The last few years, we’ve seen Jeremy “J-Bone” Albrecht out at the races helping the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) in rider penalties and things like that. He’s had a long career in the sport, first as a championship winning mechanic for Jeff Emig and James Stewart amongst others and then a long role running JGRMX before they shut down. To see Jeremy with an AMA shirt on took some getting used to, and now it sounds like he’s going to expand on the role a bit into something full time, as he is now the AMA technical manager.
Racer X Online: We’ve seen you more at the races. This has been a really positive development for the AMA. Really kind of reshaping the AMA, the rule structure, the rule enforcement, all of this. It’s been a really, really great thing in our sport for sure. Now you’re taking your talents full-time to the AMA, J-Bone.
Jeremy Albrecht: Yeah. It presented itself. It wasn’t planned which makes it better, I think. I just was doing it because I like going to the races.
What happened? Is it a different job or the same job but full-time?
No, it’s a different job than what I was doing. Obviously, I moved to North Carolina to run a team. We did that. The team shut down. I didn’t go to the races for a year, which felt really weird. I did get to do one TV thing when Daniel Blair moved up, at Salt Lake one year. I did do that. That was cool. But that was the only racing I did. I was like, I do kind of miss it. So, then the next year, [Mike] Pelletier [from AMA] asked me if I would be a rider representative. I shared the role with Christina Denney over the last few years. That’s been fun. At first it was a little odd because I kind of said yes without really thinking about the role. Handing out penalties was not what I was used to and dealing with all that stuff. So, it took me a little bit to get my mindset and understand what my job was. People seeing me in that role is kind of like seeing a police officer. You don’t really want to engage. So, it’s a little bit different than what role I’ve been in in the past. But I ended up enjoying it.
I like Pelletier. I like what he’s doing. His dad has been driving the truck. Tool Time [Tim McAdams] is there. A lot of people I already know. They all do a better job than from the outside what I was seeing. It’s easy to complain, is what I have come to realize. There’s lots of reasons why they do things. It’s been fun to learn something new. Then this role came up and Pelletier asked me if it was something I wanted to do. Just had to learn about it a little more. Do I need to move? Is it full-time? Do they have benefits? What’s the pay? All the normal things before I can say yes. It was legitimate. It was a job I needed to consider. I talked about it with my wife and kids. It worked out to be something that is good for us, good for me. I like being at the races. That’s where I was kind of going back and forth. I’m doing 20 rounds anyway that I just did because I like to go. I was making money, but that wasn’t the main reason I was going. I already had a job. Just had to really look at it and think about it and decided it’s what I want to do.
So, you’re not going to be doing so much of the discipline and all this? Is this more working with the legality of the bikes and the technical end of things with motorcycles and the rules?
Correct. Obviously, I’ll be dealing with it if someone is not doing what they’re supposed to be doing with the motorcycle, but not with the riders and all that like I was.
![Jeremy Albrecht at the 2024 Daytona Supercross.]()
Jeremy Albrecht at the 2024 Daytona Supercross. Align Media ![Jeff Canfield (Racing Manager at the AMA) and Mike Pelletier (Director of Racing at the AMA).]()
Jeff Canfield (Racing Manager at the AMA) and Mike Pelletier (Director of Racing at the AMA). Align Media ![Christina Denney]()
Christina Denney Align Media
This isn’t the three-person committee, “Let’s look at this dirty pass.”
Yeah. And they are still going to do that. It will just be different people doing that. They have some good people, ex-riders, that have liked doing it. Ezra Lusk has been doing a good job. He liked it. Andrew Short came and really liked it. It’s been good. I do like the direction they’re going. Like you said, they’re bringing in other people that I feel are fresh and new and have been in the sport a long time also. They’re changing it up. I definitely like it. John Starling does a really good job. Everyone in our sport, you think you’re the busiest person and have the most important job. And then you hop around to these different things, and you realize everyone is trying to step it up and do a good job. They do better than I ever thought, and I’m sure more than most people think. People just want to bag on them. It’s one of those things, back in the day I didn’t think someday I’m going to be an AMA official. That wasn’t ever a job I was…
No. When I was watching Fresno Smooth, I didn’t think that would happen either.
No. It wasn’t really on my radar ever. I did actually start to enjoy it so then I was talking to my wife. This could be a good job later on when I retire. We could just travel around to the races, take our motorhome. Kind of something later down the road, and then it presented itself way earlier than expected. Pelletier made it work. [Rob] Dingman [the President & CEO at the AMA] had to be involved and James [James Holter, Chief Operating Officer at the AMA] and all kinds of people at the AMA that I didn’t know in the past that I do now. Really cool.
I want to go to less races as I get older, travel-wise. You don’t seem to be that way.
