Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Off-road racersNick and Russ Pearson By Anne Van Beveren Photos by Tom Van Beveren and Matt Freeman . 46 he name of the g a m e in offroad racing ha s alwa ys been speed, endurance and the ability to read th e terrai n, but if a KTM-backed d uo from La s Veg as, Nevada, ha s its way, th at is about to change. If things go accor ding to plan, there will be a n e w name of the game in desert racing in the not-so-distant futu re - an d that name will be Pearson. The bid to cha nge the face of desert racing has been launched by Nic k Pearso n a nd Russ Pear son , a pai r of red head ed bro ther s whose aggressive rid ing styles and top- 10 finishes have been ma king th e Pea rson name be tter and bett er kn own ove r the past few years. The brot hers started making a nam e fo r th em sel v es in lo cal deser t r a ces around the Las Vegas area, then moved on to make their presen ce felt all over the wes tern Uni ted States in the AMA's National Hare & Hound Ch ampionship Series . But it wasn't until last October that the Pearson name w as catapu lted into the limelight. In a gu tsy displ ay of skill, speed and de termination , the tena ciou s b ro th e r s fou ght o ff 100 m ot orcycl e teams - including crack factory en tries from Kawasak i, Yamaha and -H ond a and ended up on top of the finisher list . a t th e prestigious 527-mile Veg as -toRenot eam race. It was a victo ry of epic proportions for Nick, who w ill turn 21 la ter th is month, and 19-year-old Russ, and the Pearsons say with hope in their voices tha t thi s is only the beginning. "Vegas-to-Reno wa s my first big win. I' ve taken a couple of seconds in National Hare & Hounds bu t never wo n one," yo unger brother Russ exp lained. "Going into Vegas- to- Reno, we d idn't know h ow we we re goi ng to do, because we were on a big bike and I had raced a 250 all yea r. At the finish line, it was like, 'Oh, my God!' It felt really good . It was quite th'e experience, and I hope we can ' do it again really soo n." " We wan t to be known as peop le .w ho can win in the desert," said older brother Ni ck. "I feel like I can ride wit h th e top riders - w i t h Ty Davis a nd Destry Abbott a nd th ose guys - b ut [ don't think I' m abov e them , for su re. I think there' s five or six of us who can go out to the races every weekend and any one of us can wi n. Right now it's a dog fight, but a cou p le of years d own th e road, [ think [ might ge t to where I can win consistently . Tha t's what we' re both wo rking towards ." And the Pearsons have been wo rking toward tha t goal for most of their lives. "We pret ty m uch star ted ridi ng from day one; I was 6 an d Russ was 4," says Nick . "My first motor cycle was an ATC 70 three-w heeler. [ rode it for abou t six mo nths , then go t onto a KX60." The d riving force behind the brothers' ea rly efforts - and a lot of tod ay's racing - is their father, Lee Pearso n. "My dad raced desert, and so that is Brothers Nick (above left) and Russell (above right) Pearson recently teamed up to win the Vegas -to-Reno off-road race. w ha t we ended up doing, too. We never really go t int o th e mot ocro ss scene a t all," Nick says. "My dad ro de KTMs, and th e loca l KTM s hop - Sports man Cycle in Las Vegas - pre tty mu ch raised us. My dad would take us there lots of n ig hts whe n h e was w o rking on hi s bikes, an d we learned a lot abou t bikes tha t wa y." . Nick was as tride a KTM 80 when he sta rted his racing career, and the brothers took a KTM 250 to the starting line the first tim e they raced as a team . "Ou r firs t rid e toge ther was a t the Best In Th e Desert's To nopa h 300. We were 13 an d 15, and it w as n' t a ve ry good s ta rt ," N ick says 'w it h a lau gh. "The bike quit before we go t to the starting line, so things didn't wo rk ou t very well - bu t the next year, when we were

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