Tuesday Toolbox: Cliff Beasley

In the vast world of off road racing there are men and women that lay it all on the line week after week to become the best they can. Some do it quietly and some do it boldly, but not many do it like GNCC Utility ATV Champion Clifton Beasley. Over the last 3 seasons alone, Cliff has amassed 32 class wins against only 3 class losses. He's also undefeated so far this year in U2. Only a few weeks since his biggest win ever, we had a chance to talk to the MotorcycleUSA.Com Snowshoe Morning Race ATV Over All Champion.

GNCCRacing.com: Hey Cliff how's it going today?
Clifton Beasley: Man it's hot and humid. The humidity is like 80%, about 90 degrees it feels about like 100 degrees in the shade. So it's perfect.

So what keeps you busy on days like today when you are not out racing?
I work here on the dairy farm everyday. We have been in business for 60 years and are now up to 250 head of cattle. We're entering into silage season and what I am doing today is putting an engine in my silage chopper. We have about 600 acres here in Middle Tennessee so we raise corn and all that stuff. Farming is not a real high paying job so I am a pretty good real estate agent with E.R.A as my partner. I also own and run a carwash in Chapel Hill and of course I race for Warnert Can-Am in the U2 Class. So I consider myself as having 4 full time jobs.

Sounds like you are a busy man, but you sound like you enjoy every one of your jobs.
Every single one of 'em! I don't have one really high paying job but I have a lot of stuff going on. And I don't like standing in one spot for very long so it works out good for me. You know if I need to go sell a piece of property in the evening and if I need to scoop cow manure in the morning, that's fine with me. I'll take a shower in between and go on. I like doing a lot of different things. But I do wish I could just race for a living. That would be nice.

If you keep riding like you have and you just may end up with that wish!
I would like to, I am just afraid that I am about to run out on my time. But I don't know, Mike Penland has been carrying on the torch for a long time and some of my hero's have been really hanging in there. There's really no set age. It's not like motocross when you get out of your twenties you are about spent. There's a lot of wisdom that goes along with GNCC, you know it's as mental as it is physical.

I looked at your record over the last 3 seasons and you have collected 32 wins in your class and you have also won 15 races in row since your last 2^nd place at Mt. Ridge in 2009. How does that make you feel when you look at all that?
Wow! That's pretty impressive when you say it like that. I don't know, I have never looked back. The only thing that matters is the next one. I didn't know how many I had won, I was just trying to get to eight because I knew that would be the championship and nine would make it even better.

Looking at how close you have come to the perfect season the last couple years, do you think it is a possibility this season?
I don't know. I don't like the word "perfect" really. It's kind of a make believe word in my opinion. Perfect? What is a perfect season? Is it 13 in a row or two seasons back to back? Winning all of them or winning over all in every one of them? So to me there is no perfect season. It would be nice to win 13 events out of 13, that would be cool. But there is so much stuff going on out there you know, all you can do is go out there do your best every time. Everybody else's best might be better than your best some days. I have had days, like the last race I lost, that no matter what I did I was not going to win that race. There were trees moving around the track, rocks popping up out the ground and stuff like that. Just because I want it to work out don't mean it always works out. I try my best at every race whether it's the first race or the thirteenth race. 13 wins in a season would be nice though.

Congratulations on the win at Snowshoe! Not only do you keep the win streak alive, you won the "Big One" and it was your first ever over all in the morning ATV race!
Thanks! I really appreciate that. That's the toughest race of the year for me because I have some kind of, I don't know, "Rock-a Phobia" I guess. I don't do well in rocks and Pennsylvania is my next worse race. To beat the rocks at Snowshoe and come out on top was just great. I felt it a long time before it got here. The biggest thing I had to work on my mind to calm down in the rocks. I usually wipe out an A - arm or the frame or tear something up in the first couple laps. That's what I've always done in the rocks before. To just finally calm down and be able to do it, I think I have really made some improvement on my fear of rocks. It was a happy day.

What was your day like at Snowshoe?
(Sighs) Man it was just confusing! My head was spinning the whole time. You would race real hard and you would come up to a bottleneck and it was just ridiculous because the competition would come up behind and pile up on you. Then all the time you had put on them was gone just like that. There was just nothing you could do. Then at the very end there was a really neat deal. Me and Dave Simmons, Traci Cecco and James Miller, the boy who finished second in my class, were all sitting there together in a bottleneck and we just kind of looked at each other and broke off in a pack and headed straight up a hill and went together and it was wild. It was kind of like an old trail ride in the Smokies. We were all together tearing it up and it was great. Then right there at the end in the last field Dave disappeared, he broke a chain or something, I don't know, I was just there by myself and I went to the finish line. Then there it was. I was blown away! I told my wife that it was that day in racing that you look forward to, the one you just don't want to ever end. I didn't want to leave the track when I left. (Laughs) I wanted to do it over. I wanted to stay there in that moment. That's the one I had been looking for.

Did you celebrate afterwards?
Well yea, my little girls like to swim and stuff, so on the way home we got a room in Gatlinburg and stayed downtown. The girls swam and had a big day and went to (my little 3 year old Lizzy calls it the "Upside Down House"), the Wonder House. We had a family day of doing family stuff, that's how I celebrate.

Before the race, my seven-year-old Korie Ann told me before I went to go race that "in order to win the bottle of champagne I had to hold the gas all the way down, except the turns." That was her strategy. She came up with that all on her own. She has a little bitty pink four-wheeler she rides, she says "It's easy, you just hold the gas all the way down and when you turn, let off of it." That rang in my head the whole race. When I would get to dogging it, I would just think, "Is that gas all the way down?" you know. If not, "Better get in it! Get to turning." That was my strategy right there. She is only 7 years old, but she understands that up on the stage holding the champagne bottle is a pretty big thing.

What did she say to you after the race?
She was really excited and after I sprayed she came up to the stage and I gave her the bottle like you always give the bottle away, and she was so stoked to get it. Afterward, she and my other little girl were telling me they were proud of me. It made that special day even more special. It would not have worked out if they had not been there. If my family hadn't been there to see it all and be part of it all, it would have been great but not fantastic like it was.

That has to be the one memory you will never forget?
That was it! That was the career highlight right there.

Anything else you would like to add?
I just want to thank the Lord for keeping me safe and healthy. And my wife Kelly and my two girls, Kory Ann and Lizzy. They have to put up with a lot to let me go racing every other weekend. Of course, my big one, Warnert Racing, I couldn't do it without them. Big thanks to everybody like Can Am/ITP Tires/Tireballs and Arai Helmets. I want to say a special thanks to my mechanic Nathan Macho. I mean he is as dedicated as I am and that's a huge part of it. He wanted me take that overall at Snowshoe as much as I did and he spent a lot of extra hours on that bike to make sure it was going to run at that altitude. If he had not gone the extra mile, I don't think we would have been up there. I want to say thanks to Jimmy at Fox Shox, he stepped it up and got me two new shocks and that was the finishing touch. You know you can have all the motor and horsepower you want, but without good suspension you can't get it to the ground that power is useless. And a thanks to all the other sponsors and people that make this possible.

Thanks Cliff!
Thank You!