Joey Savatgy | Rookie On The Rise
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Joey Savatgy is the easy pick for Rookie of the Year honors in the 450 class for the 2019 Monster Energy Supercross Series. With ten top-ten finishes, a pair of Heat Race wins, and some top qualifier honors to his credit over fourteen rounds, the Monster Energy Kawasaki rider has cemented himself as a contender in the competitive series. Getting to this point has been a long process, from a cross-country move as an amateur to injury-plagued early years as a pro and a few runs at championships in the 250 class, all of which has prepared Savatgy for the rigors of the 450 class. The 2017 250 East Coast championship could have been the defining moment of his career, but instead, Savatgy has made peace with the run-in and used the incident to become a better person on and off of the bike. We had the chance to spend a considerable amount of time with Savatgy just moments before he geared up for a recent night of racing and learned more about everything in his orbit.
The talk started with the most obvious topic, his season so far in the 450 class. When asked if he felt satisfied with the results, Savatgy replied with confidence, “This was the goal that I had at the very beginning, before we even started racing. It’s one thing to go out and do it and another thing to that it’s where you belong. Coming into the season, I believed in my ability and the team, so I thought we could be around fifth place. It’s the first year and there are a lot of gnarly dudes up front, you can’t discredit any of those guys. To lead some laps, win a Heat Race, be up there in qualifying, that would be a great first year. And we’ve been able to do that. It hasn’t been a huge surprise for me now, at this point.”
He continued on with, “You can’t really ask for a lot more. We worked hard all offseason with the team. I didn’t want to get my expectations too high, because this is my rookie year and there is a lot of learning involved. I’d like to look at myself as adapting well and really quick and I’d like to think that I’m graduating from the rookie side of things. Now it’s just another weekend.”
At twenty-five years old, Savatgy’s graduation to the 450 class comes much later than what’s considered “normal” for a young man’s sport. The last two seasons on the small-bore bike were supposed to be his chance at a championship, something he did not accomplish, but he made it very clear that he’s found a silver lining to it all. “I really wanted to win those titles and it sucks to lose them the way we did and the way everything unfolded the past two years, but if you take a step back, I have to be thankful and grateful for everything that I have,” he noted. “This is a huge part of what I do and it’s all I’ve known, but when it’s all said and done, there’s more to this than just racing. I try to take the pressure off and enjoy it, that’s one thing that I’ve tried this year, to enjoy it more. I know I won’t be fantastic every weekend and won’t win every weekend, no one does, so I can’t have that mentality. You show up with the mentality to battle for wins, but you have to enjoy it.”
The appreciation for racing and all that comes with it is a direct result of two tumultuous years in the 250 class, sparked by the aforementioned run-in with Zach Osborne in Las Vegas. Savatgy admitted that it did set him back and we talked about the topic at length, but with time he’s been able to build from it all. “The last two years for me have been miserable and I really was in a stage of my life where I was miserable and hated it. To have them extend that Lites rule one more year, I don’t know if it was a good thing, but it put things in perspective of how everything works. The race etiquette is something that I’ve learned over the last two years; I’m a little older now and stepping to this class with so many older guys that are respectful while racing, you know they are not going to do you dirty or T-bone you for the most part, because there are those guys in every class. I think everything going down the way that it did, it’s only been for the better. I’m only twenty-five but there’s so much to be thankful for.”
“The goal is to win titles and the way everything went down, how we should have won it and didn’t, it sucked. But I think the best thing that ever happened was transitioning to a different class because it’s all behind me now. It’s something I’ll remember forever, absolutely, and it will be miserable to look back and think what could have been, but oh well. Ten or fifteen years from now, if my kid asks me, I’ll show them the tape and how bad it was. But it was a life lesson. At the time, it was the end of the world. I wanted to quit everything and never speak to anyone again,” he continued. “Titles are the goal and it was a big slap in the face, to make you be thankful for all that you have and not to get greedy. That’s very tough, we as humans are very greedy and selfish by always wanting more. At the time, it was the worst thing in the world but looking back on it, it taught me a big life lesson and that’s part of the bigger picture. This year hasn’t erased all of that, but it’s made the wounds of the past not as deep or painful. When this is all said and done, I’ll always want to go back and change it, but if not for that I would have a different attitude. I might have gotten a title, but I’d be a different person.”
For the first time we discussed three very important points about the run-in: if people still bring it up, if he and Osborne talk, and if he feels it was justified. Savatgy answered each question without pause or push back.
On the public reaction: “People bring it up all the time. At first, it irritated me and I didn’t want to hear it, but now it doesn’t bother me. I’m at a different stage now and am married with a kid on the way, in a different class with a new team, and I think that’s what has been so refreshing.”
Interactions with Osborne: “We’ve never talked, honestly. Even before that, when I was at JDR KTM and he was at GEICO Honda maybe, we got into it once or twice. We’ve never talked, except for a little bit of chit-chat back when I was at JDR. And so many people blow that out of proportion. I’m sure him by himself, he’s a fine dude. But there’s nothing to talk about. Like I’ve said in the past, if the roles were reversed, I would have done the same. I would have blasted him off that berm. But I was on the short end of the stick and it’s on me. There’s nothing for us to talk about and I would have done the same thing, so from his side, I get it. People always want to say there’s bad blood, but there’s not really. I got the short end of a big stick.”
