“I haven’t been to Daytona in a couple of years, because I've been hurt or I've been on the other coast or whatever, so yeah, I'm definitely excited,” said Austin Forkner in a mid-week press conference for Daytona International Speedway. “I still have flashbacks of winning and doing the burnout with the crowd right in front of you, up against the fence, that's like a core memory of mine. I just got done riding, we built kind of Daytona track of our own at the at the Triumph facility, a little bit more outdoorsy than typical supercross. We had some sand and stuff like that. I think I'm ready. I started the season off with the flu and had a bad Tampa and then Detroit went a little bit better, so we're making progress. I'm excited to try to keep that going.”
For years, Austin Forkner’s seasons of great promise and potential have been cut short. There was last year’s win at round one and big crash at round two. The knee injury suffered off the start of Anaheim 1. The year when he was minding his own business, trying to stay safe, and then he still got hit in mid-air by Jett Lawrence when Lawrence smacked a tough block. Out again. Everyone knows the story of Forkner. Fast but it never lasts.
This year’s results, in his first season with Triumph Factory Racing, haven’t been great. Forkner’s 17-7 finishes leave him 12th in points. In his return from yet another long layoff, the riding at the practice track has been good, but his racing hasn’t been perfect.
“Something that I really worked on in the past couple weeks has just been loosening up,” said Forkner. “I'm really speaking about Detroit because I was maybe not 100 percent, but I was more healthy than I was at Tampa, and I just watched videos and I was just riding way too tight. I was just hunched up, not doing the things that I work on technique wise during the week. So, do I think that I can ride better at the races? Absolutely, because during the week, I mean, me and Jordan [Smith] are where we swap off basically every session on the track on who's faster. We push each other and we're back and forth on who's faster daily, or if not every session throughout the day. So, you know, with his results on the west coast, I know that I can be up there.
“I feel like I just need to get through the first couple of races and really kind of settle in. It's been a few years since I've made it more than I think two or three races into the series. Obviously, the tightening up and stuff doesn't help, but you can't think about it. I just need to kind of settle in, settle into my flow and settle into the series. It's been a long time since I have settled into the series. I know that I can ride a dirt bike just on how my practice has been good. I just need to bring that to the races and with my lack of racing over the past couple of years, I had a feeling that might happen a little bit and I might tighten up at the races a little bit, so it's just something that I just put a lot of emphasis on, really riding loose and trying to loosen up and just be free. My trainer Mike Brown, he knows that and and we really worked on that this week, so that that's, that's kind of my goal and the thing that I'm trying to bring into Daytona.”
Of course, Daytona hits different than any other race.
“I feel like the speedway tracks kind of bring a little bit of a vibe kind of in general,” he says. “I don't know if I’m any more nervous for it, just because every time I line up on the gate, I'm always nervous, but probably Daytona is probably the most different supercross race. The dirt, the track set up, the, just the atmosphere, everything about Daytona is probably the most different of the supercross races. Daytona, it's a super prestigious race and, and I've won it before and, and that's still one of my core memories, so I'm trying to do that again.”
There’s an interesting angle for Forkner in that he now races for Triumph, the brand that works closely with Ricky Carmichael. Carmichael is also the designer of the Daytona track. Forkner was also one of the first stars to race the Ricky Carmichael Amateur Supercross at Daytona when the event first arrived.
“I've known Ricky for a while now, like since I was on um Superminis,” says Forkner. “I think I went to like the first amateur race at Daytona [Ricky Carmichael Amateur Supercross at Daytona] and I went to a bunch after that until I went pro. I don't think I raced Daytona my very first year, but it was pretty soon after that. I also trained at The GOAT Farm back when he still owned the property. I trained there with him for a little bit and now he's working with Triumph, so obviously we talk. I would say probably say we talk even more now that he's that he's involved with Triumph. Ricky, he's got, he's got a bunch of knowledge as far as setting the bike up and, the way he's involved with the team, it's good. He's a good person to go to for questions or for advice on just being faster, being fitter, you know, stuff like that. He told me that whenever I need to talk to him, whenever I need to call him, feel free to call him. I'm excited to see the actual track that he came up with. Daytona has had a few interesting setups that he's designed over the past couple of years, so I'm excited to see how it's gonna shape up.”
