INTERVIEW
P166
EAST COAST AMA 250 SUPERCROSS CHAMPION WIL HAHN
with a fourth and then four consecutive podiums. He finished
second in the series behind dominant Weimer.
When contract time came
up, Hahn was central in some
controversy, as he took an offer
to race for the GEICO Honda
squad. Some of the people involved with the Troy Lee team
thought there was an unwritten rule keeping Honda teams
(or Kawasaki teams, or Yamaha
teams, etc.) from "poaching" racers from other teams sponsored
by the same manufacturer. But
the Factory Connection squad
wanted Hahn, and ultimately it
was left up to him.
"It's tough and it was tough deal
for me," Hahn says. "It's every rider's dream to have a tough deci-
sion like that – whether to ride for
Troy Lee or ride for GEICO Honda, right? That was the toughest
decision I've made in my career.
It was so difficult to decide what
team I was going to ride for. I
had a great relationship at Troy's.
They took a chance on me when
I was a really big question mark
and gave me an opportunity.
They helped rebuild my career.
And I credit them 100-percent for
that because no one was willing
to give me a chance to make it.
So between them and Matt Jory,
my mechanic – he really helped
out a lot and it was a huge part of
my life being there – when I did
decide to maybe leave, I called
plenty of people. I called so many
people. I think I called everybody
in my phonebook and asked for
Hahn's hand injury kept him out of
title contention in the outdoors, but
the fast starter won the season-ending $15,000 Motorcycle-SuperStore.
com Holeshot Championship.
their opinion. I asked Trey Canard, I asked Chad Reed; I asked
all these guys, 'Hey, what do you
think?' And everyone told me to
go with my heart. They weren't
like, 'Go GEICO!' They told me
to go with my heart and do what
I felt was the best for my career.
And at the time I really felt like going to GEICO was my best move
for my career. With [older brother] Tom [Tommy Hahn] being
there before, I knew a lot of the
guys there anyway, so it wasn't
like it was a big unknown. I had a
pretty good relationship with [coowner Jeff] Majkrzak and [techni-
