Hangtown...A View From the Pits

55^th annual Hangtown

2024 AMA National Championship motocross round at Hangtown was the 55^th year for the Dirt Diggers Motorcycle Club and still the only motorcycle club to put on a national championship motocross event in the country.

Well here I am again, rolling into the Prairie City OHV Park in my little motor home for the fourth time, to volunteer to be a security person in the team Husqvarna pits. It’s a great gig that I enjoy doing very much.

Friday afternoon I pulled in to the credential parking lot next to the will call and security tents to pick up my stuff. And as it has been in the past all they had for me was this year’s gray wrist band and my RV parking permit, the gray wrist ban  by itself is enough to get me anywhere in the facility. But I was missing my official big “Staff” lanyard and either a T shirt that said Event Security on it or bright yellow vest that said the same thing, I got both.

It was probably the hottest day of the year somewhere a little over 90 and the nearest tree to me was at least 100 yards away. So the first thing I did when I pulled into the Diggers parking area was fire up the generator and turn on the AC. A couple of hours later I rode my E bike down to the WC area again and finally hooked up with the leader of the security team and got the rest of my stuff and was told to meet the next morning at 5:30 for a team meeting.

The Dirt Diggers were serving dinner to all the volunteers in the Diggers reserved parking area where I was. Dinner was excellent and the next morning they were offering big breakfast burritos to volunteers as well. An interesting side note, I know a lot of members of the Dirt Diggers and the Polka Dots and there were a lot of Polka Dots who volunteered to help at Hangtown and there were a lot of them who camped out there, but they were not in the Dirt Diggers camping area. Apparently the Dirt Diggers are more than willing to accept them as volunteers but apparently they are not allowed to camp in the Dirt Diggers compound. I guess sometimes we never grow up.

5:30 AM is beyond early for this old long time retired man; I set my alarm for 4:30 and turned out the lights. I woke at 3:55 to pee and of course couldn’t go back to sleep. Sleep deprived I made my way down to the meeting on time. I think all the flaggers plus a couple of other volunteer groups plus all the security people were there, it was kind of a shit show, but eventually it all worked out and everyone went to where ever they were supposed to go. I took my E bike and rode down the hill into the pits at 6:00 AM there were only a handful of people there. I rode my E bike up and down all rows where the factory racing team rigs as well as all the smaller teams and privateer rigs were parked, it was very surreal in the early morning daylight, no bikes to be seen or equipment lying around all the factory rigs were dark no lights anywhere. Eventually people started showing up and by 7 or so things were starting to ramp up. One of the first things that started happening around the factory rigs at least besides the bikes being unloaded was someone on the teams were starting to cook breakfast and the smells filled the air. Everywhere I rode I could smell all the good smells cooking and there’s nothing like the smell of bacon cooking in the morning.

I had been assigned to find and bring a whole outside security company team, about sixteen in total to a meeting in the pits at 7:30 with the head of the Dirt Diggers security team and the AMA head of pit security. These team members were then dispersed one each to factory and larger teams as security. I went to my spot in the Husky pits.

At 8:00 AM the pits are open to those who have purchased a pit pass. The pits are open until 12:00 PM then all the security people along with county Sheriffs, etc. sweep the area removing all of those who don’t have the proper credentials and from then on the pits are closed. From 8 to noon it slowly gets more and more crowded, I think during the last hour most of the teams make their riders available to fans for autographs and pictures. The Honda pits, with the Lawrence brothers, the Yamaha pits, with Hayden Deegan and some of the other popular Star Racing riders and the KTM pits with Chase Sexton and Aaron Pleesinger. The Honda pits were over whelmed. After noon and the rest of the day my job becomes a lot less vigilant. One of the changes I noticed this year is the number of kids that were now roaming around in the pits. Like little gangs, not malicious just hanging out together trying to entertain themselves while whoever they belong to does whatever it is they do in the pits. All that I saw had the proper credentials to be in the pits. Most will probably spend the summer traveling around the country, how cool is that. Also more and more of the riders have started families it was common to see say someone like Justin Barica walking around holding his kid or Christen Craig’s son playing catch in the Husky pits.

For those of you who are motocross fans you will probably know that Husky has two 450 riders Malcolm Stewart and Christen Craig , Craig is just starting to ride after a history of injuries this year and Malcolm made it through the SX series after being out most all of 2023. And this was just his second outdoor race in ten years and I think maybe his second race on a 450 outdoors. In fact Malcolm said the last time he was at Hangtown he was riding a kick start bike. So both of those guys are just trying to get up to speed again and if you are a fan you also know RJ Hampshire broke his hand before the first outdoor race. Husky brought up a young guy named Casey Cochran to ride a 250, Casey was part of the 250 SX futures which were part of the SX series. He rode well enough to be the number one 250 qualifier. Those of you who know who Malcolm is know his brother is James Stewart and their father Big James who’s about as well known as his two sons. He hung out in the hospitality area a lot and quite frankly spent a lot of time signing autographs and taking pictures. I introduced myself and we chatted off and on during the day and I can tell you based my conversations and observations he seemed to be a very, very nice man, very funning and laughed a lot.    

