MXA WRECKING CREW GOES TO RED BUD…AND WRECKS
01/03/2025 03:00 PM
Moments before the “big one.”
The idea to race the Red Bud National came late last year when Jeremy Wilkey and Jerry Swolik drove from Illinois to California so MXA could test three of their resto-mod Honda two-strokes, as well as their Blackjack fork and National shock on our 2024 Yamaha YZ450F. The MX-Tech Suspension shop is only two hours from Red Bud, and since they have a fleet of test bikes they use for developing suspension, they asked if I wanted to race their 2024-1/2 KTM 450SXF Factory Edition in the 450 class at the 2024 Red Bud National. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse.
“I FELT LIKE A BAD TEST RIDER. HOW SO? I PUT THEIR SUSPENSION ON,
RACED IT AS HARD AS I COULD, AND BARELY EVER TOUCHED THE CLICKERS.
THAT’S GREAT FOR MOST PEOPLE, BUT DEEP DOWN I THINK JEREMY WAS A LITTLE CONFUSED WHEN I DIDN’T HAVE ANY CONSTRUCTIVE FEEDBACK FOR HIM. ALL I SAID WAS, ‘IT’S GREAT!’”
It’s hard to gauge how big MX-Tech is from the outside looking in. They manufacture their own A-kit forks and shocks in-house, and are so dedicated to manufacturing their proprietary suspension that they don’t even take in OEM suspension for regular tuning anymore. They have an all-or-nothing business model. Instead of diluting their resources by servicing “anything and everything,” they’d rather build their own high-end suspension from scratch and refine the settings for customers who see the value in it. Jeremy Wilkey has been machining his own suspension parts since he first started working on suspension in 1992.
Red Bud has an atmosphere like no other.
The trouble with making aftermarket suspension pieces is that if Showa, WP or KYB changes one internal part, then it could throw off everything MX-Tech developed for that specific application. When they changed their business model to focus on manufacturing their own suspension components, they bet big on themselves. MX-Tech makes complete forks and complete shocks, but they also specialize in drop-in cartridge kits for the WP XACT air forks. Jeremy explained that this is their best-selling product, but you wouldn’t know it from looking at the forks from the outside. Why not? Because competing suspension tuners often buy MX-Tech cartridge kits, and then re-valve them and put their own stickers on the outer fork legs. Their checks still clear the bank, but MX-Tech doesn’t get the brand awareness.
Months before MXA’s trip to Red Bud, MX-Tech shipped a set of their Blackjack forks and National shocks to California for me to test at Glen Helen, Pala, Perris and Cahuilla Creek. I raced the MX-Tech suspension on MXA’s 2024-1/2 KTM 450SXF test bike every weekend in the months leading up to the start of the AMA National; however, I felt like a bad test rider. How so? I put their suspension on, raced it as hard as I could, and barely ever touched the clickers. That’s great for most people, but deep down I think Jeremy was a little confused when I didn’t have any constructive feedback for him. All I said was, “It’s great!” I made the shock a little softer on both the high- and low-speed adjusters for the harder-packed tracks, but otherwise, I left it almost exactly how they shipped it to me.
Test rider Josh Fout grew up in Illinois but lives in Big Bear now. He drove to Red Bud, and then stayed for an extra two weeks after to hang with family.
As the story goes (written in the September 2024 issue of MXA), I raced with WP Cone Valve forks and a WP Trax shock on a KTM 350SXF at the 2024 Pala National. Then, I raced a KTM 450SXF Factory Edition with the MX-Tech suspension at the Hangtown National. I rode better at Hangtown and qualified 26th out of 90 riders. The MX-Tech suspension was killer at Hangtown, but the track prep was different this year. It wasn’t as rough or sticky as in the past. I thought that I might want to go a little stiffer on the settings once I got to Red Bud. Dennis Stapleton, Trevor Nelson and I flew to Chicago on the Tuesday before Red Bud and went straight to MX-Tech in Bradley, Illinois. The other portion of our crew, which consisted of Josh Fout and his little brother Logan Fout in their van and Shawn Bushnell and his family in their Fun Mover, decided to turn the Red Bud National into a road trip.
The MXA wrecking crew heads east.
We were set to meet them at Sunset Ridge MX (Chase Sexton’s home track) for some pre-race testing before Red Bud. They arrived Tuesday night, but unfortunately a rainstorm drenched the track, canceling our practice plans for Sunset Ridge. The MXA gang resorted to Plan B, which meant the Fouts and Bushnells had to drive an extra three hours to get to Leisure Town MX in Indiana. Thankfully, Leisure Town was on the way to Red Bud, so it wasn’t too much of an inconvenience for them. Seeing our test crew—all who race weekly at Glen Helen, in the middle of Indiana, riding on a sand track—was a lot of fun. I’ve been blessed to ride at lots of amazing tracks in some pretty cool locations, but the highlight of any great riding trip is sharing the conditions (good, bad or ugly) with your friends.
