Brad McCoy Takes a Different Approach to PXM

PITTSBORO, NC – PDRA Pro Extreme Motorcycle competitor Brad McCoy has made the trek from his Cleveland, N.C. home to each of the first three stops on the 2015 tour. This means he’s already traveled over 4500 miles this season, but he’s prepared to follow the PDRA tour for its entirety, a commitment not seen by many other PXM teams thus far. McCoy is invested in his program and believes that the PDRA provides the best place for bike racers to compete on a national level.

“We made a decision over the winter that we were going to try to run all the races provided that financially we could do it,” stated McCoy. “I’m going to stick to that commitment the best I can. I want to support the PDRA because they give us a really good place to come and race. There’s not many places to race with our bikes on that kind of level. I want to see the bikes do good in the PDRA so I want to support every race that I can.

“I’m hoping we can convince more people to compete with the PDRA because there’s definitely enough bikes to have a full field every race. It’s just a matter of getting people committed to coming. A lot of guys from the east coast don’t want to travel to the further races so we see the bike counts go down at the western events.”

According to McCoy most professional dragbike racers are self-funded and find it difficult financially to compete on a national level. He and his team at McCoy Motorsports are working toward an engine program that will allow riders to be competitive on a tighter budget.

“We’re one of the only ones to run a Hayabusa engine,” McCoy elaborated. “All of the other bikes are GS engines. It’s a little more challenging for us because we’re limited in our engine displacement from what the GS engines can run. So it definitely makes it a little harder for us to compete, but we’re going to do our best to show everyone that we can make that motor be competitive in the class.

“These engines are not as expensive to build as a GS. So I feel like if we can show people that that engine is competitive we could bring a new generation to the PXM class. It’s all about finances for the bikes. That’s why the bike count hasn’t been there. It’s expensive and it’s hard to get sponsorship for the bikes so people are running off their own money. If we can offer them a package other than the GS that they know they can be competitive in for less money then hopefully it would bring new people to the class.”

McCoy says he chose the Hayabusa engine because it has been the main focus of his McCoy Motorsports business. After switching from Motocross and Supercross to Drag Racing in 2000, finding success in the MIROCK series with five event wins. McCoy began to build a reputation at the track working on bikes. Out of that grew a full time business that builds high performance engines, chassis and provides tuning services. Most of McCoy’s customers are street bikes and grudge racers that utilize the new Hayabusa engine.

“Hayabusas are what we do. We’re more familiar with it. I’d like to see the new technology in Pro Extreme Motorcycle class with the fuel injection and the Hayabusa engine do well. A lot of people say it can’t be done, it can’t be competitive against a GS. So I guess I just want to prove them wrong. It definitely makes it more challenging for me. I probably could have built a GS and be running better than we are now. But we made a choice to do something different than everybody else. Hopefully it will pay off.”

McCoy currently sits fifth in PXM points, which goes to show that he is already proving the capabilities of the Hayabusa engine. “We’re improving,” he said of his program. “We had some bad luck at the first race. We hurt a motor, but we definitely work until we get better.

“I definitely want to thank my family. My dad goes to every race with me and is a big help. Jay Robinson and Cory Barrier work in my shop, and they try to make every race as well. Without these guys I definitely couldn’t be out here doing what I do. MoTec Systems East and Applied Nitrous have helped us out a lot over the winter. They’ve definitely helped to make us more competitive this year. I also appreciate the support from Rock Solid Manufacturing and Carolina Cycle.

“I also want to thank the PDRA for giving us a place to race and the Traction Twins for an excellent race surface.”

Look for McCoy at the upcoming PDRA Mid-America Open, May 28-30 at Gateway Motorsports Park just outside of St. Louis, Missouri, or watch the event online.