 I’m too old to just stand there for hours so I bring a chair and try and position it so when sitting I can see what’s going on primarily in the rig where the all the bikes and mechanics are. Saturday I chased the shade for hours and eventually ended up in a corner until the sun ran me out. Husky has two big rigs one is used primarily for hospitality. As I’m sitting there I had a fair amount of people I know some in groups and some individually stopped by to speak with me, most were laughing at the fact I was a security person asking the obvious question, what was I supposed to be guarding. I told Big James he wasn’t the only celebrity around here.

Between noon and 1:00 PM things in the pits were quieter but more serious; the first 250 race would start a little after 1:00 PM. All the race activities revolve around the TV coverage, everything is on their schedule.

I watched the first 250 race from the comfort of the Husky hospitality area sitting in the shade watching it on TV. I followed the Husky riders and mechanics down to the starting line for the first 450 race. I was sitting underneath a couple of pop ups on a bale of hay at the end of the starting line I had a perfect down the line view of the starting gate and actually could see who came out of the gate first. After the gate drop I followed the mechanics down through a tunnel to the mechanics area and watched the race from there. After Jets crash he came into the mechanics area right by me to have his front end straighten before going back out.  

I didn’t go back to the pits until after the last race of the day. I would go back through the tunnel to the start line sit or stand in the shade under the pop ups and wait for the next race. So I watched the 2^nd 250 race and both 450 races between those two areas. All the credentials I had gave me access to anywhere, yes I know, but someone had to do it. While sitting on the hay bales in the shade and when the riders would return from their sight laps or after the finish they would ride right by where I was sitting. If I stuck my foot out a foot from where I was sitting the riders would have run over it. I told one of the guys if I had a stick I could stick it in Deegan’s wheel when he rode by just to make it a little more fair. But he did a big helicopter move right in front of the mechanics area and gave the moto win to Tom Vialle.

Aaron Plessinger has a huge fan base almost as loud as Jets fans and when he led almost the entire race they were loud everywhere. But the man of the day was Chase Sexton he came from a ways back in the first moto to win, but came from dead last to pass Plessinger on the last lap to win the second the 2^nd moto was incredible to watch. Many thought Sexton was the first AMA 450 outdoor rider to go from dead last to first, but apparently in 2017 Jeffrey Herlings making a rare AMA appearance went last to first in a moto.

After the last race I went back to the Husky pits to pick up my bike and my chair and say goodbye to some of the Husky people I’ve come to know. I really enjoyed talking with Tyler who is Malcolm’s mechanic. Said goodbye to Big James and Malcolm who was lying in an ice cold tub of water cooling off, he looked spent.

Something of interest I noticed Saturday, first of all the mechanics washed the factory bikes a total of five times that day. After the first practice, the second practice, after each moto and after the races before they put them back in the rigs. I also saw on the Husky 250 factory bike (I’m sure the KTM and Gas Gas bikes had them as well) in the air box they had what looked like some sort of a nozzle to do I don’t know what, inject air towards the throttle body? Made me wonder if it was some sort of air pump to increase air flow, it was shinny like either polished aluminum or stainless steel but the thing took up a lot of room in the air box.

I believe the thing that impressed me the most about this year’s racing was the talent level of the riders. I’ve been to most of these events during its 55 year history and it seemed as though there were always a half riders in each class who were by the end of each moto just circulating around the track waiting for the checkered flag. Not so this year, now maybe it’s been like this for a while and I just didn’t notice it but it stood out this year. I dare say if we saw the last place rider at a local event we would be like wow. I understand there were sixty, seventy riders in each class trying to qualify for this year’s event, that’s a lot of talent. Now just maybe that’s part of the reason Jet was only able to make it up to 24^th by the end of the first moto, although to be fair he was a long way back before he even caught up to the last place rider.   

I rode back up the hill to my motor home turned on the AC laid on the couch and cooled off. After saying goodbye to a few others I took off and headed home to spend a day or so recuperating. It was worth it and if I’m able I will probably do it again next year, after all its tuff to get a phony baloney job like this.

The weather and the fans were great and we were all treated to a special day of racing. The new track layout and prep were amazing as well.

Doug 21J