APRIL 1—MALCOLM McCASSY INTERVIEW

Who is Malcolm McCassy, might you ask? “Only one of the raddest dudes alive,” to quote the ever-popular movie ?Old School.’ Malcolm’s journey to the communications person at Alpinestars is perhaps one of the most interesting stories of the motocross industry. From freestyle rider to blue-haired toys to No Fear and finally Alpinestars, McCassy has been in the right place at the right time on several different occasions. After all, who can say they had a toy doll made after them? We sat down with ?M&M’ (not the rapper) in Alpinestars ultra-cool building to talk about the life and times of Malcolm McCassey. Here’s what he said.

What is your role at Alpinestars?

My job is the Front Line, which means I’m the communications of the company. Whether it’s releasing the new Tech 10 boots, talking with amateur kids and doing new projects, such as the Michael Jordan road bike team deal, I work on that. Since we’ve launched casual clothing apparel it’s like a whole new market, so I deal with crossover athletes. I guess I’m involved in the surf, skate, and snow industry as well as the motorsports industry. Tara Dakides is one of our athletes who is sponsored by Billabong, but she also races shifter karts and car racing. That’s her passion. Sunny Garcia would give up surfing any day of the week to be a professional motocross rider. Don’t think that’s going to happen, but my job is to help support him in one of his passions, which is motocross.

How much do you work with Gabriele Mazzarola, the owner of Alpinestars?

I work with Gabriele quite a bit. It’s a private company and he’s the owner. He has a passion and I work with him equally because he’s at all the events. All the sports Alpinestars is involved in are the sports that he’s passionate about. He brought me in to the company and I knew him for seven years beforehand through No Fear and carrying Alpinestars stickers with me. He actually took me to Italy with Travis Pastrana when we put Pastrana in the Rally car. Almost three years ago I made the full switch to Alpinestars.

How do you find people like Tara Dakides and Sunny Garcia to work with them? Do you just walk up to them, introduce yourself, and ask to work with them?

A while ago I had to be a loop, but now the world is getting so small. I’ve been to the X Games and Gravity Games since the beginning, and I’ll be in the athlete lounge and it’s one small group of people. I kind of find out who rides motocross and then they find out about what I do, and sometimes they’ll approach me. Now in this day and age with agents, we work with someone who represents Travis Pastrana or Jeremy McGrath, and that same agent might also represent someone else outside the motocross industry. That gets the word spread. I have musicians like Lil Jon and Ludacris who are going riding quads for some TV show. We’re a product driven company, so because of that people have gained a lot of respect from the Tech 8 boot and that drives them to us. I can’t even take full credit because sometimes they’ll call the front desk and they’ll transfer them to me. They want Alpinestars products and the front desk receptionist will transfer the call to me and that’s where I talk it up [laughter].

You’ve met Michael Jordan, so do you have a cool MJ story?

Yeah, I guess the one thing in life that you write off is like meeting the President of the U.S., and I guess Michael Jordan would fall under that category. I got a call from a guy named Dragon, and in this industry a lot of people want free clothes. It would be easy for a guy named Dragon to name drop Michael Jordan’s name in order to get free products. I had to go through trial and error because I didn’t want to pass it off because it could actually be for Jordan, but at the same time they sent me a proposal that wasn’t all that professional. When I thought Michael Jordan I expected something that was color print and real precise. Why would I receive some generic proposal?

Eventually, though, things worked out.

Yeah, we went back and forth and the guy was really nice, and then I met this other guy who was friends with Jordan and told me about how he wanted to start a street bike team. They put on this guy Michael Jordan who had a deep strong voice, but I was thinking it could have been an imposter. Dragon told me to fly and meet them, so I flew on a red-eye flight to Chicago and walked into the highest building and told them my name. They called me upstairs and Michael Jordan and the two other guys were right there. We laughed, had fun, and just ran down the streets of Chicago and I was in Michael’s championship jacket, which was like a trench coat on me. It’s just a funny story because that’s how a lot of things happen. They called us because they were into Alpinestars product. I just happened to be the guy that got the call.

Before you worked at Alpinestars you did freestyle, you had a toy made, and you worked at several other companies. Really though, we want to know about that toy.

[Laughter] In my head I didn’t know any of this stuff was even possible. I didn’t know you could go around the world and hang out with athletes for companies like No Fear, Spy, and Reef Brazil. I ended up working for all three of them and I was still riding dirt bikes because every kid’s dream is to be a professional motocross rider, which sadly only like one in a million kids seem to really make it. I was riding, racing, and working for the three companies and I worked in the warehouse. Then I got a job as the Team Manager for Spy and then I was a sales manager for Zing graphics when they started.

But then you got into freestyle.

I was still racing and I hung out with Mitchell Bailey over at Zing and we rode at Michael LaPaglia’s track. There were two tabletops and I was an idiot so I jumped them and was doing heel clickers and no-footed can-cans. Around that time the freestyle jump video thing was just starting up, so I went to Hawaii and Clifford Adoptante and Trevor Vines and I were the first people to hit this big jump over there. I was working with Reef Brazil and they took a picture of me and said it was an amazing photo, so they ran it in a bunch of different ads. I was also doing Mini Warriors and I thought I was going to ride in it, but right before they started filming I crashed really badly but I went on the road with them anyway.

