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Bro you have a bs in engineering, hop off your high horse
Forget to mention the stress concentrations that your holes in the frame introduced?
Edit: I am a ME to be clear
The Shop
I live this place. Great laughs over my morning coffee.
Unlike Racer X or any of the Hi-Torque publications being owned by smaller businesses, TransWorld started out under corporate ownership. Those corporations bought and sold titles, splintered under joint ventures, and became absorbed by even bigger companies. Donn was the Editor-in-Chief. He didn't run the business or own the rights to the magazine. If he did, they wouldn't have been locked out of the social media accounts and forced to use the name SML. Anyone involved can and has verified that TWMX was financially successful right up until the end. TEN split up and the MotorTrend side of the business joined up with Discovery, and the owners of the action sports side of TEN began shopping around for a buyer. When AMI acquired the business, they saw motocross as dangerous and risky and didn't want the liability. Instead, they tried to funnel the established audiences from TWMX and the other shuttered titles into the titles they owned that were lacking in 18-35 year old males. That's why any of you subscribed suddenly got Men's Health in your mailbox.
I'm not sure why formal education matters. I've got a communications degree and feel like the coursework was a complete joke. I learned more in the first month at TransWorld from a group of "uneducated" guys than I did in college.
Who cares how fast he is on a bike? The guy gets to ride more than most of us. When I met Donn I couldn't even ride a dirt bike and I was never shamed for that. I barely even caught shit for having a quad background.
I'll concede that he can and has been a dick to people and I think it's perfectly fair to be critical of some of the things he's said and done on social media. At the same time, though, he's also done a lot to help grow the sport and has helped many people in the industry and if he was truly as bad as you say, he wouldn't have the industry support that he does.
I was never all that close with Donn when I worked for him and we've barely spoken to each other since being laid off from TWMX. There are legitimate reasons to be critical and I'm not here to convince anyone to be the biggest fan of all things Donn and SML. But, between this and the whole "Anton 'banned' from Pulp" situation, there's been a ton of misinformation about the people involved and the reality of these situations.
And for the record, I experienced the entire YZ450F debacle firsthand, including some of the conversations between Adrian and Donn. Donn's version of the story was completely accurate, and he didn't even cover how that incident negatively impacted the magazine and Yamaha...
/sarcasm
Out of the gate, I am an Engineer, by education, and vocation. I worked directly as an Engineer in industry (engineered rotating machinery) for 6 years, before moving into technical sales in the same technical world, which I have now done for 12 years. I still work with Engineer's every day. They are who I sell to at a high level. So I have to understand people, personalities, and specifically the personality traits of Engineers. I would estimate that 65%+ of people who work as Engineers are actually INTP or "Engineer" personality types. So you really can stereotype most Engineers. Once you understand the personality type, Engineer's are the easiest sell there is....
To do this, it is helpful to have the Engineering personality type yourself (INTP - https://irritatedntp.tumblr.com/post/92357629826/intp-the-engineer) and learn to recognize the shortcomings of it through self awareness/maturity. Engineering personality types are "idea" people most of all, and they tend to get caught up in their own technical creativity and the endless search for better solutions. The biggest potential character flaw in INTPs is that they equate their self worth, their identity, get their ego tied up in "having the right answer". This can be an incredibly damaging flaw, especially in organizations with other personality types.
Adrian embodies many of the worst aspects of the Engineering/INTP personality. It is so transparent. He just can not acknowledge being wrong, because his whole identity and self worth is tied up in "being right". His dismissal of others who are "not educated" is nauseating, and representative of him viewing his ideas as superior. A solution is a solution. If an Engineer determined a solution through a rigorous understanding of physical and mathematical principles, then power to him. But if a talented mechanic, through experience, feel, and the simple work of trial and error comes up with the same answer, is it any less valid or valuable because of the path he took? NO! A solution is a solution.
But Engineers (the personality type) can be easy to deal with once you realize that their inability to admit being wrong is simply a fundamental personality trait. They literally can not help it. It is how they are wired. Admitting they are wrong is like the end of the universe to them. This is where, for someone in Don's position, having"people knowledge", can save a lot of grief and conflict once the understand that Adrian is not trying to be a flaming asshole. He just stumbled upon a core personality conflict for that person. Again it is a fundamental personality trait that relates to a need to have the solution and "be right".
The sad thing is, when Engineers are wrong, everyone else involved usually knows it. But INTP personality types have such poor perception of other people that they do not know that everyone knows this. And some just keep on digging the hole deeper and making themselves look more pathetic by refusing to own being wrong. Owning it when you are wrong is a great ability, both life and career enhancing.
BEING RIGHT IS NOT ALWAYS THAT IMPORTANT!
At the time I was working on a Engineering Degree from a well-known California university. I was frustrated in school as it simply wasn’t applicable to the real world… at least not as applicable as I had hoped. Lots of math I’d never use… lot’s of BS frankly.