MX-Tech’s Blackjack forks are American-built works forks.
“WEDNESDAY WAS OUR ONLY DAY FOR TESTING WITH MX-TECH BEFORE IT
WAS TIME TO GO TO RED BUD. JEREMY HAD A NEW SETTING FOR ME TO TRY
THAT THEIR IN-HOUSE TECHNICIAN, PETRO ‘ZAVO’ ZAVORYTSKYI, HAD DEVELOPED WITH RUSSIAN MXGP PRO EVGENY BOBRYSHEV DOWN IN FLORIDA.
I LIKED IT.”
Wednesday was our only day for testing with MX-Tech before it was time to go to Red Bud. Jeremy had a new setting for me to try that their in-house technician, Petro “Zavo” Zavorytskyi, had developed with Russian MXGP Pro Evgeny Bobryshev down in Florida. Right away, the updated MX-Tech suspension felt stiffer than my settings from California, but I liked it. It had more hold-up in the sand whoops, but it didn’t feel overly harsh or rigid on my hands. I was comfortable right away, and I saw no need to even try putting my older MX-Tech suspension on the bike. I’m always leery of getting too excited about suspension during a local practice day, because the tracks are never as rough as a National track, but I did feel better having more hold-up for the big jumps and soft dirt at Red Bud.
Besides the suspension, I brought a few extra parts to throw on MX-Tech’s stock KTM 450SXF Factory Edition. I brought a D.I.D 520MX chain and ProTaper SX Bend handlebars, grips, throttle tube, and rear sprocket. I also had Maxxis tires with the MX-SI tread on the front and the SM scoop tire on the rear, mounted to MX-Tech’s LGR wheels. I brought my Guts RJ Wing seat and Luxon triple clamps and bar mounts (stock 22mm offset), and I made sure Redline shipped some fresh oil and lubricants out to freshen up the MX-Tech Factory Edition bike before the big show. Finally, Roost MX knocked the graphics out of the park! I had last raced the Red Bud National in the 250 class in 2016 and the 450 class in 2017, but I had never gone all out with American-themed graphics until this year. The graphics with the patriotic ProTaper bar pad were amazing, and the final cherries on top were the custom American flag-themed MX-Tech fork stickers with my name, number and the MXA logo designed into the decals. Thursday and Friday were all about amateur racing and press day.
The MXA wrecking crew the rides toegther gets to have a good time.
The Red Bud National is one of the most iconic races in the USA, so it wasn’t hard to convince Dennis Stapleton, Josh Fout and the Bushnell clan to drive 2000 miles east to race the Amateur days. Red Bud has acres upon acres of grassy fields covered in motorhomes and trailers for amateur racing, and it seems like every class had multiple divisions with full gates. The track was great on Thursday for the gang, but the rain showed up for Friday’s activities and made for an interesting day. Dennis Stapleton was racing our 2024 Honda CRF450. Josh Fout was on our 2024 Kawasaki KX450, and Shawn Bushnell was on our 2024-1/2 KTM 450SXF Factory Edition.
All of the bikes got hammered, but luckily almost everyone was racing on last year’s test bikes, which were going to be swapped out for all-new 2025 models once we got back to SoCal. Shawn’s wife Alison and two kids, Bode and Jett, raced as well. Alison broke in a brand-new 2025 Husky FC350 at the race, and Bodie and Jett raced their Husky TC85 and TC125 two-strokes. Bodie was also one of the test riders for our DR.D YZ85 project in this issue. Read about it and see Bodie in action on page 88.
Dennis Stapleton finished first, second and third in his three classes at Red Bud’s amateur-day races.
While the crew was out racing in the rain, Trevor and I were getting our parking spot dialed in with my mechanic, Nick Bollinger, for the weekend. Funny story, Nick’s dad Chris worked at Wiseco and was Dennis Stapleton’s mechanic 12 years ago at Ohio International Raceway on an MX-Tech/Wiseco project bike. Fast-forward to today, and his son Nick is working as an intern for the summer at MX-Tech between his sophomore and junior years of college in Montana where he’s studying to be a mechanical engineer. Nick’s love for moto and working on cool things meshes perfectly with his summer job at MX-Tech (where they have all kinds of crazy-expensive machines in their shop that make cool parts). This was going to be Nick’s first time as a mechanic at an AMA National—if only I had made it to the National in one piece.
“I HIT THE CORNER BEFORE IT WITH EVERYTHING I HAD AND WENT FOR THE JUMP IN THIRD GEAR WIDE OPEN. I KNOW EXACTLY HOW FAST I WAS GOING,
WHAT MY THROTTLE POSITION WAS, WHAT GEAR I WAS IN, MY RPM AND HOW FAR I FLEW, BECAUSE I COULD TRACK THE DATA ON THE LITPRO FEATURE ON THE KTM 450SXF FACTORY EDITION.”
