Chase Sexton called into the PulpMX show Tuesday night to talk on many topics, among them the Team USA rider selection for MXoN. Sexton is in for Team USA this year, but let’s just say he is less than pleased with the politics and believes riders should be honored to go represent their country. We have typed out Sexton’s exchange with Steve Matthes below, and we have also added the entire episode if you prefer to watch.
By the way, this interview breaks some news we expected to hear, including that Chance Hymas is the likely 250 rider for Team USA this year.
Matthes: Motocross of Nations at Ironman next year is going to be great.
Sexton: I’m looking forward to it. You’ll see all the guys coming out of the woodworks wanting to race next year. They won’t go this year.
I know right, it's amazing that no one can find the time to go to France or England.
I think if they turn it down you should ban them for however many years they turn it down. It's not right, it's not right.
They want to be the heroes when it's on US soil but then, Chase you know how it is, like with the Deegan thing, Star is just going to say, 'Hey we want money to go,' and then the Deegan’s go, 'Well it's not us, it's them.' You’ll never really know.
Everyone is pointing fingers. I’m pretty frustrated about the whole thing, because there's just a lot of egos involved and nobody’s honest. It's just like, 'This is what we should do. This person is saying this.' Dude, we are going to race for our country, there should be no other (thing to consider). The Olympics is the biggest sporting event that all the other sports have. And you can’t even get guys to go race for our country. That should be an honor for you.
Some of the guys last year who I heard said no, I am just like,'What?!' Not you, you were in between sponsorships I get it.
No, I was one of those last year, but I had a week on the bike. And honestly, I was so close to going too. It took a lot for me not to go.
Yeah, your dad was on board, but KTM was like, 'We’re not really ready.' Is that how it was?
Yeah, there was a lot riding on that because it was my first race on the bike. If it goes bad, it could start the relationship off wrong. But then supercross ended up going bad so it didn’t really matter.
What I don’t get about the Star thing is they’ve always been there for team USA. They went with Troll Train, they went with J-Mart, Cooper Webb. They always support that thing and now the last two years, they don’t support it. And Kawi doesn’t support it.
There’s a lot of egos involved. Not like singling anybody out, it's just like, that’s a lot of egos. And it really should be, 'Okay we need to do this for our country.' Letting the egos go and going, not for a good cause but going to win. Like, I don’t like getting beat by France. At all.
I heard last year from people on the team that Brian [Deegan] was saying, 'We don’t have a team that can win so we don’t want to go.' I heard that from someone involved in team USA, so everyone wants to run around and deny it, but this person would know and that’s what they told me Brian said.
I have no idea. If he has to fix his wrist, that’s one thing. But there’s just a lot of stuff being said, and I am just like, 'Dude.' I’m not even saying just Haiden, just in general, teams, none of them are coming together to make this thing work. Which is frustrating.
You can go back to Kawasaki, they didn’t like some of KTM’s tactics with Roger and so they were like, 'We don’t want to ride for Team USA with Roger.' That’s an ego thing, the ego of a team saying they don’t want to work with Roger, we don’t care about America.
Yeah there’s a lot of animosity between the teams, it's not like it's Haiden’s fault, it's just none of them are coming together. It’s annoying.
Watch below starting around the 36:00 mark:
I don’t get it either. I don’t begrudge anyone who turns it down, whatever, it's fine. But the politics going on are at an all-time high.
I’m not mad, I’m annoyed. We should be sending our best team, best riders. And I’m not saying we’re not sending our best riders but if I’m not the best guy I don’t want to go. Send somebody that’s going to go win. That’s how I look at it.
Chance Hymas is going to end up going, and he’s been riding great, but Haiden Deegan’s faster.
This is why you go off points. Like I said it's cool if Chance is going, he’s willing to drop everything and go. That adds two weeks onto our season that’s already long. So, I am stoked. Obviously, I love Aaron [Plessinger], I am glad he’s going too. So, it's going to be fun. But it is a little frustrating. I didn’t want to go on a rant, but I got like a lot of news today so it's on the top of my list right now.
Honestly, I hope nothing but the best for AP because he went last year, kind of on short notice, wasn’t exactly sure if he was going. Didn’t have a great second moto. RedBud (in 2018) didn’t go great for AP as the 250 champ. I hope this one goes well for AP.
His starts are good, he’s been riding, like Ironman he was ripping. I thought my pace was pretty high and he was right there. I don’t know, he’s been riding good and so has Chance, so we’ll see. I am going there to try and win my class. That’s my motivation.
And with Kawi, I get it but if the fans are pissed then they should tell them. Eli [Tomac] was staying home all those years that he was 450 motocross champion. But then again Chase, my thing is, I like David Luongo and the MXGP guys, but they are making so much money from this race and RJ Hampshire just told us a few months ago that he spent I think 5K. Maybe ten [out of his own pocket to race last year]. Why should RJ Hampshire spend 10K out of his pocket to go represent USA? He shouldn’t. He shouldn’t spend a dime. I think MXGP should be like, 'Team USA sells tickets, here you go. We’ll help your travel.'
You’re never gonna see that happen.
