Cycle News

INTERVIEW P172 EAST COAST AMA 250 SUPERCROSS CHAMPION WIL HAHN fore he ever gets to the pros, so he always has someone faster to aim for. Well, Tommy Hahn was no slouch. He raced for factory teams and even won an AMA 450cc National at Steel City. Tommy's not racing anymore, although he did show up to a couple AMA Nationals in 2013, and Wil is officially the more accomplished of the two now. "You know, I don't rub it in, as much as I'd like to," Wil says. "I got plenty of shit when he won a National, though. There for a while he was like, 'I've got a Supercross podium.' All right, and then I got one. And then he was, 'Well, I have an outdoor win.' I was like, 'Well, I don't have that, so you're right.' He also had a Loretta's Championship, and I never got one of those, either. I'll have to go back in my 'plus' [veteran] days or something to get one eventually and rub that in. That's not out of the cards yet." But Tommy never got a professional championship. That's a Trump card for Wilbur. "I would rub it in, but he was just so damned happy for me that all I can do is hug him," Wil says. MR. PERSONALITY As we've already covered, there are very few in the AMA pits who don't think the world of Wil Hahn. This makes it easy for teams to stand behind him when he's repeatedly injured, for example. A decade or so ago, he even had a column in Moto Kids Maga- Hahn captured his career-first Supercross win in Atlanta. zine published by Cycle News, because even as a kid, he was smart, and he was fun. And the main reason he is so well liked is because he doesn't look at his job as if it's a job. "I think it can be tough if you look at it like it's a job or something like that," Hahn says. "But at the same time, I'm still honored that people want to come up to me and ask me for an autograph and want to talk to me. Because of the position that I'm in, it's something that I really try hard not to take for granted, even though it's easy to do sometimes because you're not only under the stress of riding but you're actually expected to do good that night. There's a lot on the plate at a race. So, I know whenever riders come across as dicks and stuff like that, it's only because there are a thousand things on their mind right then. It's a tough line to walk. But I really try to find a good balance there. I'd love to have the following that K-Dub [Kevin Windham] had, and I feel like I'm able to fill those shoes as a good guy to the fans because I welcome that with open arms. I just think it's something special to have that relationship with people and just be a normal dude, because we all are just normal dudes." Hahn sees himself, accurately, as a normal guy with extraordinary abilities on a dirt bike. It's really that simple. "I swing my leg over the bike like any guy that goes to Elsinore or Glen Helen on Sunday," Hahn says. "We all take it a little bit differently and we can take it a little more seriously because obviously it is a job for me, but at the same time, I really try to be able to relate to those people any way I can, whether it be sharing stories from back in the day or just normal dayto-day stuff that you'd want to talk about. I'm a normal guy, so there's no reason I shouldn't be easy to talk to, you know?"

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