I also listened to the guy from Ride Engineering state his rational for what he did. K sub c comes to mind. He will understand what I mean.
A few things. The guy from Ride Engineering is making good product and should be supported by the industry if you are looking for solutons he produces. He seems like a good human. Looking for creative areas to produce products targeted at specific areas to increase performance. This is geat to see! Thank you.
Second, engineering is applied physics. You want to get to the root of the science behind a engineering problems; its’ all based on physics. What an engineering degree is great at is dealing with explaining what was the technical reason for xyz happening AFTER it happened. It’s not good at teaching creativity and predicting the new laws of physics. To do that you have to experiment…..Try stuff..then get the physics people together to justify why what was just “invented” worked after it did!. Few engineers create. The smart ones can as they are willing to toss caution to the wind and say “let’s try this and see what happens”.
In short, don’t look for engineers to “innovate”. Most are so hung up on their degree they can’t toss it aside long enough to image the future and try new stuff knowing they can be wrong… new products or services… without a scape goat/ crutch to hang their hat on.
But that's just me. LOL
Pit Row
It's run its course? Really? Listeners and sponsors both seem to be growing....from the outside looking in of course. Maybe you have some insider knowledge. The Pulp network has done nothing but ADD podcasts the last 3 years, doesn't seem like something that has "run its course" would continue to grow....
Got some proof he's trying to sell it on "podcast sites" ?
Don't about 15k people do the Pulp Fantasy? Seems like a cash cow to me, not something that is about to crash down cause it has "run its course".
Your post seems like classic internet axe grinding.
I did quick search for the podcast, couldn't remember recently which businessman (owns a successful off-road accessories company) he recently interviewed that sponsors a mx/sx team. But Steve was trying to sell his podcast to him and some other wild ass ideas that was funny as hell. Kind of jokingly, but then kind a spoke about other deals that he's been offer by podcast networks. So just like any business should look at exit plans to sell your business at the top of there time to get maximum dollars. He's probably even more interested now because of the competition.
Actually he recently discuss the fantasy site. He's actually upset he didn't get a bigger chunk of it. So he's not a very big piece of what you would call the cash cow.
All that said, still good podcast and give him credit for the length of the shows. Didn't want to grind, just indulge in some opinions of things I heard recently on the show. I've gone from a dedicated listener to maybe once a month.
They BOTH have good and bad days.
I’ve worked/have been around both guys when they’re working and doing their job. I worked with Adrian back when he was working for Yamaha. I know Swap from back when he was parking motorcycles in tractor tires.
Again, BOTH are good dudes.
Both are passionate about what they do for a living.
And...
Both have a bit of an F’up on this one.
Both have mishandled parts of this “story” & there’s PLENTY of culpability to go around.
But! I, for one, “ain’t gonna pick a side” on this one. Why? Because, when I look in the mirror, I see a guy that’s stepped in shit like this, too. A guy that’s had a hard time “letting go” of something...too.
Besides, it’s all behind us now.
Matthes should have a new segment for shit like this. He can call it The Drum Circle.
As for him only getting information from the riders he's close with, firstly the same could be said of Swap who uses A-Ray and the Star riders for 90% of his content. But look at the larger picture with Matthes, he has the Privateer Island podcast where he has different guy every week on there. Where else can you get detailed information on guys like Moranz, Piazza, Schlosser, etc (just thinking of most recent ones)?? Steve gives the little guys a massive platform and some of those guys go on to be regulars on his Pulp show, like A-Ray (he was Pulp long before SML), Clason, Enticknap, and now Moranz. No one else is doing anything close to covering the entire field of riders like Matthes and Pulp. In addition to his Privateer LCQ challenge where he's actually RAISING MONEY for the guys who are on the bubble. You might not "like" Steve or his takes, but you have to respect everything he does. Actually I guess you don't....you can keep giving Gypsy Tales the clicks, I mean I really want to hear Mike Sleeter talk about Cooper Webb's Yamaha in 2021 FFS.
Anyway, I don't think Matthes is looking to get out any time soon, despite his statements of "this is my last year" (which he's been saying since 2013).
Are you telling us which pronoun to use when addressing you?
Remember when Maeda tried to out some "squid" at a local track by posting his photo (because he didn't have numbers or his gear wasn't cool or he somehow or other didn't fit the SoCal cool guy image). Doing that to a random moto guy was dickish enough, then it turned out it was Damon Bradshaw and he had to publicly apologize. As if it would have been okay to use his pulpit to publicly shame some random rider.
It was a picture of Bradshaw on a cereal box with Canard and Short. Donn had no idea who number 45 was and made fun of it. Turns out it ended up being Bradshaw.
Here is the quote he wrote.
Our Take: We absolutely loved the Wheaties box, but the thing that killed it for us was the schmoe on the number 45 bike. We mean, Trey Canard? BAM! Andrew Short? BAM! Schmoe with stick-on numbers and beginner form? Guess two out of three ain’t bad. This one was so close to winning, too.
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