It’s been a whirlwind two weeks for BTOSports.com KTM’s Andrew Short. He’s led laps, got food poisoning, and missed flights. Like we said, a crazy few weeks for the veteran. We caught up with him after Daytona to get the scoop.
Racer X: It was awesome, wasn’t it?
Andrew Short: My last two weeks have been chaos. I got food poisoning. I haven’t ridden in two weeks and I barely made it here. But life’s an adventure.
What did I see on Twitter about not making a flight or something?
Apparently out of Austin all the flights were oversold because of the situation in Dallas with the ice. They bought out every flight. There wasn’t a flight until Sunday, and it’s spring break. And Austin’s a hard place to get out of, apparently. We had a mechanical, so I saw a sunrise and a sunset at the same gate.
You sat in an airport for an entire set of daylight?
Twelve hours at one gate. And then my friend…put it on Facebook, “Hey, anybody have a plane?” Luckily he had a buddy Austin who flew us. It was a small prop plane. We got in 3:30 or something last night in a single-engine plane. It was pretty adventurous. I went to bed at like four after staying in the hotel all day. It was definitely an adventurous last two weeks. I’ve lost five pounds. I got to lead for a long time tonight. I died at the end, but at least I gave it everything I had and I’m still enjoying racing. It’s just frustrating because I think tonight could have been really successful if the situations were different, but that’s life.
So you didn’t die because you were like, oh my god, I’m in the lead and I tightened up; was it more because of the other stuff you were dealing with?
Yeah, it’s been two weeks of life. Sometimes it deals you a different set of circumstances, but that’s how it is. Everybody can make excuses; I’m just happy to be here doing what I’m doing. Unfortunately it didn’t end how I wanted it to, but my heat race went really well, and the main and the first ten laps were excellent.
When you were getting here, were you flying Friday?
Friday, I think it was supposed to leave at eight and I would have been here at 1:15 or something. So I wasn’t that panicked until about four or five last night, and then I realized I could have made it to Atlanta last night about 11:30, and then I could have drove from there with a rental car, which I think is like six and a half hours, seven hours. And that was still risky. The whole situation wasn’t good, but I’ve learned now that I’m older—I used to like to control stuff and it’s been a real adventure. I keep saying that but it’s been crazy the last few weeks.
But I hear you’re Mr. OCD? You’ve dealt with this well.
Obviously I’m not going to keep racing for much longer, so I’m just trying to embrace it. It was cool to be here again. I’ve raced a lot of good people. Leading for as long as I did was cool, but it’s frustrating it didn’t end the way I wanted it.
Was it fun to battle or do you not even…?
Yeah, even in practice it’s fun. Everything’s cool. I really like the new bike with KTM. If I wasn’t so pumped on the bike then racing wouldn’t be as near as enjoyable. The fact that the bike is really good and the team with BTO, everything. At this point in my career, low pressure, and I’ve had some good results this year, makes it really fun.
Have you ever had a “the plane might not make it to a race” scare before in your entire career? Is this the first time you thought this would happen?
My first national was in 2000, but I didn’t start racing supercross until 2001, so I’ve been racing for quite a while. Especially with my status with Delta with Diamond I thought for sure I would have no issues. It turned out to be quite a lot more difficult than I expected.
Was the team panicking, thinking you weren’t going to race?
Yeah. Even the situation was kind of dodgy, but it was cool, different. I’m never going to forget this Daytona—let’s put it that way.
