Troy Dog
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Blake Wharton has always been a go-to interview for me. He’s got a great personality, he’s always been well spoken, and these days he’s got nothing to lose and tells it like it is. He’s got plenty of great stories about his years as an amateur coming up in the ranks for Suzuki and KTM, while also plenty to say about his professional days with GEICO Honda and Rockstar Suzuki. The guy could win on any given night in his prime and he was a rare breed when it came to talent. He battled and beat the top 450 riders today many times.
Well, a couple of weeks back I had a really cool conversation with Wharton about some crucial years in his amateur career. From 2006-2008, Wharton rode for three different programs and three different brands. In 2006 he finished up with Suzuki and made the move over to KTM, which hadn’t supported an actual amateur team at the nationals. They had helped out Zach Osborne in the past, but Wharton said that first year with Jacob Hayes, Tommy Weeck, Derek Rogers, and his brother Tyler Wharton was an entirely new, revamped program.
That 2007 year was very detrimental to Wharton’s career as he went out and proceeded to win just about everything he could. Yet, why switch to an unproven brand of KTM for that season when he just won 4-6 motos at Loretta Lynn’s Ranch and a championship in 85c (14-15) Mod on the powerhouse Suzuki Am team?
“Suzuki at that time was already the premier racing team, you had some people on Yamaha and that was prestigious and Honda, but the most highly coveted was Suzuki,” Wharton said. “Some people thought that the KTM move was a bit strange. We always liked KTM and Sel Narayana opened up the keys to the kingdom. He was great. The vibe was really good. We were allowed to do our own thing, which is what we were used to doing. Cole (Gress, Suzuki Team Manager) was great, he held nothing back, he just couldn’t match that offer. I think part of the reason that we had so much success that year was because KTM was really just all in. I wish I had another chance to ride for the Austrian group because it was really my favorite bike. I really liked the Suzuki bike as well, as far as the Japanese bike goes. We’re just very fond of the KTM group of people.”
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That 2007 season went great and at the World Mini Grand Prix that season, he raced everything from a 105cc to a 450. Winning more than a handful of titles.
“The funny thing was that I wasn’t even planning on racing the 450 class. I had never even ridden a 450, but my dad said sure, why not? It was on a hunch and a whim and whatever it was it served us well. That sort of thing can go bad pretty easily. I think my riding style always suited a 450 better anyway. That was why I was able to win seven instead of four or five championships because we added that and we were still on the Supermini at the time. That was my last Supermini race.”
Going into 2008, Wharton signed with Factory Connection Honda, which would later become GEICO Honda, he would race his final amateur year on the team before moving up to the pro team after Loretta’s. Wharton said that he had an offer from KTM as well. Looking back on the decision, Wharton had some hindsight to add.
“KTM’s program in a lot of ways was actually better, at least amateur racing wise,” Wharton said. “I know Trey (Canard) did exceptionally well on Honda’s, but he was a Honda guy through and through. You can see it. You’re either a Honda guy or you’re not in this sport and that’s it. I know Honda is good and I really liked the people there. The infrastructure of the team was awesome and I have a lot of friends I was able to make from back then. I talk to Ziggy every now and again, but you really couldn’t beat the KTM program. It was far superior in a lot of ways. I liked the KTM more, it seemed to agree with me for whatever reason. It was like a factory ride as an amateur and that was awesome. The GEICO Honda program was further along on the pro side, which was KTM’s achilles’ heel at the time. They just didn’t have a factory team at the time, they had MDK. It just seemed like their pro team wasn’t as organized as their amateur team was. When you go pro it’s not just about the bike, or the money, it’s about the environment.”
So, there you have it, a little more insight into Wharton’s final years as an amateur and what went into his decisions. He also went on to tell me that he was going to fill-in for Canard in the 2011 outdoor season for Factory Honda. He had talked to former Team Manager Erik Kehoe about it, but it never happened because at the time his shoulders needed surgery and it never came to fruition. He never had a chance to show what he could do on a 450, which was a bike that he really meshed well with.
