is that the way?

• 1:58:12Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:13Speaker 01

  And my son's like, I ain't doing that, dude. That's crazy.

• 1:58:16Cameron Hanes?

  The way.

• 1:58:16Speaker 01

  I'm like, bro, that worked. And he's like, dude, that's why he retired when he was like twenty six.

• 1:58:21Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 1:58:21Speaker 01

  He's like, he was the man. He retired on.

• 1:58:23Cameron Hanes?

  Icon.

• 1:58:24Speaker 01

  He's an icon. Yep. And he did it. But I, my, my opinion on it is, how can you do it to where you're still enjoying it? And you're not just take, you know, I feel like there's a point where you can start tearing your body down.

• 1:58:40Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:40Speaker 01

  Right? And taking days, if not years, off your life, right? Just because you're grinding your body to the extreme so much.

• 1:58:46Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:47Speaker 01

  And now recovery is a new thing. Like people are understanding recovery is a big thing. Showing up at the racetrack fresh, ready to go. And.

• 1:58:55Cameron Hanes?

  Sauna, cold tub, diet, that, you mean that?

• 1:58:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:59Cameron Hanes?

  Massage?

• 1:59:00Speaker 01

  Yeah. All the, all the things that probably fighters do, you know, everyone's kind of knows now because of the internet. Like ice bath, you know, hyperbaric chamber, uh, we got a red infrared saunas, you have, um, you know, eating right. The vitamins, the supplements and uh, rest. Like to me, there's nothing better than just sleeping.

• 1:59:20Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 1:59:21Speaker 01

  You know?

• 1:59:21Cameron Hanes?

  True.

• 1:59:21Speaker 01

  End of story.

• 1:59:22Cameron Hanes?

  You know, I, I'm fascinated, I'm always fascinated with the, the top tip of the spear people. And I asked, you know, this American record holder. The best American marathoner we have right now, I had him here like a week or so ago, but he was like, he wants to be a good husband and he wants to be a good person. He's like, I'm like, okay, well, that's good, but what about the guy who doesn't care about that? Doesn't care about being good. All they care about is competing.

• 1:59:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:59:49Cameron Hanes?

  And they're just going to train nonstop. They don't care about anybody.

• 1:59:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:59:53Cameron Hanes?

  Just what they, they want to be the best. So there's a. But does that, I don't know, because he said he was like in a marathon, he has, he picked 26 names every mile he's running for somebody. So he cared about 26 people.

• 2:00:07Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 2:00:07Cameron Hanes?

  Did that give him more of a purpose than the guy who's just like, I don't give a about anybody. I'm gonna, I'm gonna kill everyone. I'm gonna beat everyone.

• 2:00:17Speaker 01

  How long does that last?

• 2:00:18Cameron Hanes?

  I'm gonna out train everyone. I don't know, but maybe, maybe it only lasts as long as Ricky Carmichael.

• 2:00:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:00:24Cameron Hanes?

  And we're still talking about him.

• 2:00:25Speaker 01

  Okay, so Ricky, I believe his motivation was not losing. He didn't want to lose.

• 2:00:29Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 2:00:30Speaker 01

  And I think he's retired on top because he's like, hey, I'm retiring on top.

• 2:00:33Cameron Hanes?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:00:33Speaker 01

  Instead of riding it out another three or four years, making an extra five, 10 million a year for extra three or four years. That's a lot of money. You know, to, you know, it goes, when you want a certain lifestyle, money goes quick, depending on who you're with and what, what your, you know, your lifestyle is. But, uh, yeah, I think that, um, man, yeah, I feel like that, that is, there's a many ways to look at that.

• 2:00:57Cameron Hanes?

  It's likely unsustainable that just all, all about yourself all the time.

• 2:01:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, I don't think that's sustainable.

• 2:01:04Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:04Speaker 01

  And I think what has been a secret to our, you know, success, whatever you want to call it, is goals, goals.

• 2:01:12Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:12Speaker 01

  We have goals written, like when I was younger, if you look at pictures when I was a teenager racing, I had goal sheets on my wall. All handwritten, goal sheets, what I'm, what I want to do today, tomorrow, the next day of the month.

