SNOHOMISH — Marcus Janssen is pretty good on a motorcycle, but it wasn’t always that way. The first time he took a ride, well, he flopped.
Literally.
Janssen, who is 14 now, was 3 at the time. He was in his garage, the bike toppled over and he took a hard spill, hurting his hand. Several months passed before the youngster was willing to try again.
These days, though, it’s harder to keep him off the bike than on. Janssen, who lives outside of Snohomish and is a home-schooled ninth grader, has emerged as one of the more promising young riders in the Pacific Northwest.
And this week he will test himself against some of the best in the United States.
Janssen and his family are at Loretta Lynn’s Ranch in Hurricane Mills, Tenn., for the 28th annual AMA Amateur National Motocross Championships. It is the largest amateur motocross race in the world and a terrific chance for Janssen, who rides a Suzuki 450, to put his skills up against other top young riders from around the country.
Intimidated? Not a chance.
“You have to be confident that no one else can beat you,” he said. “I hope to win.”
Riding has become a way of life for Janssen, who once played soccer but gave it up years ago. The Janssens live in a rural area, and father Mark Janssen — a motorcycle enthusiast himself — built a motocross course in the family’s vast backyard. Marcus trains there several days a week, and is often joined by friends who love riding as much as he does.
He started competing when he was 8, and in time he began racing bigger bikes in bigger events. Within three years he was at a national event in Las Vegas.
“Marcus is a phenomenally talented young rider that has all the right tools to do anything he wants to do,” said Greg Crater of Renton, a professional rider who has been training Janssen for two years. “He just has to figure a couple of things out mentally, and as he goes up he also has to keep himself in shape physically. But he can be anything he wants to be.”
Janssen’s foremost strength, Crater went on, “is his technical ability. The way he rides the bike is good. He’s doing things on a bike at 14 that sometimes guys struggle with who’ve been riding much longer than him. It’s very natural to him. He doesn’t have to work hard to make it all work.”
And he also has a seething desire to win. Janssen describes himself as “pretty competitive,” though his mother, Carol Janssen, smiles at the understatement.
“He was born with the fever to compete,” she said. “Even at a young age, if he didn’t get first, you didn’t want to try talking to him. And it’s still that way now. If somebody beats him who he normally beats, that’s really hard for him. He has to be first.”
Losing happens, of course, because even the best riders can’t win every race. And sometimes a good race is marred by an inopportune fall.
Janssen has fallen from his bike several times, both in practice and in competition. His worst injury was a broken arm suffered during a backyard training workout when he was 8.
“If you’re scared, you can’t let it get to you because that makes you go slower and you do even worse,” Janssen said. “So I think about (falling) as little as possible. I just try to ride smart and smooth.”
“You can’t let (the fear of crashing) bother you,” Crater said, “because that’s part of it. You’re going to crash, you’re going to get hurt sometimes, and it’s not a big deal. You have to be willing to do it and put it out your mind and get back on the bike.”
Janssen’s goal is to improve enough in the coming years that he can turn pro when he is 18. “I want to be able to make a living off of it,” said Janssen, who already has several sponsors, including Everett Power Sports.
He rides three times a week, usually at his house, and he often goes away on weekends to compete or just to ride. If friends come by the house, they might ride all afternoon.
“I can have fun riding a dirt bike anywhere,” he said.
“I don’t think they know how to do anything else,” his mother said. “They ride. That’s all they do.”
Well, not exactly. Janssen, you see, does have a few other interests. Like a typical teenager, for example, he sometimes enjoys playing video games.
“But they’re dirt bike video games,” he said.
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