Battling injuries and enduring the life of a privateer, after having enjoyed the royal life as a factory racer for many years, Brit Jonny Walker seemingly came out of nowhere to win this year’s AMA EnduroCross National Championship in dramatic fashion.
Photography by Jack Jaxon, Red Bull Content Pool and Moore
Jonny Walker could have felt down on his luck early in the season after missing out on the entire FIM Hard Enduro World Championship when he elected to have surgery on a bum shoulder and an old ACL injury. The privateer Beta rider from the UK, however, remained steadfast, played his cards right, and came up aces late in the year in Reno to win the GEICO AMA EnduroCross Championship after dealing up 3-2-2 moto scores—just enough to trump Trystan Hart for the number-one plate. Jackpot!
The 31-year-old hadn’t led the championship all season and came into the series finale in Nevada sitting just one point behind Hart. However, the likeable Brit rode a steady race and capitalized on a nod from Lady Luck when Hart went down in moto one, eclipsing the factory-backed KTM rider by three points in the final standings to walk away with his first U.S. title. Needless to say, it was a tense and exciting night.
“I knew tonight was like a game of chess between me and Trystan. I knew that going in,” said Walker. “So, I just thought I’ll stick with the ‘not trying to push and make a mistake and maybe lose time’ strategy, and it paid off.”
Walker ended the EnduroCross season well, but his first round was somewhat of a disaster, although he got stronger as the season wore on.
“I had only ridden the bike two weeks before,” said Walker who was coming back after a couple of injuries. “I had six months off the bike. The first time I rode an endurocross track was when I came out here on the Monday before the first race. Then we went to the track. I just rode around, so I could feel good on the bike. That was the first race. It always takes a bit to get back into it. I was really pissed off after the first round. I had a few little issues, so then we came out, and I think I won the second round, which was good. Then a bit of a disaster again at the third round. At the fourth round, I feel like I should have won. I was definitely the fastest, but I just had an issue in the last race in the first corner, which kind of screwed it for me.”
Walker finished second to Billy Bolt in the 2022 FIM SuperEnduro World Championship during this past winter but injured his shoulder during the final round, which put a question mark on his plans for the rest of the year.
“I tore my shoulder in that last round so I decided to get it fixed,” said Walker. “That meant I missed the Hard Enduro Championship, which started in April. I also had a torn ACL, which I’ve had for like four years. So, I was, like, ‘I’ll get them both done.’
When he got his shoulder fixed, Walker decided to wait six weeks so he could use his crutches before getting his knee operated on, so it turned into a bit of a long period. “Obviously, it was quite hard to rehab two things at once,” said Walker. “One is the top half of the body, and one is the bottom half. One was on the left and one was on the right. So, it was difficult.”
Running his own team, Walker must be resourceful, so he called on his sponsor Red Bull for help with his rehab.
“I spent 10 weeks at Red Bull in Austria,” said Walker. “They have a full rehabilitation center there. It’s an amazing center. The plan was to go for two weeks, but I was there for one day, and I was like, ‘let’s just extend this as long as possible.’ So, I stayed 10 weeks. They have trainers, physio, nutritionists—they have everything. I’d go in at nine every day, and I’d leave at 4:30. So, I’d have two or three physio sessions. I’d also have ice baths. You’d have everything there. If I would have done it on my own at home, I feel like my recovery would have taken a lot longer.”
Walker might not have even considered riding the AMA EnduroCross series had it not been for the injuries. He didn’t ride the final few rounds of the Hard Enduro World Championship since he didn’t feel ready, and he had no shot at the title. And since the AMA EnduroCross schedule coincided perfectly with the end of his rehab, Walker decided to hop the pond and give it a go.
“I was sick of being at home not racing,” said Walker. “I was desperate to get back on the track. I feel like I could maybe have ridden the last hard enduro, but then it made no sense because I hadn’t done anything for a long period of time. That’s what I’m struggling with at the moment. I can only ride two to three days a week, maximum, just because my body has taken so long to recover. So, I decided I would come over here and race a full championship. It’s better. I want to learn it because I want to come back and race again in the future.”
With EnduroCross utilizing shorter races, it made perfect sense.
“EnduroCross was perfect for my situation,” said Walker. “I’m actually speaking at the moment to sign my contract for next year, and I’m going to try and keep more shorter races. I don’t think I’m going to race the WESS Championship [FIM Hard Enduro World Championship], just because I do everything on my own. It’s quite difficult to drive to all the races, and they’ve extended the calendar. There are more races. There are three fly-aways now, and it just costs so much to do that. So, I’m going to do the SuperEnduro series and EnduroCross, and then pick some other races in between. Maybe a few of the WESS rounds, and maybe Romaniacs.”
The factory KTM team let the veteran Walker go two and a half years ago during Covid, and since then he’s run his own program.
“There were just no other teams to ride for, so I had no other option,” said Walker who was a long-time KTM family member. “I spoke to the guys at Beta because it’s a good bike. I always thought it was a good bike. So, I just decided to do my own thing. There are no teams out there really to ride for back in Europe, unless you’re a factory rider, and I just decided I’m not finished racing. I want to race until I’m 30, 40 years old.”
According to Walker, in Europe, if you’re not racing the World Enduro Championship then the factories don’t want to help. “They don’t concentrate on extreme races,” said Walker. “I went to them, and I was like, ‘let me just run my own setup and bring my own sponsors in.’ So, I feel like I’ve got a really good deal. To race SuperEnduro and EnduroCross, it’s a really good deal, because I can use my own products and do my own stuff, whereas with the outdoor races, you’re competing with the likes of KTM, who’ve got 20 people. They’ve got people all around the tracks. I’m there on my own with my mechanic normally, which makes it difficult to race against them, but it makes it sweeter.
“I honestly don’t blame people, like Stew Baylor, who do their own thing—it’s nice to be able to use what you want to use. There’s no politics. You race where you want to race. I have so much more fun now doing what I’m doing. Hopefully I can run a team in a few years with more riders.”
Walker was one of just a couple of riders on a two-stroke in the Pro class at EnduroCross, but he admitted it was mostly out of necessity.
“Because I do my own thing, to build a four-stroke engine would be a lot more difficult,” said Walker. “Like with this [two-stroke], I can come to a race, change a jet, that’s it. My bike has been the same, my same engine at every race. I just change jetting. Whereas if you’re on a four-stroke and it’s not good, then you need to do something else with the engine—change the ECU and stuff like that. So, I just wanted to keep it simple. I know that the bike is good enough to win. Obviously, no one else rides a two-stroke because they’re not on carbs. They’re all on TPIs. They’re not competitive indoors. You can’t ride them the same.”
With the EnduroCross title under his belt, Walker is excited to go back home and race the 2022/2023 SuperEnduro series.
“I’m excited to go home now and race SuperEnduro because, coming into a season, I always take a few races to get going, but now I’m going to be coming into a season hot,” said Walker. “It’s a bit different, though. The tracks are a lot faster out here, and in a night, you have 30 minutes between races, whereas back at home we have an hour between each race.”
Always humble and polite, Walker was obviously thrilled with the outcome of the series.
“Winning the title is amazing,” said Walker. “It was a struggle, obviously, since I had two surgeries this year and not too much time on the bike. Back home you watch a lot on the TV of the motocross and supercross, and you always dream of winning an AMA Championship, so to actually get it done and get one, it’s amazing.” CN
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