INTERVIEW
P70
AMA SUPERCROSS 250 WEST POINTS LEADER JASON ANDERSON
16 or so, for my first B-class year,
people started noticing me a bit
more," Anderson said. "I was do-
ing good and I was on big bikes.
Just making the transition from lit-
tle bikes to big bikes and still do-
ing good is kind of like a big deal.
A lot of good mini racers never
make that transition work. And
then I went into my first pro year
and I got a ride and everything,
and thought I was all-good."
Anderson was actually a top
KTM-supported amateur from
late 2007 through 2009. The
plan all along was for him to
move to the factory KTM outfit,
but the KTM factory effort in the
USA was waning in those years,
with basically one racer on the
team by 2010 because he had
a multi-year deal. The future of
factory KTM was up in the air,
so Anderson ended up taking a
new amateur ride from Kawasaki
Team Green.
"I actually rode KTM 250Fs
one year [in] B [class] and one
year pro [A class]," Anderson
says. "I was actually planning
on going pro with KTM. I actu-
ally signed a deal, but their whole
program kind of went downhill
for a year and there was nothing
going on over there. I think the
only guy they had was [Tommy]
Searle because he had a multi-
year deal with them. So I didn't
know if I was going to go pro or
whatever. And then I got an ama-
teur deal with Kawi, and that took
me through another year of ama-
teurs. I did good that last year in
amateurs and ended up signing
with Bobby Hewitt for a pro deal."
Hewitt's team started out as
an amateur team for Kawasaki,
but got a pro team started in
2008. But for the 2010 season,
because of cutbacks at Team
Green and Kawasaki's race sup-
port in the amateurs and pros,
Hewitt's team, with backing from
Rockstar Energy, moved to Su-
zukis.
Hewitt's amateur team sup-
ported standouts Ian Trettel and
(Left) When
others might
have given up,
Jason Anderson
forged on and his
perseverance is
now paying off.
(Right) Anderson
is one of the
fittest riders on
the track, but it
wasn't always
that way.
