While things are relatively quiet in Canada, the European Supercross season is just getting underway. Last year, Jéan-Sébastien Roy had some big Euro races on his agenda, all of which got sidelined when he was injured before Montreal. But this winter, we’ve already seen JSR’s name in the results at the Sheffield and Bercy Supercrosses, and next week, he heads to the Geneva SX. We caught up with Roy to see what his Euro schedule includes and to check in on his plans for 2008.

RXC: Hey JSR. You’ve been doing some world traveling and thought we’d give you a call. How are things?
JSR: Good, I’m just at home, working on the house and thinking of making a quick trip down to Florida. In the next little while, I have the Geneva SX, and maybe a race in Mexico, but that’s not 100 percent yet.

Let’s start with Bercy. You were part of "Team rest of the World" with Langston, Reed and Belgian Jeremy Van Horebeek. Tell us how the weekend went?
First of all, Bercy is a big ‘spectacle’ as we say in French. At the beginning of the night, the introduction of the riders takes a full-on hour. They have the French team, the U.S. team—since U.S. riders have dominated the race a lot—and then "Team rest of the World"—which is me and years ago, Greg Albertyn, and this year Chad Reed. I was part of that team. To be honest, I’m not sure how it works because I didn’t really pay attention to the points but our team was pre-qualified every night. I didn’t have to qualify but I had to get a good pick for the gate for the main. They have a French-only final, like our Canadian-only final in Montreal. The top four from that go to the big show. There ends up being fifteen or sixteen guys on the gate. This year they had us do about eight races. Chad Reed raced like four races in a row. It was a weird format. It was an experience though. It’s a long weekend, because it’s three days and we ride a lot.

How many times have you raced there?
I’ve done that race quite a few times, being French Canadian I get invited there, it’s kind of cool to have a Canadian Frenchman there; I get involved in the opening ceremony. Results wise, I was not prepared like I was for Montreal. I was not far off speed wise, but I was short a second and it made the difference between 12th and sixth or seventh. It was okay though; it was all right.

You also headed overseas to Sheffield. Tell us about that?
Last time I was there was back when Mike Metzger did his first back flip [laughs] so that was 2000 or 2001. It’s been a while. It was fun; it was very cool there. It was an in-and-out trip, it was very short. We got in the night before, went to the hotel, next morning we worked on the bikes, practice in the afternoon, get some food, come back and started qualifiers and two main events. I did well. I rode with Colton for the whole race. We raced two classes with a 250F. The first qualifier was Colton and I, we went 1-2. The Open qualifier, I won my heat. In the Lites main event, I finished second, and pretty much right after was the Open main event. I got sixth. Colton did well in that second one, he got third or fourth. I was tired; we did 20 laps in the Lites class and right after that we did the other main. The track was pretty nice, a bit simple, it had a nice whoop section and it was safe but a good show for the fans. Those European Supercrosses are easy compared to the U.S. ones. They don’t have to line up ambulances in the pits like they do in the states.

Brett Lee made the trip and he said that the British fans know quite a bit about Canada.
Yes, I think because of John [Hellam], the promoter, he always invites Canadian riders and he presents us like they present the U.S. riders in other countries. U.S. riders always have the red carpet. We get good treatment from John and I’m glad that he invites us. I am pretty sure I am going back to Liverpool at the end of January. We are just finalizing things. I am also doing Dortmund, the biggest race in Germany before Christmas—it’s one I’ve done for years and years. Then the race in Liverpool and then maybe another one in Germany in January, and that’s it.

When Stefan Paetow caught up with you at Sheffield, you said you were "probably" racing the Canadian Nationals this summer. What are you plans as of now? Do you still want to race the full series?
There’s not much to say just yet, but I’m going to be racing a Toyota Yamaha Blackfoot bike again, for sure. I’m just considering doing a bit of a different schedule next year, nothing is finalized yet. I’ll be racing, but I am thinking about doing a few less races next summer. But we’ll see. We are still talking.  I’ve got my contract; I’ve got everything dialed for next year so I don’t have to worry about anything. We are just discussing different options, a different job description for me, helping out the team a bit more, helping out riders and starting to share my tricks with other riders on the team—which I’ve never really done before.

