Welcome to Momentum, a motorsports podcast powered by High Gear Success. I'm your host, Heather Wilson-Shields. Here we share the stories and strategies that keep the world of motorsports moving forward. And joining me now is Preston Campbell, a National Hare and Hound competitor, and most recently, a Dakar competitor. So thank you so much for joining me. Yeah, thank you Heather for having me on and super excited to talk. So I have been following your racing career for a few years now, but can you kind of take us back to the early years of your racing, how you got started? Yeah, I just grew up obviously going to the races every weekend with my dad all over. I grew up in the back of a box van going Baja or Nevada or district races. So yeah, it's all I really knew and wanted to do. So I, yeah, I started riding when I was three. My first race was when I was three, but yeah, I didn't... I just rode every once in a while when I was younger. I didn't take it too serious, just once a month or weekend ride. But yeah, as I got older, probably around 13, 14, 15, then I was like, okay, that's what I want to do and start putting more effort in training and racing a lot more. yeah, it got me to where I am here today. I feel like that was a really smart move, obviously, with your dad being Johnny Campbell. He could have just forced you into racing at a really young age and been really competitive. uh That doesn't always work. I think the relaxed vibe when you were younger probably led to being more serious about it when you were older. Yeah, I think so. Like he never put pressure on me to ride or race. It was all up to me if I wanted to. And uh yeah, I enjoyed it when I was younger and I still enjoy it. So I think if, uh I mean, I think if he would have put a lot more pressure on me when I was younger and I don't know if I would enjoy it as much as I do. So if you have raced a variety of series throughout the years, but what series do you feel most at home racing now? Yeah, I grew up racing Grand Prix's mainly maybe some motocross when I was younger and I mainly grew up racing National Grand Prix's and works but as I got older I moved more towards the desert and I found a little more success there. So I got more comfortable racing National Hare and Hounds. I really enjoy those. And then the last few years I've been riding some of the more High speed like big races like Vegas to Reno and Mint 400, Parker 400. Yeah, I've enjoyed that too. It's a little different, but yeah, those are super cool races and that kinda between the Hare and Hounds and the best in the desert races, kinda got me used to the high speeds of like rally racing. It was a step-by-step transition, but I think it's all been a really good setup. So for those that may not be familiar with the hare and hound format, can you give like a quick overview of what that looks like? Yeah, Hare and Hound is typically 80 to 100 miles. It's two loops, a big mass bomb start. So you start dead engine, they drop a banner and uh you go once the banner drops. It's all marked by ribbon and arrows so you don't uh have any practice or anything. So you're reading the terrain. It's trail-based. So it's mainly two tracks and a single track. Yeah, some areas are usually the first loop is more high speed across the valleys, little less technical. And then the second loop usually works in the tighter technical rocky uh trails and some hills or mountains. And yeah, the race is usually takes about three hours. With racing different series growing up, did you approach preparation differently depending on what series you were racing or did you kind of have the same core routine no matter what the race was? Yeah, depending on what race I was going to, um if it was a Grand Prix, I'd try to ride more motocross or some uh tracks, because that's, a Grand Prix is like a 10 minute lap. If I went desert racing, you still need that intensity, but I'd mix it up with trail riding. So go on some long rides uh in the desert or in the mountains but yes, do try to do a well-rounded training of both of intensity on the tracks and trails. How close to the trails were you growing up? Did you have to drive a couple hours to even get out and ride? Yeah, at first uh I grew up in San Clemente, so there was no riding there. Yeah, we'd have to drive an hour to two hours just to go ride either tracks or the desert. But uh when I was 14, we moved to Murietta and that opened up a lot of opportunity for me to ride. I could ride from my house, motocross tracks. like... private motorcross tracks, but I live close to all the tracks in Southern California, so it was easy to uh drive there and ride the tracks, or I could ride trails or enduro training straight from my door. Nice. Yeah, that definitely makes it a lot easier when you don't have to spend several hours getting the location just to go ride to begin with. Yeah, it definitely helps, makes training more convenient and lets you have more time on the bike just because I could come home from school and go ride. where we never lived super close to the desert, I always had to drive to the desert, uh I mean, that's what I am the most familiar with. we were always driving to a District 37 race every week and almost. So you recently returned from racing Dakar for the first time. You competed in the Rally 2 class and you took runner up after two weeks of crazy intense racing. So for those unfamiliar with Dakar, can you explain that race a little bit? Yeah, it's a rally raid. It's two weeks long. You cover 8,000 kilometers, so 5,000 miles of riding uh in 13 stages. You get one rest day halfway, um and it's all by road book. So yeah, you're navigating each day, and you uh have to read the road book and... uh read the terrain to go as fast as you can. Yeah, I can't even fathom riding that