"Most People on Social Media Haven't Hung Out with Me" | Haiden Deegan on Negative Comments 4

 Through the years there have been many amateur motocross kids with hype of being the next superstar following them. Ricky Carmichael, James Stewart, and Adam Cianciarulo are just a couple of examples. Few, if any have had the level of criticism as well as praise from fans that Haiden ‘Dangerboy’ Deegan has had. In the day of social media, it’s much easier to not only stay connected to what your favorite riders are doing but also voice an opinion or ‘troll’ someone you are not a fan of. I personally don’t wish that kind of criticism on anyone, let alone a 16-year-old kid. Regardless, Haiden is proving he’s currently one of the best amateurs in the world with his results and anyone who has a chance to chat with him will see he’s a well-mannered kid that just wants to race his dirt bike. Haiden called us up to have a check-in post Mini O’s as he’s about to start Supercross Futures preparations.

For the full interview, check out the YouTube video right here. If you're interested in the condensed written version, scroll down just a bit further.

Jamie Guida – Vital MX: What's going on, Haiden?

Haiden Deegan: Oh, nothing much. Just got done at Mini O's. And, yeah, I decided to hop on with you guys.

Vital MX: You absolutely crushed it at Mini O's? You pretty much won every class except for the 250 A Supercross.

Haiden: Yeah, we had a bad start and I tried very hard to pass with the short amount of laps you have.

Vital MX: You are one of, if not the elite amateur rider in the country right now. What do you learn when you go to a race and dominate like that? Are you really taking anything away it that transfers to the pros?

Haiden: After racing the two nationals, the first one didn't go the way we wanted it to. And the second one, I was actually happy with the way it went. In the first moto I was riding really good and lost my rear brakes, so I couldn't do much about that. But then the second moto at Fox I finished 10th and came from like 15th or 16th and didn’t fade at all really. I was happy with that. But going back to Mini O's, the team wanted me to do that just because we have no pro racing to do right now, and Futures hasn't started. So, we're going to keep you racing, we're going to let you do Mini O's. And I was like, that's fine. You know, we're racing pro classes. I just got out of the ‘B’ class after Loretta's, so it hasn't been that long. And I went there and did very well. I’ve been putting in a lot of work with training and I like to win a lot, so I focus on it. When you go to Mini O's and you dominate like that or you win, it gives you a reminder of how much you like it and how much more you need to work to go do it in the pros.

Vital MX: That's a good point because obviously the two nationals were a little bit of a struggle, maybe even eye opening. To go back and get some wins, that always feels good. When racing Mini O’s, are you testing as well? Are you trying different things to use for ’23?

Haiden: Mini O’s is a really difficult track to get the bike set up on the outdoor track. It becomes very choppy and rough and it's like no other track I've really ever ridden. We kind of found a pretty good setup during the week, but we really can't find anything bike wise that would help with outdoors for 2023. It’s more just since they're 20-minute motos learning to sprint the whole time because that's only pretty much halfway at a pro national.

Vital MX: And you could go out and practice all week doing sprints, but race conditions and the track conditions are much different at a race like that.

Haiden: Yeah, definitely. And Mini O’s has been the gnarliest track I've ever ridden. I can't say any other track has been rougher than that one at the end of the day. With the racing between outdoors or supercross, it just helps doing starts when you're in race mentality getting your starts dialed as well.

Vital MX: How is it to work with (Brent) Duffe?

Haiden: Yeah, Duffe’s really good. After Cristian (Craig) parted ways with the team, Duffe said he wanted to stay with the team. So, we're like, “We can't miss this opportunity”. Duffe's been with a champion, and he's been with Justin Brayton for a long time, which is also very good. So, we're like, “He is a top tier mechanic, and I'm going to need a top tier mechanic if I want to go win championships”. So, we decided to take Duffe on and so far, it's been going awesome.

Vital MX: How important do you feel that relationship with a mechanic is? He has to know when to pick you up, when to be quiet, what you're looking for, I think it's a pretty important relationship. But I've never been in your shoes.

Haiden: Yeah, definitely. Having a mechanic is honestly 50% of your mentality before you start the race. If your mechanic is getting you fired up, saying, “you're going to win this” or, getting in your head, letting you know you're going to go dominate this it's a lot better than if your mechanic just packed the gate and steps back. There's a whole difference. Your mechanic can really change the way you ride, whether you're aggressive or not.

Vital MX: What are a couple of things that you picked up on from the Nationals that you needed to implement for the rest of your amateur career and going into your pro career? Were there a couple lessons that you learned?

Haiden: I learned a lot of lessons during those two pro nationals. That was my only goal with those two pro nationals, to see how it was, see the pace, and see how intense it is. So I would be ready for the next year of outdoors. And you still learn a little bit with amateur racing, like the way you have to sprint and stuff. But the pro national is what taught me the most out of anything in my career, racing those two nationals. And after the Nationals I really just took time and studied how my starts were. I studied how Jett Lawrence, Justin Cooper and those guys start. Because Joe Shimoda can come through the pack well but being up front on the start is a big role in the whole race. If you start up front, you have way better chances of finishing up front.

Vital: Yeah, I feel maybe ten years ago there were guys that could come from the back regularly. But as the talent level grows and it gets more spread out in the last few years, it is very difficult if you don't get good starts. And we've seen that with Dylan Ferrandis. He's had bad starts in Supercross and you just can't come through the pack easily.

Haiden: Yeah definitely. I feel like back when Ricky was racing people were definitely, you know, training and stuff. But I feel if you did a little more than the other guy it would really stand out. Now though, everyone is at their peak training and trying the hardest they can or doing the most they can off the bike and on the bike. You just have to find little things that you can beat people with.

