Take us through the ups and downs of putting Bomaire on the team today.

Yeah, no, I'm glad you asked me.

Like, it was crazy.

I was calling guys in Europe this morning asking, hey, can you get the bikes from Belgium to Austria and then get them to the track on the truck? And then we want to change the engine spec.

We wanted to go to a little bit more of a mellow engine.

Can you do that? They said, okay, yeah, we'll do it.

Then I called my engine guys.

to win a title here, right? Yeah.

What changed after the injury and all of that, you think, to him to decide to hang it up?

Yeah, I think I've mentioned this before somewhere also, but I feel like there comes a point when they feel like, okay, I've achieved everything.

What else is there really to go for? I mean, they have the titles, they have the race wins.

they he's he's won on multiple brands there's so many different aspects of it and i think the last few years he's been thinking okay hey maybe this is gonna be it maybe this is gonna be it but he he um he he he mentioned to me that hey i think this is the end of the road and then um just to make sure, because we were trying to lock in some of the riders.

I checked back in with him and stuff, and we spoke a little bit, and he goes, no, I'll ride Supercross.

And so we were, like, you know, high-fiving each other.

We were all pumped, you know.

Do you have any theories on... that just getting older and the workload catching up or do you have anything that you know you were like well this is what he was doing because you know he was telling us that everything's fine and and you were saying yeah everything's fine and but looking back on it do you have a theory on sort of the second half um slump a little bit

I forgot about the Chase and Tom one, which was bad of me.

Yeah, well, I'm glad you brought that up.

I did too, but I'm glad it's not that long ago.

You did win a title, I think, that day.

So that's why you forget both classes.

Yeah, it was a big day too.

Yeah.

More of a roller coaster than I think he maybe expected.

Mm-hmm

... competitive again.

And, and landing Jose Serrano obviously did a lot for that.

Um, but yeah, you know, I, I mean, the, the change in the feeling around the team obviously since a guy like Brad Bateman joined the lineup and, and what he's been able to deliver, you notice the kind of energy on the bases and, and, uh, plays in the field.

And, and it has seemed a little infectious.

You know, the, the whole, the whole team just seems a little bit crisper.

We've seen some really nice play on the infield, in the outfield, some e- some remarkable throws from the outfield, uh, on the last road trip to cut down runners at home plate and so on.

Mm-hmm.

Happy with the steps forward again today, the progress again today?

Well, I'll give you a little bit of insight into him.

He had a really, really tough week.

He was extremely sick.

He said to me the furthest he walked was from his bedroom to the refrigerator.

So no riding at all.

And we were thinking that today was going to be a tough day.

What is it exactly that he's looking for from the bike? Because again, it's vague, but it's clear that something's kind of itching at his brain.

Mm-hmm.

And you try to get something back that you need, a reliever or something like that.

Um, you know.

Or maybe even trade somebody like a, a Jonathan Classé, someone who's kind of, you know, shown in the last couple of weeks that maybe they have what it takes to play at the majors, but a little bit surplus to requirements on this roster most of the time.

Uh, maybe you can turn that into something.

So, you know, I can see a scenario where you're trading off your Major League roster rather than trading from prospects in the low minors, and yet still trying to improve your, your 26-man roster, uh, trying to just get it to a point where, you know, you can, you can, uh, climb back into above .500 and, uh, inch, inch forward because chances are it might not take a whole lot more than that this season.

[laughs]

You know what I mean? This is a, a doormat for so many years in the American League, and here suddenly they're on top of the Central, which to be fair is not the most exceptional division in baseball, but I think the White Sox are a fair measure for their record.

And then I'll go to Zena and we can talk about your last, the time you spent, especially over the last nine years at Partisan, like the change in the indie world as well.

Yeah, absolutely.

So we've seen at least three significant commercial shifts in the last 20 years in the music business, from when I started around 2004, when I started working at indie labels.

We were largely selling CDs and a little bit of vinyl.

Punk labels were selling vinyl.

Most other people really weren't selling that much vinyl at that point.

And then shortly after that, iTunes really turned the corner, took off, and now we're not just selling on a different website or something.

How is the industry thinking about that? And from a label perspective, how are you thinking about that? What are you hearing from artists, et cetera? But we'll start with the macro.

What did they say about the difference for the American bikes and getting used to that? What did they say to you? I think this one

was relatively easy because of the altitude, you know? So you're just fighting to get the maximum out of them for the weekend.

Yep.

So it'll be interesting if they do come back for Southwick, how that goes.

But we did go riding with them on Tuesday and Wednesday, and we made some small changes for regular stuff for the next race.

So we'll see.

But it's not far away from the rest of the guys.

Is it just from him missing all that time, you feel like? I think so.

the moto 2 ride isn't sustainable across the board because clearly he can win whilst riding within his means you know he's not over his head to win no i

are you you're referring to sasha right yes i um i like it like when when he gets on the bike whether it's practice whether it's riding where we wherever we are the guy wants to be the fastest guy there's nothing wrong with that you know and of course everyone can say yeah back it down a little bit but he'll figure it out And I think he is.

You know, we've seen this year now that he's leading the world championship.

He's definitely got more consistent than he was previous years.

Yeah, he still has his mishaps here and there.

But when you're going at that speed, yeah, things sometimes come at you quicker than you expect.

But I think you'll get it figured out.

Can he go further than that? Do we dare to dream or do we still build slowly?

How serious do you feel it's been with the vibes you're getting? I don't know how much communication you get at this point.

Yeah, Eli and I were in contact a lot this week.

He filled me in.

He has a muscle tear in his neck and a tendon tear.

And it's not like an ankle where you can wrap it and ride or something.

Your neck is exposed and you have the weight of your helmet and all these other things.

So he's going to be out for a few weeks.

So can you talk to us a little bit about how we got here and a little bit of the logistics behind that? Because it has to be a big ask to get them here in the middle of their race championship as well.

He's killing it

Yeah.

Thank you.

Um, yeah, I'm so proud of him because, you know, he had that, he had a, he had a major back injury, breaking a, breaking a vertebra and, um, having, needing s- immediate surgery and putting those pins in.

But as a team and, and him collectively with his family, we decided, okay, we are going to, um, heal up and then ride a little bit with the pins in and then we're gonna ...

Then when it's time's ready, we're gonna take the pins out, and once the pins are out, then he can start riding.

And there was a little bit of a area where he just wanted to go for it, but in the end, he, he, he took the advice of everybody and, and got everything out.

So how do you all get on the same page of what the expectation is with these, uh, tryouts, I guess?