• 2:01:24Cameron Hanes?

  How old were you?

• 2:01:26Speaker 01

  Probably seventeen, eighteen.

• 2:01:28Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 2:01:28Speaker 01

  My dad, you know, I was struggling with leading races at the time. I get out front, get nervous, so I went to like a sports psychologist and started talking about, you know, the, the brain game and, and I was great. He's like, hey, man, let's start writing goals down and making, you know, having a plan.

• 2:01:43Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 2:01:44Speaker 01

  So that was kind of where, where I started with it. And I would do whatever, whatever it took, you know, whatever it takes. So I'd write my goals down. You know, to this day, the kids do that. You know, to this day, I ask kids at a young age, hey, let's write your goals down. What are, what are we doing today? What are we doing this month? What's your plan for this year? What's your plans for next year? Let's write all this down. You ha- let's write it down.

• 2:02:04Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:02:04Speaker 01

  Now it's scientific.

• 2:02:05Cameron Hanes?

  Well, cuz that makes it real.

• 2:02:06Speaker 01

  Makes it real.

• 2:02:07Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:02:07Speaker 01

  And scientifically now, there's a percentage that how much more it is gonna actually happen now. It's scientifically proven.

• 2:02:15Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:02:15Speaker 01

  Writing it down, it produces.

• 2:02:16Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 2:02:17Speaker 01

  It's not, there's no question. For me, I'm still a note taker. Every day, like, I know you have your iPhone, you put notes in it, but I write notepads. I still write on paper and this, what I wanna do, what I need to do. And that's when I get it done. I like mark it off.

• 2:02:31Cameron Hanes?

  That's awesome.

• 2:02:32Speaker 01

  I'm like old school, dude.

• 2:02:33Cameron Hanes?

  We've got all the secrets on this podcast.

• 2:02:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, a lot of old school stuff, dude. People are like, "Yeah, I don't do that."

• 2:02:40Cameron Hanes?

  I love it. Well, okay, you guys have one question cuz he's, he's gotta get out of here.

• 2:02:47Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:02:48Cameron Hanes?

  This is the peanut gallery. We gotta entertain them.

• 2:02:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's cool.

• 2:02:51Speaker 02

  I'll choose the most important one.

• 2:02:54Speaker 02

  Marry, kill, racing dirt bikes, uh, freestyle or truck racing?

• 2:03:01Speaker 01

  I feel like, um, out of it all for me was freestyle. You know, that was my era. That's what I was known for.

• 2:03:10Cameron Hanes?

  Gonna marry freestyle?

• 2:03:13Cameron Hanes?

  So you gotta one, marry one, kill one.

• 2:03:15Speaker 01

  Oh, is that what it says?

• 2:03:16Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, so one you can never do again. You gotta kill it.

• 2:03:19Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 2:03:20Cameron Hanes?

  One, you're gonna fuck it, just, just fun. One, you're gonna marry. That's, that's your anchor.

• 2:03:25Speaker 01

  Okay, so yeah, I would say the, you, you said motocross, freestyle or truck racing?

• 2:03:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:03:31Speaker 01

  Okay, so I'd say the truck racing, yeah, that could be.

• 2:03:36Cameron Hanes?

  Kill it.

• 2:03:36Speaker 01

  Kill it, that's fine. I had my run in it. And the one I would probably.

• 2:03:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, it would be freestyle and marry would be moto.

• 2:03:48Cameron Hanes?

  Okay.

• 2:03:48Speaker 01

  Cuz I'm married to moto, dude.

• 2:03:49Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:03:49Speaker 01

  Right, it is what it is. Like, I've lived it like every day, you know?

• 2:03:53Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:03:54Speaker 01

  And my, my wife's even like, "Dude, is that all you think about?" And I'm like, "You know what?" She's like, "When you talk to people, you have so much to say when it's about racing." She's like, "When I have friends come over, family or others who come over and it's not about racing, you don't even wanna say nothing."

