Blatantly lifted from our friends at RoadRacerX.com

Now in his second year as a crew chief for Graves Motorsports, Curtice Thom has a number of proud seasons under his belt—as well as several two-stroke championships from the days of AMA 125 and 250cc racing—but is still hungry for his first four-stroke #1 plate. He’ll head-up 16-year-old Yamaha-rider Josh Herrin’s Supersport effort next year, and he recently sat down in the Daytona garages with us for a long-overdue BTR.

Road Racer X: You’ve been in this industry for more than a decade…. Can you start by summing up that first handful of years?
Curtice Thom: Well, I got my first professional job in 1995; I got to work with Chris Rogers and Rodney Fee doing 125 Grand Prix, and from there I went to 250 Grand Prix, and now on to the big four-strokes. I’ve been really lucky over the course of my career to work with some really good riders, starting with Rogers and Fee—both champions in their own right—then Roland Sands, another [250] champion, and from Roland I moved on to Chuck Sorenson and won a pair of championships with Chuck. After that I took some time off, then had the opportunity to work with Jamie Hacking in 2004 when I joined the Graves team, and came up just three points shy to our teammate, Aaron Gobert. After that I took a break from being a mechanic and moved to the manager’s chair for the Graves team for a season, and last year I got to work with Eric Bostrom, which was a coup for me in my first year as a crew chief, for sure.

Were you always mechanically minded?
I think ever since I was a kid I’ve been the type who would take things apart to find out how it works, and luckily my parents kind of supported me doing what I wanted to do, even though this wasn’t their choice. And I’ve always gravitated toward motorcycles, for some reason…. I think I probably have the same addiction the rest of the people around here have. I’m definitely interested in the technology side of things; I love building the motors, love working with the data, and I also love working with the people—the riders, the other technicians, the team owners, managers, everybody.

Are you a rider yourself?
Of course. I started out on Vespa motor-scooters, and currently I own a YZF250 dirt bike and am looking to get back into the street-bike scene again soon. I don’t have one now, though, no—unfortunately, certain sacrifices have to be made to work for Chuck Graves [laughs].

What’s your favorite part of this job?
The people, for sure. I love traveling with this group of people who make up the AMA paddock.

And the hardest part?
The travel, the time away from family and loved ones. They make a huge sacrifice so that we can do this job, and they don’t get thanked enough for what they give up so that we can come out and do what makes us happy.

What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned since starting in the paddock?
I think the longer I do this, the more I realize I know less than I did when I started. There’s so much to know in this business that you can never attain all the knowledge, but that just drives me to continue to learn and work with people like Geoff Cesmat, Chuck Graves, Chris Lessing, who have such depth in technical knowledge that I can draw from and improve my own job performance.

How have you seen the bikes evolve since you started?
It’s really spectacular to me to see the evolution of the sport bike become something that is useable on the racetrack. The sport bike that you can buy and ride around on the street today is far superior to anything you could buy ten years ago, and that’s because of the work done on the racetrack. The gap has really closed between a full, purpose-built race bike and a production street bike, and it’s definitely exciting to be a part of that evolution, especially with all the forward-thinking technology that Yamaha’s introduced with the R6 and R1 the last couple years.

Tell us about your 2007 effort.
For 2007, Josh Herrin will be campaigning the #46 R6 for Graves Motorsports Yamaha and I will be crew chiefing the effort with Gary Dean as mechanic and Chris Lessing’s support on suspension. Josh is obviously a young, talented, up-and-coming rider, and he’s very fun to work with. We’re definitely going to have a lot to try to teach him as far as communicating with a professional team, and then we’ll just try to make him comfortable with the team and the bike, and see if we can start to get some of the results that I think everyone expects him to be capable of.

Having shown the kind of potential he did so early on, it must put a lot of pressure not just on Josh but on his team, as well.
It’s definitely a double-edged sword to do that well, that quickly, for sure.

Did your team get a kick out of ending up with the number Valentino Rossi has made famous?
Oh, of course. There’s obviously a lot of people in Yamaha who look toward the big number 46 as being “the guy,” so it’s going to be interesting to have him come around at the MotoGP and see us running his number as well. It really is something we’re paying homage to him with, because we definitely want to move Josh in that direction. I think Josh does have the same natural talents and abilities, and hopefully will get the same opportunities throughout his career.

Talk a little bit about the bike you’re working with as well…. As a mechanic, is there anything about it that you’re particularly in love with?
The R6 is just a beautiful piece of machinery. And obviously it won the [Supersport] championship last year quite handily, and both Josh and Michael Beck were able to use the R6 quite effectively as well, and I think that with yet another year of development, we should be able to remain competitive even with the new bikes that the other manufacturers are bringing to the table this year.

What are your goals for Josh this season?
Well, I’d definitely like to see him finish top-three in the championship, and I think that getting toward the podium on a regular basis is an attainable goal—he’s proven already that he can get there—and then hopefully we can get him to the top step.

And do you see yourself staying in this industry for a long time?
My goal has always been to be in this industry, and I don’t see myself going anywhere else as long as someone will have me.

Thanks, Curtice. It looks like Supersport is going to be a really stacked class next year, and we’re looking forward to seeing you in it.
Thanks, Laurel—we’re looking forward to being there and being up front, for sure.