many miles, that many days in a row. That's just like so crazy. But for the lead up to Dakar, what did that look for you physically, mentally, logistically, and how did you prepare for that compared to your usual race prep, which might've been a three hour race, right? Yeah, yeah. Honestly, I didn't completely know what to expect. I had really good mentors here that I trained with, with Ricky and Skyler and my dad and Jimmy Lewis really helped me get prepared for Dakar over the last six months. But until you do it, you don't really know what you're in for. I actually like to go back. The beginning of last year in March, I rode Sonora Rally. in Mexico just to get a rally, uh just to see what it was all about. So I really enjoyed that. And from there, I prepared and worked on getting to go to Dakar for this year. I did some trainings with Jimmy and the guys uh over the summer and Then I went to Portugal with the HRC team and Morocco with the HRC team. And I learned a bunch there. They were both five day rallies. So got some experience there. I came home and then uh with Jimmy, Ricky and Skyler, we did about three weeks of road book training here in the U S in like late November and December. And Yeah, so then we went to uh Saudi and I felt kind of prepared, but yeah, it was a really awesome experience the whole time. Every day I was learning a lot and yeah, at the end of the race, I really wish I knew everything I learned over the two weeks to restart at the beginning of the race. When you are doing the road book training here in the US, is it something that your dad and Jimmy Lewis were like, they were mapping something out and then you weren't aware of the navigation ahead of time and then you had to try to follow it? Is that kind of how you prepared? Yeah, I mean, it's a collective uh group of Jimmy and Ricky, my dad, Skyler. We all make some road books. Each guy makes some road books and we put them all together. And oh yeah, just to kind of simulate what we might see out during Dakar. And again, that's not something that's typical here in the U S. So can you kind of further explain that road book and how that looks even like mounted onto your bike and what the different symbols or mileages and stuff might mean. Yeah, there's a tablet. It's pretty much like any type of iPad. It's a special one that ERTF makes for the race. you have to match the odometer with the cap heading and the notes with the little symbols and arrows and all the directions and waypoints you need to get through the stage is all information you're reading while you're racing. you could only, I had to like slow down to learn the road book because I was like riding almost too fast to what I could read. So that's my biggest thing I need to work on is just understanding and reading the road book and riding at the speed you're able to ride at. So it's like a really complicated texting and driving. That's a good analogy for it. And like, what kind of average speeds are we talking about? We saw really high average speeds in Dakar. One of the days, think Skyler said he averaged 117 kilometers an hour. I don't exactly know the... But I think it's over 60 miles an hour. I had something in my head like 60, 70 miles per hour, but then I thought maybe that's crazy. Maybe that's too fast. So yeah, trying to go that fast over crazy terrain while also trying to read. That's just crazy. Yeah, you can't you have to definitely be intentional when reading the road book because if you look it's like every time you look down you're riding blind pretty much because here just you got to look ahead. Okay, I have a second to read. Okay, quickly get the information you need and then look up and and try to put it all together. I'm used to Enduro or dual sport roll charts here, where it has the turn and the mileage, but you're usually only going sometimes in the woods, 20, 30 miles an hour. You're not going 60, 70 miles per hour. So that would be a challenge. Yeah, it's definitely taking uh just time on the bike. And um I mean, every time I ride a road book or something, I'm learning uh still. I feel like I learned a lot through Dakar and I'm much better navigator now than I was at the start of the two weeks. But yeah, I feel like there's so much more I could still learn. What were some of the things that you wish you would have known ahead of time? Obviously, sometimes you just, you can't know until you try it, but what are some of the things that you're taking away from that race? Yeah, just like, um, biggest things I took away is just, have to keep pushing, um, throughout, through the race. Cause you never know what's going to happen. Things, change super quick. in that long of a race, so many variables, uh, I mean, the navigation is one thing, making navigation errors. could lose a lot of time. Um, your, your body, like throughout the two weeks, uh just not knowing how the end of the race was gonna feel, the pace of the race, how fast guys were pushing early on or towards the end of the two weeks. also just, mean, like you could have any bike issue or anything instantly. um yeah, to put together two weeks is a... is a difficult task and for me it went pretty smooth and I was happy to make it to the finish. Was there a specific stage or day that you felt truly pushed you to your limit and how did you get yourself through it? Yeah, there was some difficult days, long dune days with the really soft dunes. You were working really hard to get through them, just physically and mentally. Also, there was one day, it was 920K, so you were on the bike for 12 hours, or over 12 hours, so it was a long, tough day to get through. Do you find yourself like just, you know, 50 more miles, just 40 more miles, just 30 more miles, like, do you talk yourself through that? Yeah, at the beginning