• 2:04:08Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:09Speaker 01

  And I'm like, "You know what?" And I've studied this and I, I have done counseling and I've done, and I'm scared to say that. I've been to many, like, talked to many. Smart professors, many smart, I don't wanna say professors, but counselors and

• 2:04:22Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:22Speaker 01

  Very smart people that have given me good advice on

• 2:04:25Cameron Hanes?

  Human psychology.

• 2:04:26Speaker 01

  Human psychology.

• 2:04:27Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:28Speaker 01

  Cause I like to learn about that and, and, and I like, I feel like that has been, yeah, that has been something that has taught me to like, I feel like make, make the, the right decisions and I don't know, just kinda see the, the, the overall big picture, you know?

• 2:04:45Cameron Hanes?

  Like have more perspective.

• 2:04:46Speaker 01

  Have more perspective, like step back and go, okay, there's more to life than just this motor thing. But what I was trying to say for a lot of thought there was the, I get in a flow state.

• 2:04:55Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:55Speaker 01

  When you have stuff you wanna talk, when you love, I mean, you're like, if it's something you like, like, you get in a flow state and, and moto's a flow state for me. I can talk about it all day. Like, like, good, I'm glad I found that.

• 2:05:06Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:05:06Speaker 01

  Glad I had that. Right?

• 2:05:07Cameron Hanes?

  I, I've told Rogan this before. I'm like, what do people who don't bow hunt, what do they talk about? It's like, and so that's kind of what, I don't know what the people do or talk about is.

• 2:05:19Speaker 01

  That's funny.

• 2:05:20Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. So it seems like it's similar to you.

• 2:05:22Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That world you think so big.

• 2:05:25Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah.

• 2:05:25Speaker 01

  To you, that's a big world. Like, I don't know that world. So to me, it doesn't even like really, that world doesn't even exist, right?

• 2:05:31Cameron Hanes?

  I get it.

• 2:05:31Speaker 01

  I'd like to learn more about it.

• 2:05:33Cameron Hanes?

  I get it.

• 2:05:33Speaker 01

  To me, like it's probably moto to you. Like, yeah, it's cool. I went and checked it out this weekend.

• 2:05:37Cameron Hanes?

  I'm fascinated by.

• 2:05:39Speaker 01

  Probably didn't even know that happened over there. Right? That huge event.

• 2:05:41Cameron Hanes?

  I didn't, dude. They were talking about this Washougal thing, like after I did the super crap there at Seattle. I had never, I'm like, oh, it's a big thing. I didn't even know.

• 2:05:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. It's probably like your biggest event for bow hunting, right?

• 2:05:54Cameron Hanes?

  Right.

• 2:05:55Speaker 01

  I don't even know what that one is.

• 2:05:56Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. Yeah. So it's a, but I've, it's been amazing to learn about and like all your, you know, I've, I've known, I've been a fan of you for a long time, but like to hear the, like how your mindset and. I mean, your story has just been amazing. So thank you for for coming here and sharing everything. And I learned a ton today. Loved sharing archery with you and Mount Piscata with you. So thank you very much. Yeah, it's a huge honor to have you here, Brian.

• 2:06:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, thank you. Yeah. And I guess I didn't say too, I did, I don't know when it was about a year or two ago, I didn't read your book. I listened on Audible. Okay. Yeah, I'm more of an audible guy.

• 2:06:36Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah, no, it's all good. Well, thank you.

• 2:06:38Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I've listened to the whole story. And that's I'm like, I have to make my way out there. Yeah. Because it's just, and at some point, we have a conversation more about what you have to say to.

• 2:06:49Cameron Hanes?

  I don't have anything to say.

• 2:06:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Like, I like to hear your story more too from you. But I've listened to your story on Audible and so it's just is why I'm here.

• 2:06:58Cameron Hanes?

  Thank you. Yeah, tons of respect for you and your in your family. Love. I mean, I want nothing but success. Loved. I mean, I appreciate you as a friend now.

• 2:07:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, I appreciate it.

• 2:07:09Cameron Hanes?

  Yeah. So thank you. Yeah. All right. Good job, guys. It's a wrap.

• 2:07:14Speaker 01

  Thanks.

• 2:07:14Cameron Hanes?

  Keep hammering.