Vital MX: You just mentioned training and how people train now, and you also mentioned going back and winning some races reminds you why you love this. Do you like the training side, the grind? There are guys like Alex Martin that love that side. I can't imagine looking forward to training off the bike.

Haiden: Training cannot be fun or it can be fun. I was talking to Jeff Lawrence at Mini O’s, and he said if you're training and you're riding and you're having fun, it's going to be ten times better and it goes quicker. It's a lot more fun, too. Because if you start not having fun when you're doing it, that's when I feel like your career may start going downhill. So, when I'm riding and I'm off the bike training, I'm still doing everything I can, but I definitely try to make it fun as well.

Vital MX: Do you have a plan locked in for 23? I've heard Supercross Futures. I don't know if you can even confirm or not.

Haiden: At the moment we're in the middle of the plan. That's another thing. We went to Mini O’s to get my supercross points. People would be like, “Why are you racing? You're sandbagging”. And I'm like, “Well, I kind of have to to get my points. I mean, if you guys want me to go pro, I have to get my points. So, we went and got our points there. Right now, we're going to train up until Supercross starts and we’re 100% guaranteed to do Futures. But if I'm feeling really good and my speed's there, then definitely they'll start talking about other things. But I've got to get there first. We start Supercross training in a couple of days because we just got done at Mini O's. We'll just see where it takes us. But my goal, if I do end up racing Supercross is treat it just like it's your first year. You just want it to be a learning year. And I feel my followers and other people expect you to do stuff that may not be possible sometimes. I feel like you might have to block that out a little bit and just learn and then attack the next year.

Vital MX: If I'm understanding right, you're going to do Futures, but there's a possibility that you could do some actual pro Supercross?

Haiden: Yeah, I mean, hopefully if we're going fast enough but yeah, futures right now.

Vital MX: If you were the one making the decision would you want to go straight into Supercross or are you pretty cool with Futures to begin with?

Haiden: Futures is good, but I feel like the only way for me to go get wins quicker in Supercross or to win championships quicker is to just get in it and start learning. You have to be smart as well because you can get injuries. So, if I do get in quick, you know, it's just being smart and learning and not having the fans or people that are haters getting in your head and telling you, “you have to go quicker” or something. Or, “you have to do better”. You just have to focus on yourself and learn.

Vital MX: We’ve talked a little bit about the fans, and you already are a guy that the fans either love you or they hate you. As a kid, that can't be fun. Or even as an adult. It's not fun to deal with hate and having to block that out. It's probably not easy, and there are some unrealistic expectations. How do you deal with that? Do you just block it out, or do you let it bother you a little bit?

Haiden: I'd say some of the people and the hate comments or videos they make about me, it does motivate me to do a lot better. But again, I'm only a 16-year-old kid and I just literally trained my heart off and I work as hard as I can to get to a position where I can win championships. So as of now, I just try and block that stuff out and keep working as hard as I can until I can get to a point where I can really shut the people up.

Vital MX: There you go. I actually had this conversation with somebody the other day. I said, “I've talked to Haiden two or three times over the years at these races. When I talk to you, you're very polite. You don't seem to have any ego. I think people have a misconception. The way your dad has handled your career has been very smart, very business oriented. He knows what he's doing, but some people feel like, “Oh, there's too much hype” or whatever. I don't think that's fair to take that out on you because you're just going to ride your dirt bike and your dad is doing what he feels is best for the business plan and it seems to be working. So, yeah, you just have to keep your head down and keep doing what you're doing.

Haiden: People always have their opinions too, which is all right. Most people on social media haven’t hung out with me in real life. It's all right for them to have their opinions. And I just have to keep focusing on myself.

Vital MX: Do you feel your personality is laid back or are you more of a fired-up kid all the time?

Haiden: I have a switch. Sometimes I'm both ways. I like to be fired up and have a lot of energy and do a lot of stuff. The only time I really ever am just chilled out and calm or quiet is after a long day of training maybe. But on days off, I'm always wanting to do stuff and I always have a ton of energy.

Vital MX: Since we were talking about the hate a little bit, the championship celebration at Mini O's got a little social media negativity. Just take us through it, man. It's a busy week. You won multiple championships. I get it. But what do you think about the championship celebration at an amateur race?

Haiden: My whole perspective on it is we go there to have fun. And after that race the motor builder was fine with it because that was the end of that engine. So, he said we could do it and we just wanted to have fun. I won those races and after I was like, “Shoot, why not? Let's just do a massive burnout over at the semi”. So, we did it. We did it for about a minute or so. Yeah, but that stuff is really just exciting and the whole time I was doing that, I was just thinking about doing this if I were to win a Supercross championship. It kind of made me want it even more.

Vital MX: Growing up in moto and always in the spotlight there’s lots of expectations out of you because of the name, because of the hype. Do you ever feel like, “Man, I wish there wasn't so much spotlight. I want to do something else and just be left alone”. Do you ever think, “Hmm, maybe I should have went a different route”?

Haiden: There's been times, I'd say when I was a little younger that I kind of would think that. But now that I'm at a point where mentally I want to push myself to be really good, all the followers and stuff is just another step to help me in my career. To help with fans, even help the sport if I do it all right.

Vital MX: I'm sure you've heard this. Your dad has probably said it, if you're getting hate, you're doing something right. People send the hate because of sometimes jealousy, insecurity or whatever. You're doing something right.

Haiden: Yeah. Because if people are able to give their opinion, they have to be watching what you're doing.