of the day, you're like, you're having a lot of, or I was having a lot of fun, like, and the miles are going quick. And then, and then on a few stages where maybe you're not feeling the best or it's difficult, then you're, once you're over, or once you're within like a hundred K's of the finish, then you're start counting down. You're like, all right, 80 more, oh, 50 more. So yeah, it was, I caught myself doing both where I was like, oh man, I'm having. great time, they were going by super quick and then some of the times I was like, we got to count down to get to the finish. So when you're on the bike that long, do you have time to like stop and eat, like have a snack? Yeah, you'll leave, uh like the longest day we left at like 4 a.m. from the bivouac and we rode like 300 kilometers of liaison. So pretty much you're on the highway for three hours and you stop at the start of the special, know, maybe there for half hour or 45 minutes to eat or just tell your time. so you get a little time there. And then um throughout the stage, the neutralizations, it's a mandatory 20 minutes stop at the neutralization. You can't work on your bike at all, but you could fill the bike up with gas there, eat, drink water, bathroom break. But yeah, you can't touch the bike. And then... Most of the stages only had one of those neutralizations. A handful of them had two 20 minute breaks. And then you stop at the finish of the special and you have a certain amount of time to ride the second liaison back to the bivouac. So you do get a few breaks throughout the day, but yeah, it's a long day. Yeah, like just a quick 20 minute break doesn't seem like quite enough. How did you handle any mistakes or setbacks that you had when you were out there? Yeah, I made a couple navigation errors throughout the couple or throughout the two weeks. And I mean, the best thing I could do is just not like panic and try to force things and oh, like, this is the right way and just guess that and go like every time I made a mistake, I just slowed way down or stop, like came to a stop and thought about it and went back. And I don't know if it was the fastest way, but it led to not making one mistake into two mistakes. So yeah, I just tried to take my time when things were not lining up or I knew I was off um the road book and just had to like methodically either go back to where I knew I was on the course or just figure it out from there. But yeah, I made a couple mistakes that I wish I didn't make, it was all learning. There's no communication with the team, right? When you're out there aside from like an emergency response button. Yeah, no, there's nothing. You're out there by yourself. And I mean, there's you unless, yeah, unless something goes really bad and you have to call off the uh off the your track to call the organization that you need help where the bike is completely broken or you need medical assistance. There's no uh no communication with the team throughout the day. Did that freak you out at all being alone kind of out in the middle of nowhere? know, historically when you're riding motorcycles, you're taught never ride alone, right? Like always ride with a buddy. And then here you are on this biggest race kind of in the middle of nowhere. And you might run into competitors here and there, but it might be kind of rare too. Yeah, there was a few days where I rode 100 % by myself. And then there was also days where I rode with someone the whole entire day. um honestly, it didn't freak me out too much or not at all. I mean, I'm used to riding in the desert or racing in the desert with no communication or by myself. So um yeah, wasn't anything too foreign to me. Honestly, the tracking and the... Organization is really good and they have a really good like safety rescue stuff at the race there. I mean, most of the time if a guy crashed or something, the medical helicopter will be there really fast within 10, 15 minutes. um I mean, we can't even have that here in the US. So, uh I mean, I've crashed out in the... desert in California and been out there for two hours till the helicopter showed up. it's a really good program they have there and good safety helicopters and stuff. Can you talk about kind of the lodging that you guys have when you're over there for all of those nights? Yeah, on the, our team gets three motor homes. So we have, there were six riders on the HRC team. So two guys to each motor home and uh yeah, that was super nice. Cause the, the, all the mechanics and team helpers and guys, they're all in uh tents. So we get, we get motor homes, which is really nice. the marathon bivvacs uh where we don't come back. It was like two stages, two days um where we don't come back to the team bivvac. They have us ride out to middle of the dunes and there they have one truck with tents and sleeping bag and a box of like camping food. So we did that, we camped. in tents twice out in the middle of the desert. And honestly, the weather was really good and it was pretty fun just to hang out out there with everyone. But and then on rest day, we get to go to the hotel and that was that was really nice to take a full shower and and get cleaned up for the next week. Yeah, I mean, it just each each time you describe something, it just sounds like crazier and crazier. Like you're you're riding all these miles and then like, by the way, like tonight you're going to sleep in a tent. Like that does not seem fun to me. You know, I'm a little spoiled, but I'm sure it's a really cool experience. Yeah, yeah, it was all part of it all part of the experience and yeah, I enjoyed ah Enjoyed it is super super fun How is it interacting with people from other countries that may may not speak English? Yeah, uh that's another, say, I don't know if it's a difficulty, but there's a