Jeff Emig had an incredible career as a motorcycle racer. From the time he was a young boy riding minicycles in Kansas, he was winning races and championships. Emig was groomed by Kawasaki Team Green as an amateur, earning scores of major amateur titles along the way. His pro racing career really took off when he signed with the Yamaha factory team, where he would win his first championship, in 125cc AMA Pro Motocross in 1992. Five years later, Emig won both the 250 AMA Supercross and Pro Motocross Championships for Kawasaki. And before an injury forced his retirement, Emig won the ’99 U.S. Open as a privateer. All told, he won 36 AMA SX/MX races, rode for Team USA at six different FIM Motocross des Nations, and won a King of Bercy Supercross title. By any measure, Jeff Emig had a AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame career; he was inducted in 2004, his first year of eligibility.

And I guess all of that is what made a recent statement from Emig himself such a shock to me. While we were chatting on The Whiskey Throttle Show about all of his accomplishments, Jeff said, “I really had a moment last year, probably right around Christmas, where I realized that I was probably more proud of the work that I had done on the supercross television broadcasts than what I accomplished as a racer.”