Unfortunately, our National hopes ended early on LaRocco’s Leap. Unfortunately, I let LaRocco’s Leap get into my head, and it truly conquered me before I even went for it. The whole month leading up to Red Bud, I was thinking about LaRocco’s Leap. I saw the entry list for Red Bud. It was stacked with the regular heavy hitters, plus some extra international talent who came to the U.S. for just Southwick and Red Bud. I figured it would be harder than usual to qualify, and I thought I would need to clear the leap to make it straight into the motos. I wanted to get the scary jump out of the way during Friday’s 15-minute press-day riding session, just because I knew it had a stronghold on me and I needed to just do it. With the rain on Friday morning, Dennis and Josh Fout told me there was no way I could make it; however, I still wanted to take a look at it for myself and make that call once I was on the track.
From left to right: Jeremy Wilkey, Josh Mosiman, Nick Bollinger and Jerry Swolik.
Of course, hindsight is 20/20. Now I realize that I would’ve been far better off shelving the idea of clearing Rocco’s Leap and instead focusing on doubling it. Looking back, I now realize I would’ve been fine if I had done that, because even in the 450 class there weren’t very many riders clearing the jump every lap; however, on Friday, I saw Broc Tickle clear the jump multiple times in front of me, so I decided I would do it, too. Little did I know, Broc was one of the only riders hitting it, and multiple other big names elected not to do it during press day. Dean Wilson cased it and blew his rear wheel out early in the practice, and even Jason Anderson waited until the last lap of the 15-minute session to go for it.
I hit the corner before it with everything I had and went for the jump in third gear wide open. I know exactly how fast I was going, what my throttle position was, what gear I was in, my rpm and how far I flew, because I could track the data on the LitPro feature on the KTM 450SXF Factory Edition. The analytics showed I was in third gear at 100-percent throttle, pulling 11,768 rpm going off the lip, and flew 101 feet, but I needed to fly 106 feet. I realized that I was going to come up 5 feet short while I was still mid-air. I thought I could save it, but my rear wheel blew out on contact, and I got sent over the bars. The landing was not forgiving in the slightest, and the steep drop on the backside made sure the bike had enough room to endo big time.
We have multiple videos of the crash, but none show exactly how the bike hit me. Josh Fout saw it and thinks it smacked me in the back of the head, launching my noggin and left shoulder into the ground. I got a concussion and still don’t remember the next 30 minutes of the day (apparently, I was on the side of the track and then in the ambulance for some time). I also broke my left collarbone. Unfortunately, this pain was familiar. I’ve broken this collarbone twice already (both times were at Oatfield Raceway in Northern California when I was 12 and 15 years old). MX-Tech’s Jerry Swolik and our digital editor, Trevor Nelson, took me to the hospital as I started to come to, realizing where I was and what I was doing. There’s video of me talking in the ambulance (telling the nurses I didn’t need an ambulance ride to the hospital), but I was operating on autopilot. It was only once we got back to the van, where I had to ask Nick what his name was, that I started putting the puzzle pieces back together.
The aftermath. The rear wheel was missing spokes, and Josh’s collarbone was in four pieces.
My overly ambitious goal put me on a flight back to California while the rest of our crew went to Ironman Raceway in Indiana for the 2025 Honda CRF450 intro. I was bummed to miss out on it, but Josh Fout and Dennis Stapleton handled it well. Although I had broken my left collarbone twice and my right one once before, this was the first time I had a collarbone break that required surgery. Back home, Dr. Greenbaum set me up with a big plate, eight screws and a doctor’s note for physical therapy.
MY OVERLY AMBITIOUS GOAL PUT ME ON A FLIGHT BACK TO CALIFORNIA
WHILE THE REST OF OUR CREW WENT TO IRONMAN RACEWAY IN INDIANA
FOR THE 2025 HONDA CRF450 INTRO. I WAS BUMMED TO MISS OUT ON IT,
BUT JOSH FOUT AND DENNIS STAPLETON HANDLED IT WELL.
Normally, I wouldn’t think you’d need a lot of physical therapy for a broken collarbone, but if you look closely at the photo, you’ll notice my deltoid muscle is almost completely atrophied. That’s from a nerve injury in 2012 where I dislocated my shoulder and severed the axillary nerve, which is required to fire the deltoid muscles. I spent a lot of time doing physical therapy on this arm to learn to lift it with different muscles, so I’ll be sure to take the right precautions to get it back to normal for me.
Josh’s before and after X-rays.
It’s hard to believe, but only two days after surgery I was already in the physical therapy offices working on mobility. I’m usually good at riding within my limits, but this time I got caught operating out of fear and not faith. I should have trusted my intuition, but instead, I learned a lesson and have a 5-inch scar to show for it. Perhaps the most painful part of my Red Bud crash is that everybody got to say, “I told you so!” and they were right. And, of course, Jody had plenty to say when he realized that I was out of action right in the middle of the 2025 model-year test season. His final words were something that he reminds of all the time. He said, “You get paid whether you win or lose.”
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