lot of uh different languages and countries all together at this style race. on the HRC team, we have English speaker, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish, French. So there's a handful of languages. going around, but we're lucky because the common language is English. So most of the time you could communicate just fine. But yeah, there's always some uh little misunderstandings from both sides. uh yeah, it's also really nice to get to learn and see these other countries, how they live and I don't know, it's nice to see other things other than just open, it opens your eyes to the rest of the world. Can you talk a little bit about the bikes that you're racing and the setup and any customizations that go into it ahead of race time? Yeah, I rode the CRF450 RX Rally. It's a production rally bike that Honda's selling now. So it's based off a CRF bike, chassis and motor. Yeah, they built tanks because they have to... The bike has to carry like 35 liters, which is almost nine gallons of fuel. And they had to attach the navigation tower. So there's some modifications the team had to do to be able to make the bike ready for the rallies and for the customer to buy these bikes. But yeah, we did uh some suspension testing and tuning at like Portugal and Morocco that helped us set up for the bike for Dakar. So I didn't honestly have to do too much testing or anything throughout the race, which was nice, because we kind of the bike up a couple months before. Does the bike seem like so much lighter when you're getting to the end of those nine gallons of fuel versus when you're starting the day out? Yeah, at the start of the race, the bike definitely feels different. You have to uh manage the bike when it's full because it reacts completely different in the bumps or in the camel grass where the bike's getting uh kicked around. You have to be careful. And then as the goes away, then you could ride more aggressively and yeah, the bike becomes almost... 50 pounds, 60 pounds lighter by the end of this stage. How much water are you guys taking in your camelbacks too? Like I would imagine quite a bit to start the day. Yeah, you start with a three liters full camel back in the morning. usually that was enough to get through the day with a couple at the neutralization, have a water or something. But yeah, I saw some guys adding water um at the neutralization. So you're out there for a long time. So you got to make sure you're staying hydrated. Any dietary stuff that you kind of took into consideration before the ride? For me, I'm allergic to a bunch of stuff. So I have to be careful what I eat and stuff. But no, I'm not on any strict diet, but I knew I was gonna be burning a lot of calories throughout the day. So just try to eat as much as possible the few days before the race and make sure you get breakfast and big dinner after the stage to get a. refueled for the next day. Can you talk a little bit about your support system before and during Dakar? people that are kind of helping get things ready and that are there on site with you. Yeah, Monster Energy Honda HRC team has had about 30 guys there to help the program. um each rider has a mechanic. We have team managers. had each motor home for the guy or for the guys has a motor home driver that kind of takes care of our gear, make sure we have food for breakfast and dinner. um There's so many, we have a team physios. So we get a massage and therapy after the stage, which is really helpful for the feeling. Yeah. Feeling, I don't think I would have felt this as good at the finish. If I didn't have that, I would have been in a lot more pain. Um, but, uh, yeah, there's 30 guys working super hard and, and, uh, definitely cannot do it without any of them. So. um Yeah, I can't imagine organizing or uh trying to manage the whole program, but yeah, they do a great job. How do you decompress after an experience that intense? What's it's over? Do you just like collapse for weeks or how does that work? After the race, at the finish, didn't feel that bad. The next day I was like, I'm okay. Like, I'm not too tired. I feel like I've done a lot, but not completely destroyed. And then once I flew home, that was a whole day flying home. And then I got home and sat on the couch and yeah, I think I just turned everything off and didn't really leave the house for about five days and just hung out. watching TV or, and then, yeah, then I was like, once I felt better, I was like, okay, I need to need to start going again and start training for the next race. crazy. Do you see yourself ah continuing to do rally racing more and more? Yeah, I really enjoyed the whole race and being with that team and yeah, I loved every minute of it. So that's what I'm working towards is all the Rally World Championship and yeah, I don't have anything uh set yet, but I think it will go that way in the future. What's kind of coming up next for you, whether it's racing here in the U S or overseas. Yeah, there's a just right now I'm just training and getting everything ready um for that next race. I don't know exactly when that will be, but yeah, just I don't want to lose anything and why things are getting uh worked out. I just keep riding and training on and off the bike and so ready to go. Cool. Well, tell people where they can connect with you or follow your racing career online. Okay, yeah, I just have an Instagram at Preston Campbell 300. That's my main source of social media. Cool. All right, well, I will link that in the show notes for everybody to follow. But Preston, thank you for joining me and thanks to everybody for tuning into Momentum. This has been a production of High Gear Success. If you want to connect or recommend a guest, head to MomentumMotorsportsPodcast.com. Until next time, keep the momentum rolling.