I thought the same thing. It’s kind of messed up. My son did go to ten of them with me. My older son. He worked ten of them. That helped. My younger one worked a couple. My wife goes to a few here and there that are fun to go to. In the future, probably not this year because my older one is graduating at the end of the year here, so he’ll be going to college next year. So that’s when I see my wife going to more with me, and maybe we travel around in our motorhome a little bit. My kids can fly in here and there. I just see it fitting what I’m doing. When you’re doing it every weekend, you do always say you want less. Then when it gets taken away and you don’t have a team, you’re sitting at home. I wasn’t doing anything with motorcycles at all, except for my kids were racing which was cool. But you just feel disconnected. It’s what you’ve done your whole life. It’s weird. It’s almost like I’ve been trying to figure out what I’m missing. If you didn’t go for a year and you didn’t work anything in the industry, it’s really weird. I liked it. There was parts I liked. Don’t get me wrong.
Doling out the penalties and being a little bit front-facing with the riders, and like you said when people have to see you, it’s not a good thing. Would you have kept doing that if this job didn’t come up? Or were you feeling that that wasn’t a role that you liked anymore, and you were looking for something different or whatever? Would you have been happy to continue to do the role of “bad cop” J-Bone?
Yeah, I was good continuing bad J-Bone. I liked it. I actually did like it. The reason I did like it is they let us sit and really look at all kinds of angles and really come up with what we all felt was fair. That part is what I do like. We got to really think it out, talk through it. Even when we talked to the riders or teams—one side is always mad. I actually started to enjoy it. I would have done it still. I was planning on doing it until like a month ago. But that was the plan. This kind of just popped up that they had a new role they wanted to hire for, and Pelletier thought that I fit the role and kind of wanted me to do it. So, I took it serious and did it.
You brought Dean Baker over a few times for some races. Dana Wiggins has jumped in. There’s been people that you know and people with some technical background helping to enforce the rules of the motorcycle. Does this indicate maybe a little more of a focus on motorcycles? Motorcycle penalties, weight limits, sound limits… More tear-downs. More of an emphasis on that from this year with your job full-time? Do you think?
Yeah. Dean Baker is still going to do it. Some people that I do know that aren’t on teams that I feel are good people and knowledgeable. You’ll see a few people that you recognize. I’m bringing them in. We did do a lot more than people realize the last couple years. Every year I think we do more. Really for me, I wanted to make sure we were doing a motocross team again. We were doing this, and we were trying to get a team going. When I knew that wasn’t happening. That’s kind of when this idea came up. We’re probably not doing a team here at JGR, so this would be the time that I need to decide. Do I want to stay, keep doing what I’m doing? Do I like motorcycles? Motorcycles is my background. It’s what I wanted to. So, I went this direction.
When you and I talked, [Ryan] Breece was saying that we made some penalty fighting him, or something. We were saying how we don’t really tell people what we do. So, I kind of want to do that in tech also, so that privateers know who we check. Everyone knows that we did check whatever it is on the weekend. We want to get to that. I don't know how soon, but I want to do that. The penalty thing was great, too. Trying to change things up and just share more of what we’re doing. I think people would be surprised that we do more than they think. We tore lots of bikes down last year. Southwick we did tons of sound checking. Actually, Pelletier wasn’t there and Dean and I went a little crazy. So, we probably need to back it down at Southwick next time we go. But that race is so important for qualifying. So, people risk cheating sound, because it definitely helps if you have a muffler that’s not choked up. It runs better.
I think more transparency on what you guys are checking, just like the penalties, would be great. Also, you were there, as was I, and there’s nothing worse than having to split your cases after a supercross main event, but those are the rules.
I remember the AMA taking my frame for two weeks. That wasn’t what I was expecting. People just get used to it being a certain way. We need to start enforcing more. It’s not going to all drop the hammer at Anaheim 1, but it’s definitely going to get better.
So, this is a big move for you in the sense that you’re now leaving JGR. This is a full-time job. I’m guessing you can work from home, maybe visit Ohio here and there where the AMA is located. But this means you leaving JGR after how many years?
Seventeen and a half.
So, how big of a decision is that?
It was big. I talked to my wife a lot and we were kind of talking. This move was less risky than the one we moved to JGR from Kawasaki, moving across the country. So, it was definitely a tough decision, just a struggle back and forth. Am I making the right decision? Trying to ask Pelletier how long term of a job is this one. Leaving a job for that long that’s a good job. That’s what was cool. This job was all those things. I just didn’t know the AMA had all these benefits and full-time job and it pays good. It was surprising, and good. The other day I had a call with HR, and they have IT people. It’s a legitimate, real company. It’s not what we all think. It always seemed like it was weekend help, which still will be some of it, but they’re definitely adding. [Jeff] Canfield [Racing Manager at the AMA] was just brought on last year. Pelletier is making a difference.