Are you ready for that?
[Laughs] I’ve definitely never done that before but there are a few different things I’d like to try out.

Is this discussion coming from you or the team?
It’s coming from me, and, as I say, there is nothing official yet. So far, what’s official, is that I’m going to be racing again next year. As you know, I signed a two-year deal. It’s nice this time around, it’s the same program, I already have a 2008 here and we’re going to Florida before Christmas for a bit of testing. We are ahead of last year for sure in testing and getting bikes ready and we want to test a bit more, just before Christmas, before those guys start building motors.

So how do you like the 2008?
It’s good. I’ve mostly ridden it outdoors. It’s better than last year, it seems a bit more flexible, a bit easier to point and shoot. It’s a better bike, it was already good and the ’08 is a big improvement. And there are still a few little things on our side that will even make it better with more time and preparation. We’ll be 100 percent when the season starts. I think Colton and I are going to try and do a few small races in Florida or Georgia this winter to try and get some races under our belt before the season starts. Colton is doing more U.K. races, and Nelson is doing some arenacrosses, but when that series is over in March there is nothing to do but train and ride before the first round. We’ll have our bikes ready so we’ll be able to go to the states and do a few races. There are some good outdoor races, not Nationals, but there are always fast locals to learn from. Then we’ll have some time on our race bikes before Ste-Julie. There are a few things like that that I’m working on to be more prepared than I was last year.

Colton has been riding really well, eh?
Yeah, I think slowly he’s building up his confidence, and skill wise, there is no question about that. He’s pretty young too so he’s just going to grow up and learn more and get more confidence and more fitness, and then he’ll be pretty tough to beat.

With some many Euro races on your calendar, are you racing any snocross?
I will probably do one or two, probably the one in Valcourt, near my house, and there’s another fun one in April at a ski resort. Most of the time the weather is on the plus side, and it’s a really cool weekend. I didn’t do much last year, I rode a couple days. But I’m not getting into racing snowcross, it’s as bad as motocross, you have to be full on prepared for it. It’s actually more money to race, you can’t show up with a pickup truck and your sled in the back, you need a trailer.

So you’re enjoying things overall right now, with your family and racing, and travelling?
Actually life is pretty fun, I go overseas, do a few races, come back home, work on the house a bit, spend time with my family, it’s pretty cool. It’s quite fun to do races without any stress, like Bercy, I didn’t have to worry about qualifying. Sheffield you give everything you have one night, and that’s it. There’s no stress for a championship. It’s more fun and it’s more relaxing, and having a little girl back home, and a house project, I’m staying busy. And now with the DVD coming out this summer…

Yes, we heard a bit about the DVD project from Felix Trépanier, tell us about that?
We’ve been talking about this for two or three years and Felix has the time to work on it now. Felix flew into Bercy and if I go to a few more International ones, he’ll come. It’s going to be more like a resume of my life, it won’t be a crazy DVD, it will be more like a biography. It’s not like I’m a freestyler, so don’t expect to see me try to back flip a car or something but I wanted to do one DVD in my life, and this is going to be it. Of course, I will still be racing after this but this will be a look at my career so far. I have a lot of footage to put a DVD together, there will be some old stuff, I have boxes of tapes and we are going to try and use some of those. The new stuff will be HD and the other half will be old stuff, from when I was six, seven, eight, and hopefully I’ll get footage from the U.S. Supercrosses when I raced there too. We’ll be busy this winter working on that.

Thanks, JSR and keep in touch.
Thanks. Simon Homans and I leave next Wednesday for Geneva, and I’ll be in touch when I get back.