By Allison Kennedy

There’s no doubt Brady Sheren had a challenging SX season last winter. Sheren found himself on a Wonder Warthog Yamaha, a Solitaire Honda and back on a privateer Kawi before the SX season wrapped up. He made his first main event in San Diego, with the Solitaire Honda team and Ryan Clark’s support. Sheren has now found a home on the Fun Centre Suzuki Team, alongside Michael and Chris Blose. He’s hoping to pick up where he left off last season: making main events. We caught up with Brady to see how his first few weeks on Suzuki’s have been going.

RXC: Hey Brady. Where are you now?
Brady Sheren: I’m just hanging out at the shop, watching them work on my race bike.

How are things going? How long have you been back in Cali?
Pretty good so far, my wrist was sore for a little bit but it’s pretty good now. I got here last Saturday. I rode a couple of days outdoors, just to get a feel for things and my wrist, before I moved to supercross stuff. I didn’t want to case something and have something happen. I just wanted to take a couple of easy days and then get back into it. It actually turned out that supercross hurt less than outdoors; it was weird. The thing that hurt it the most was braking bumps in long straights; that hurt more than casing something. I thought it would be the opposite. We ended up making a couple of little changes and fixed that anyways.

I know you had an injury after the Canadian season, and you also missed the Montreal SX. What happened?
I broke my scaphoid out practicing; I was actually getting ready for Montreal. It was my fourth ride back after outdoors, and I just made a stupid mistake. It was a little step-up out of a corner and on the outside of the track, there was a little ditch right on the edge, I came over the step up with a little too much speed and spun a bit and got pushed out and my front wheel just went off the edge and I fell forward really fast and put my hand out. I was pissed too because I wanted to go to Montreal and the track looked good this year.

At least you’re back now, that’s not too bad.
Yeah, it was my scaphoid, which sucks, because it never heals. It was just a hairline crack though so I was thankful for that; it wasn’t too much of a problem healing up. It’s still not really healed, the doctor said it would be about 90 percent by Christmas, but it actually turned out to be better than I thought it would.

Yeah, I guess if you have to be ready for West coast, you don’t have much of a choice?
No I don’t really have much time. It’s crunch time. I hate doing that, every time I get hurt it’s like that. You have to come back and do what everyone else has done in five months in one or two. It’s hard but I’m used to it now, I guess.

So you’ve signed on with the Fun Centre Suzuki team? Is this your first time on a Suzuki and how do you like the bike and the team?  
I rode Newf’s when I stayed back at his house, when I was there for the outdoor nationals. I rode it for a couple of laps at one track but I didn’t really get a great feel for it. I love it; it’s probably the best bike I’ve ridden. The practice bike that I have now has a lot of work done to it, suspension and motors, everything. It’s pretty close to the race bike so it’s kind of hard to tell from a stock bike perspective, but this is probably the best bike I’ve ever ridden in terms of total package setup. It’s fast; it works good and it feels good. It wasn’t like when I switched to Yamaha. With those you had to totally change your style and ride them a different way. But the Suzuki, the Kawi, and the Honda are all pretty similar in the way you have to ride them, so it’s an easy adjustment to have to make this time.

What’s the team like?
The team is awesome. Great mechanics and everyone is really cool. They did arenacross last year so they know what they are doing. Everything is organized. When I got here my practice bike was ready to go, I had gear, everything was all set. There wasn’t any waiting around. It’s definitely a good scene.

Do you know Michael and Chris Blose?
I know Chris because he was on the Warthog team last year, so I know him from that. I’ve seen his brother around before but hadn’t actually met him. They are from Arizona, but they’ve been down here since I’ve been here and we’ve been pretty much riding together every day. We’ve been mostly at Competitive Edge, and we had to ride outdoors because it was too wet to ride any supercross tracks. I think we are going to the Suzuki test track on Friday to do some tire testing. That will be cool.

Where are you staying in Cali?
I’ve been staying at Sean Hamblin’s house. He’s doing good. He actually walked in to Pro Circuit the other day and asked for a ride. He’s supposed to hear back soon, so we’ll see. Villopoto is probably going to ride East. He punctured a lung, re-broke his collarbone that was already plated, he messed himself up pretty good. He’s just back riding now, but he had a screw in his scaphoid and it never healed, so he got a new screw put in that and a bone graft. So it looks like he’ll be riding East. So Hamblin figured he might as well ask, even Mitch said to him, “Any rider we pick will probably be a long shot anyway.” So they have a few spots open there.

Are you glad you are racing West coast?
When I did East that one year, it sucked. Even if you can fly to all of them, which I did, I flew home since I was in school. It’s a lot of traveling. One weekend you are in St. Louis and it’s minus forty and the next you are in Florida and it’s thirty. It’s just weird. The West is so easy. Staying where I am I can drive to most of them. It’s so much nicer to have a home base where you can be home the night after the race. You don’t burn yourself out traveling. This is definitely a better series to do from my standpoint. I like hard-pack supercross tracks too, better than the rutted stuff.

Things really started to come together for you at the end of last SX season. What are your goals for this season?
I hope to continue that streak. With last year, everything was so unorganized at the beginning, and then switching bikes, by the time I got off the Yamaha’s it was mid-season already and I wasn’t in the best spot. I hadn’t been riding that much and my confidence wasn’t up there. By the time I got on the Hondas, back on familiar territory, I knew how good the bikes were, I was just way more in my comfort zone. I finally had some positive people around me, like Ryan Clark, he’s all about moving forward. Everything kind of clicked and I could finally get some good practice in. I think this year, being as prepared as we are going to be, we already have bikes, our testing is done, it’s just a better setup and I think going in we are going to be that much more prepared. I think I can start up where I left off last season.

Canada seems a long way away right now, but what are you hoping to do next summer?
I will probably ride the 450. If I am going to go all the way across, I will probably ride the big bike class. It sounds stupid but they pay more money; there’s no point in riding the 250F and getting half the money each weekend. I’m not sure what I am going to ride or who I am going to ride for. We’ve been poking around, so we’ll see what works out. This race bike, I’ll be taking home at the end of the season, so maybe I’ll try to do something with Suzuki up there.

Well, have a great Christmas and good luck at Anaheim.
Thank you very much.