Did you have to talk to Joe [Gibbs] about leaving?
They did do a little going away cookies and cupcakes to come say bye to me, and Joe actually showed up. So, I got a photo of Joe with myself and my son. Actually, my older son, Trevor, still works there. He works part-time while he’s going to college, so he’ll still be there. I’m still friends with all those people. I left on good terms. I plan on using some of them. Some of the tools we might use in the future with the AMA to be able to check some things will be tools that they have that I think we could leverage. So that’s some of the ideas in the future.
There’s a rider you used to manage from New York. He had said to me that he thought maybe you were moving back to California, but he has fake news?
He has fake news. That was one of the things. That was one of the reasons I thought I probably wouldn’t work for the AMA, is they’re based out of Ohio, and I wasn’t planning on ever moving to Ohio. Moving to North Carolina was a big enough move for us. But that was one of the questions I had was where would I live. I can live and work from my house, so I’ll just be traveling from here. Now with [Microsoft] Teams and all that, it makes it pretty easy to be anywhere.
The rider rep role you mentioned with Shorty and Yogi coming out, and I may have missed a few names, but here and there you’ve got some really good people to come out and help talk to the riders, look at tracks, help with any discipline stuff that goes on, and basically get in a rider who competed at the highest stage and get their opinion. Again, I like it. You like it, too. Are there more plans to do that for more races for more guys? Some of these guys have a lot of money, so they’re not always interested in doing the travel again and all that, so that’s an obstacle. But do you think we see more of that this year?
Yeah, you will. I like to think that when I went and did this role that it made other people realize that it’s a good job and it’s fun. It seemed like it brought more people out, but maybe I’m just thinking that because I’m in it now and working for them. But it feels like more people are open to helping with the AMA than in the past. But maybe it’s just because it’s all my friends. It’s myself and Christina’s friends who are helping out. That’s probably the only difference. It just feels like it.
You’ve been doing this longer than I was, back in the day of some AMA people that were disconnected from the sport. Pretty hard-headed, not really knowing the personalities, not really knowing what’s going on. It has been such a breath of fresh air the last few years. So this has been a nice change from the AMA. And Feld and MX Sports working together has helped. We still have DMG down in Daytona, and AMA in Ohio, and there’s still some weirdness with that, in my opinion. But we have gotten so much better as a sport. Don’t you agree?
I do. Everyone working together has been the biggest thing. I think COVID, as messed up as it was, that’s the one good thing that came out of all this. Everyone is working together trying to make it better. I think that World Supercross thing coming up and getting people thinking about that and where’s the best series and all that. It just made them step it up here. I think they’re doing a great job.
What’s the one thing that getting this job with the AMA the last few years, and then having come from a mechanic back in the day, and then the team manager with JGR and you were in those meetings with Phil [Nicoletti] and Weston [Peick] and all these guys. What’s the one thing that you didn’t realize until you joined the other side?
Honestly, just how hard it is to make the right call. I would say before me, so I think the first year I started doing it, we have a TV in the tower next to the finish line and we can rewatch different angles. We can pull up every TV angle. People might not see what we saw, but I think without that, it would have been even tougher because I would see something live and then go rewatch it different angles and then come up with a different decision. So, if you didn’t have that to go back and really study it more, I think it would be easy to make the wrong call. Still, do we make the right call every time? Probably not. But we try. All I can say is I always did make the call that I thought was right, and that’s what’s good about the voting system. If you were wrong, which there’s probably two times that I wanted something to happen or not happen and it didn’t. But most of the time, we all agree. There was probably only a couple times we didn’t all agree.
When you slow things down, like people do on social media, and they’re trying to break down a pass and everything and you slow things down, I understand that helps it and looks at it, but it’s so misleading at times because these guys aren’t going that slow. So, you can’t be like, 'Look at his front end here, his front wheel.' It’s so different.
We’d also save stuff that we have penalized for, or not, and then replayed some of those older ones to make sure we’re being consistent also. That’s where it’s tricky. A lot of it is, was it intentional? And that’s a judgment call. That’s the tricky part, too. Vince Friese does stuff all the time, but a lot of his stuff, it isn’t all… Some of it is just dumb. That’s hard to do, too. But again, he’s trying to race, and you hear his side and it’s completely different. Some of it is legitimate, and some of it’s not. But he’s trying to race. It definitely made me talk to people I didn’t talk to in the past. It’s been good, honestly. I kind of liked it. I am going to miss that part a little bit because I did start to like it. I will be going to some road races, also. So, that will be new for me. That’s something I don’t know a lot about. There will be some road racing involved also. So, it’s going to be cool for me to learn even more.
