Issue link: http://trailridermagazine.uberflip.com/i/1543392
March 2026 21 Scrambles and Sprint Enduros out of our facili es at The Shoals, and I'll be honest… all of them put together weren't as difficult as the communica on on one single Na onal Enduro. Makes sense. As far as the par es involved, you've got ANEC, the local club, a mul tude of landowners – like Muddaubers last year had over 100 individual landowners, right? The local sheriffs office to do the road crossings, the AMA… is there anyone I'm missing? There's EMS, making sure we have a medical crew. There's Livelaps. Our scoring isn't in-house like a lot of series, it's through Livelaps, so there's a lot of communica on each week with them. As crazy as it sounds, we also have to make sure when we send out a blast email, that the Facebook and Instagram posts all go up at the same me, since it's three different par es doing each of those, plus making sure it matches what's on Livelaps and our ANEC website. We also talk with the race teams, to make sure the decisions we're making are good for the growth of the sport, not just for our personal benefit. There's a lot of details that running a hare scramble just doesn't prepare you for. Communica on is the biggest and most over- whelming part of it. Since you already touched on it a li le bit, do you want to talk about the steps you've taken to keep a degree of separa on between you as a racer, and you as a team owner, and you as the promoter of ANEC? Yeah, so even with my crew. I had a mee ng with Blake and Corey, saying if you're going to cheer for my kid or your kid in the youth race, you have to cheer for every kid. You can't show favorites and you have to separate yourself. Realis cally, this means you're taking away from your kid or your- self in these situa ons. I actually have worse intel than I used to. In previous years I'd show up early, ride at a local landowner's place, do some fishing for informa on… This year I made sure to show up on Friday evening with everybody else. I didn't eat dinner with my Na onal Enduro crew. I only went over to the tent twice – once for a situa on with trophies and once for a medical call. I did my best to keep separa on so there is no confusion. It's difficult, to an extent I am looking forward to re ring just because of that. Overall, me ge ng fi h at Sumter was actually a blessing, because nobody's thinking to themselves "oh yeah, this guy's got an unfair advantage." It's not the primary focus of the interview, but I did want to ask how Sumter went for you as a rider and for your team as well – and is Levi old enough to be racing ANEC yet? Yes, he did the youth race. He got his first ever win. Only two par cipants in his class, but he did win! He's pumped on that. I actually missed the en re race, I had to be out tes ng with the team. So I didn't even get to watch the kid race, and that's… those are the difficult mes where I do have so much going on that it makes it difficult for me to be focused on my own race. I misjudged what I could take on, so I took a lot of notes on my personal performance this weekend. I think some of it was prepara on, and even though I was leading the first part of the race and s ll think I could have won if I didn't have a big crash, I s ll came in underpre- pared, and I knew it. Just because there is so much going on. I have a good crew both for the team and for Na onal Enduro, but I s ll stressed myself out worrying about the small stuff. I get it. This fall I inadvertently became a co-promoter of women's endurocross, and to help get turnout I had set up rental bikes for several women who'd nev- er even raced EnduroCross before. Un l it was me to put my helmet on for first prac ce, I almost forgot I was racing (laughs) (laughing). Yeah… I actually have a separate phone line for all things Na onal Enduro, and I set it in the semi on Saturday night and I le it. Walked away. Just so that I could not think about it for a brief peri- od of me. What made you try to decide to take on so much? Was it a case where you saw an opportunity and couldn't pass it up, or…. I had interest in the series five or six years ago, there were rumors it was going to be sold. Didn't happen. Then I heard that it was going to go for sale again, so I spoke with Alan [Randt] and he did everything to warn me that I didn't really want to do it (laughs). But he said that he knew I was capable. We didn't want to see enduro racing go backwards. So we spoke with AMA and had the intro conversa ons. As crazy as it sounds everybody had a lot a belief in me that I could help grow the sport. So, then I went