How was it determined you were going to be the guy to put the helmet on and run around the track and potentially save riders? Did you lose a bet?

Last year it was two other guys that had to wear the helmet, and this year we were all lucky enough to lose the bet and we all get to wear helmets. Four of the guys don’t work the track, so they don’t have to wear them. Any of the guys who are on the floor during the practice and the race, they have to wear helmets now.

It’s not easy. Watching you guys out there, you’re busting ass running around. It’s kind of dangerous too, right? But at the same time I guess it’s a little bit of a thrill every Saturday night.

It’s definitely a rush, especially for some of the guys who don’t come from as big of a racing background as me or some of the other people. They’re like, “Man, this is so exciting!” I’m like, “Yeah, dude, why do you think we love this so much?” It’s definitely a rush.

What’s the craziest part of your job? You’ve probably been hit or almost been hit a bunch. Can you talk a little bit about what you do and what the protocol is every Saturday night, if you see a guy go down?

The most exciting part is definitely just when the night show starts off and just being on the floor while all that goes on. Basically our job as the track crew guys is, there’s flaggers out there and there’s medics out there, so if I see a rider go down that’s not obviously going to be jumping up right away, I’m just going to protect him any way I can. I’ll pull out a Tuff block to block other riders from hitting him or hold his bike up or whatever.

We’re just mainly looking at the track to keep as many riders as safe as possible is what we’re trying to do. Equally as impressive, I think, is what the whole crew does, turning these stadiums into race tracks. I get a lot of satisfaction out of that too, honestly. How fast we tear it down after it’s over. It’s amazing when a game plan like that comes together. I really enjoy that too.

Are you telling me that after you run around the track and you put your life on the line, you’re the one breaking the track down at the end of the night? You don’t get out of there until two or three in the morning?

Yeah, definitely. We don’t get out until like three in the morning. We have like eleven semi trailers this year. Everything that’s on the floor gets tore down and loaded up before we leave.

Do you have a radio on, or is your head just constantly on a swivel?

You have a headset inside the helmet or whatever. Even if you weren’t wearing a helmet you’d wear a headset. We have responders in the press box level. Most sections, obviously, I can see my section of the track. I can see down the whole lane, but obviously some of them you can’t see because there’s a berm or a triple or whatever in the way. Definitely want to rely on whoever’s the eye in the sky that week.