2023 AFT SuperTwins Grand National Champion Jared Mees Interview
Jared Mees, a nine-time Grand National champion, discusses his aspirations, the future, and what it’s like to be a nine-time champion. Will he become the next great on flat track? Few other two-wheeled American sports have as much
historical significance as Progressive American Flat Track, its protector. Indeed, even if you broaden the scope globally and permit both two and four wheels, you may still make a convincing case that the audacious claim is true.
The series has been in operation for 70 years, but its direct connections go much further back, almost to the beginning of motorized transportation. These special connections to the past are not merely a theoretical concept. Every time a new national is added to its history, that connection is demonstrated. The fundamentals of the high-speed art form have remained remarkably stable over the years because to a combination of its straightforward, mostly oval-based patterns and the very intricate factors that make up its fluctuating and constantly changing dirt surfaces. With its focus on inch-close racing, scorching speeds, and a small, fully visible battleground, dirt track racing has maintained its attraction for a century.
This is still the case because, unlike many other types of racing, the physics behind the sport has not yet been solved, cracked, or reformulated by engineers and computers, making it more of a black magic than a science. Progressive American Flat Track firmly maintains its claim to be “America’s Original Extreme Sport,” even as the never-ending labor of cunning tuners seeking little improvements continues to produce
measurable results. Together with the erratic, extremely tight action that first made the sport popular so many decades ago, this fact makes the sport’s respect for its past a crucial component of its continued relevance. As a result, if that history is altered, especially when it comes to its most treasured documents, there is an extra layer of significance.
