Photo by: Ryne Swanberg
Before the weekend off after Southwick, Monster Energy / Pro Circuit / Kawasaki’s Joey Savatgy was off the pace of the leaders, but during that week off, he and the team went to work on making him more comfortable. They must have found something to make the #17 more comfortable, because since returning from the break at Millville, Joey has gone 1-1-7-1 and taken home two overall wins in a row in the 250MX class.
After sweeping the 2017 Spring Creek National last weekend, Joey came into Washougal ready to back it up, but after getting a mediocre start in moto one and crashing while battling with Sean Cantrell for 5th and finishing the moto in 7th, the overall looked out of reach. In moto two, though, Joey pulled his third holeshot of the last four motos and, after a tough battle with RJ Hampshire, went on to notch another moto win. With nobody that finished moto one up front being able to repeat their performances in moto two and the cards falling just right for him, Joey’s 7-1 was good enough to give him his third overall win of 2017 and his second in a row.
After Joey’s win, we caught up with him to ask about his back to back wins, his late season turn around, whether he’s racing the USGP and more.
Joey, kind of a interesting overall win for you today, but 7-1 gets it done. That’s two wins in a row for you.
Obviously not how we want to do it, but anyway we can get the overall win is an overall win.
The bonus check is the same. (laughs)
Exactly! The #1 for the weekend is the same no matter how we do it. It’s not something I expected with the class being as stacked as it is. It’s unlikely that, that will happen again. There’s too many good guys right now to go 7-1 and get the overall, but we did it. I crashed in the first moto—lost some spots—and we rebounded the best we could. We got off to a great start in the second moto. I rode tight at first, but once RJ [Hampshire] passed me, I picked up on his lines where he was faster. I was able to force the issue and get him back. From there, pulled a little bit of a lead and just managed it. I didn’t feel awesome out here this weekend but we got the job done and that’s all that matters.
There was a heck of a race going on behind you all race long. Did you see some of that from up front?
I saw the battle. I looked over one lap all the way in the back, and I think I saw maybe AC [Adam Cianciarulo], someone on a Yamaha [Dylan Ferrandis] and [Zach] Osborne. But obviously I didn’t know what was happening for position or points or anything like that. I crossed the finish line, and I was hoping maybe third overall would be good on the weekend. A second moto win—maybe third overall—and I was going to be stoked. We came to find out we got the overall. It was good.
You won Thunder Valley and then you took a long hiatus from the podium before the week off after Southwick. Then, you come back from a weekend off and throw down two overall wins in a row. I heard that you did some chassis testing that helped, but what do you think the biggest difference was?
A lot of things. Like you said, we tested and made leaps and bounds with the bike. Even with myself, we’re always learning. We’re getting better every weekend and there’s always something you can take away from the weekend and learn from no matter how long you’ve been doing it.
I don’t remember this being an especially good track for you, but you were really good today in the second moto. It looked slick out there.
It’s a lot of throttle control and a lot of technique. I like to think I pride myself on proper technique and good throttle control. I don’t mind this place. It was definitely brutal in that second moto with a lot of shiny stuff underneath. The rear wheel was breaking loose a lot, and you had to be very cautious—or mindful of the rear end. All in all, I don’t mind this place, though.
I raced here a lot back in the late ’90’s, and there were second motos where I got scared looking at the track before my race. Was it chopped up with square edged in moto two?
Rough wise, it wasn’t that bad. It was just so slippery in certain areas. A lot of areas were bad areas. You would come out of a corner, get ready for a jump and you would feel the bike slowing down with a lot of rear wheel spin. You almost had to back it down so the rear wheel didn’t light up.
At this point you are pretty far out of the championship and you would need a lot of help from Osborne to luck into that, but is second in the points something you’re looking at all? Does that not even matter?
No, we’re just taking it weekend by weekend. Obviously, we had these two weeks in a row and we got two wins, and we got three more to go. I’m looking forward to the break, heading to Unadilla and we’ll take it one by one at this rate. The championship is what it is. If something happens it happens, but I’m not looking at anything or counting points. All I’m here to do is to try to win races, and try to win overalls. We’re making progress.
Do we see you at the USGP?
I don’t know yet.
Congrats on the win Joey, enjoy the week off and thank you again for the time.
No problem.
