By Eric Johnson
After competing in the 2002 125cc World Championship Series, in 2003 Mannum, South Australia’s Brett Metcalfe jetted over to the United States of America to compete for the Red Bull KTM team. And he’s been here ever since. Having also raced for the Boost Mobile Yamaha and Monster Energy/Pro Circuit/Kawasaki teams during the past six years, Metcalfe has been a consistent podium-placing rider, but at the same time, ill-timed injuries and bad luck have seemingly derailed him just as if it seemed he was about to make a run at an AMA Number One Plate. In 2008, Metcalfe, for the most part, was able to remain injury-free and was rewarded with third place in the brilliantly competitive AMA 250F National Championship. His best year in America, Metcalfe looked set to begin preparing for 2009 when a major rumor started to leak out of the Inland Empire: Metcalfe would switch from the all-mighty, all-conquering Monster/Pro Circuit outfit to the heavily armed, championship-winning GEICO Powersports Honda team. As the rumors seemed to become more and more prevalent, concurrently, sightings of the Australian pounding out laps on numerous Southern California racetracks became more frequent. A poorly kept secret, today, Racer X was able to sit down with Metcalfe and get to the bottom of it all. The following is what he had to say.
Brett, you sound a hell of lot better than when I spoke with you on Saturday…
(Laughter) Yeah, I’m getting a little bit better. I’m starting to liven up.