If it was justified: “People come up to me and say that he should have gotten docked, but no way. He shouldn’t have gotten docked, because it was for a title. If it was for a Heat Race win or the Main Event, maybe, but it was a title.”
But that’s in the past and after we addressed the topic, the conversation turned to the present, like Savatgy’s current role at Monster Energy Kawasaki, the excitement of the 450 class, and his family and impending fatherhood. Even after years under the Pro Circuit tent, Savatgy’s relationship to the Monster Energy Kawasaki team was cordial at most, as there was little need for him to interact with them much as a 250 rider. “It’s quite a difference, honestly. It’s still Kawasaki, but I didn’t know anyone here aside from Dan and Bruce. I saw everyone’s faces, but I’m a pretty shy person so I was never one to come over here and just chat it up. Coming over here was intimidating because it wasn’t ‘my truck’ so I never spent a lot of time over here. But now that I’m over here, it’s awesome. Nothing against Mitch, because he gave me the platform that got me here and I’ll forever be grateful for that and I just wish I had won him a title, but it’s different from one thing to another. He gave me the opportunity and said that he believed in me to win, and we were close. Without him, who knows, I might not even be racing right now. He took a gamble on me when a lot of people didn’t believe in me and I’ll forever be grateful.”
“This is everything I have ever wanted, to be in the 450 class. Indianapolis was my first time in opening ceremonies and that was awesome. I started the year off with some struggles and that didn’t do me any favors, not racing Phoenix and having a DNF, but it’s going to be awesome to come out in the lights and will remember forever. God forbid something happens and that’s the highlight of my career, but I would be okay with that, coming from a kid that just rode for fun and had no one really believe in me. I truly feel there were a lot of opportunities when I was an amateur that was about to go pro that I was passed up for to give to other people. That was discouraging and a lot of guys that I race against had factory deals before they turned pro, and I wasn’t one of those guys. I was basically a privateer deal, with my dad funding it. He always told me if I’m going to do it that I should do it, and to never half-ass it. And that’s the mentality that I’ve always had. I’m going to get that break and I have to keep believing in it.
“I’m glad that I never gave up and that’s something I’ll take forward to my kids, to show them that it’s not always going to be awesome or good, but that you can’t quit. I’d rather suffer now and go through the trials, heartbreak, and tears in order to have something positive at the end of it, whatever that positive thing is. Maybe it’s having a part in opening ceremonies or going on to win races and fight for titles, but I’d rather have to go through all of the suffering for one positive thing. It’s a dream come true because as a kid you want to be one of the guys that kids look up to and have the opportunity to showcase what you have. I’m thankful for Kawasaki for stepping up, we didn’t have the greatest last two years, but I’m trying my best to show that I appreciate the offer and sticking out their necks for me. I just want to provide for my family and make myself and my circle proud. I do a lot of work during the week and I’m not a big social media guy, so there’s a lot that people don’t see, but I grind. We’re on the rise and I’m trying to keep that going.”
Monster Energy Kawasaki’s signing of Savatgy to a one-year 450 class contract without a championship drew plenty of heat from fans and it’s something he noticed but did not respond to at the time. “It’s so messed up that people love to see other people fail. It’s unreal how much people want that and it’s something I don’t understand. I dislike a lot of people, but if someone else is succeeding and putting in the work, I’ll never discredit that,” he expressed. “Kawasaki made the announcement and it took everything in me not to go on there and blow everyone out. Everyone said by round three there would be a replacement or that I would choke. Why not give me the chance? Give me the opportunity to prove that, don’t shut me down as soon as the announcement is made.”
One might think that a single year deal would be worrisome for a racer, but Savatgy went on to explain that it’s a situation he’s familiar with. “A one-year deal is nothing new for me. Every contract I’ve had has been one year with an option for another year if they decided to. I’ve never thought, ‘I have two years with a third year if I do this.’ It’s always been, ‘I have one year to figure out what I’m going to do and if I don’t, they can pull it from you.’ The whole one-year thing doesn’t bother me and it’s worked out,” he noted.
With a solid string of results already on his resume this season, it’s widely assumed that Savatgy has already done enough to land a contract extension with Kawasaki or a spot on another factory team for 2020. Savatgy is aware of this but is not using it as a chance to relax, as he explained he feels he does best when against a challenge. “I truly think that when everything is on the line, I’m a gamer. Look at the year against Webb in Las Vegas in the mud, when I had to win everything and he had to get twelfth. I was the fastest qualifier, won my Heat Race, and won the Main Event. Everything was on the line and I did everything I needed to do. When things are on the line and I need to get shit done, I believe in my ability to be one of the guys that can make it happen. Does the one-year deal come with added pressure? Yeah, I guess but it’s not something I’m uncomfortable with.”