Let’s hear about that toy!

Everything started happening in a row and suddenly Road Champs decided that they were going to step up and do toys with 50 athletes. Did I qualify with all of those athletes? No. Was I in the right place at the right time? Yes, definitely. Do I claim to be the best rider? No. I wouldn’t have gotten that toy if Travis Pastrana hadn’t broken my back at Perris Raceway. I was in bed and I was supposed to leave for Japan for a supercross race, but I couldn’t, so I was able to talk to the toy company. They had seen the videos and I ended up getting a toy, so I put blue hair on it because at the time I was always dying my hair different colors. It ended up being a great marketing ploy and it was one of the top sellers not because the kids knew who I was, but because of the blue hair. The toy thing was like a thank the Lord because I never made it and my hero’s are McGrath, Pastrana, Deegan, and those type of guys. It was a dream come true to have a toy with those guys.

How did Travis Pastrana break your back?

We were out at Perris and I just signed him and he was the big wonder kid. It was McGrath, Sunny Garcia, and all the boys just out riding and having fun. I wasn’t in nearly as good of shape as Travis and on lap 15 we were going off a high-speed double that they used to have on the back hill. It wasn’t a tough jump, it was just high speed. Travis thought it’d be pretty cool if we bounced off eachother in the air and then split apart and landed. I didn’t know that he was planning it so it was just in his head. We went off the jump and hit and I kind of freaked out because I didn’t know what was going on. I bounced to the left and landed on a hay bale. I think that was when I broke L1, 2 and 3 in my back. I know, only because Travis measured it, that I did two full front flips and traveled 60 feet and landed on the next mound and was foaming from the mouth. I went to the hospital and Travis stayed with me when I was in bad shape. That’s the whole story. I was in bed for a month and a half. It was unfortunate but I didn’t hurt any tendons or anything that would cause paralysis.

Switching back to Alpinestars, how has the Tech 10 been received in terms of sales numbers?

The Tech 8 has been a benchmark and it’s set the standard of a motocross boot. We’re constantly evolving and while other people were cutting apart our Tech 8 and trying to reproduce it we were working on the Tech 10 and taking it to the next level. The sport is getting crazier and the Tech 10 was a natural evolution for us. The first time I remember testing the boot was when I went out to Castillo Ranch with Jeremy McGrath. He’s been a huge part of a lot of our development, and we started working with him on it three years ago as far as testing goes. Around the same time Pastrana broke his ankle in supercross so we had to custom build his ankle brace. Travis ended up winning the 125 supercross title that year.

ÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿ We understand that a lot of people are really sensitive to change. There are a few guys who are in Tech 8’s, but the safety function of the Tech 10 is amazing. We took 6mm off the bottom and created one sole. We also transferred the weight up towards the top of the boot. A lot of people said that the price of the Tech 10 is too much, but it’s like helmets. Most people want to have the top safety so they don’t get hurt. That’s our philosophy. We don’t make anything cheap and the same products that our sponsored riders wear are the same products that the consumer can buy. We can’t even make the boots fast enough! When Chad Reed got hit by Sean Hamblin at Millville last year, he told us that if it weren’t for the Tech 10 his ankles would have been toast. The boot is doing great and I wish we could have more of them. It’s another step for Alpinestars continuing to set that benchmark.

Where is Alpinestars headed in the future?

Alpinestars is a product driven company. We have the top three guys in F1, which is the second largest sport in the world as far as viewing and attendance goes. We have Nicky Haden in our suits. We send out Jeremy McGrath in our boots with digital sensors in them to monitor how they work going through the whoops, the abrasions, the impacts, and where the boot was heating up. We’re going to continue that evolution. We’re also going to continue to develop our casual apparel line. People want to represent and have that feeling of being a part of the motorsports world. One thing that’s coming out too is the Tech 6S for kids, which is going to redefine youth motocross boots. The Tech 4S is the top-of-the-line boot for kids right now, but the Tech 6S is the next step.

If you had to pick one amateur rider to work with, who is your favorite rider?

It’s a hard question because all the riders are so competitive. I could say that Travis was my favorite and before that it was McGrath. Travis was 11 or 12 when I started working with him. Nico Izzi and Austin Stroupe are highly competitive and they have a lot of issues, but they’re both great kids. One kid right now that I want to pick, because he’s so good, is Adam Cianciarulo. He’s got a great family, great personality, and he jumps 80-foot triples Kevin Windham-style. It’s fun to work with him and I’ll get to see him evolve even when I’m as old as goat cheese [laughter].

ÿHow about a favorite person outside the motocross industry?

Outside the industry I’m good friends with Tara Dakides, Sunny Garcia, Ryan Sheckler, and they’re all fun and into the sport. If you give them a boot then they freak out! We gave

Danny Way

a custom-driving suit and he loved it. Steve Caballero is also great. I’d probably be shooting myself in the foot if I only picked one person, because they’re all my friends. Thank the Lord for cell phones because I’m in constant communications with these guys. I hope that I don’t get a brain tumor! The most fun part is that they all love hanging out and riding. Everybody all kind of comes together.

ÿ