Welsh grateful for hands-on knowledge in race team building
It’s been a few years since the name Alex Welsh appeared in motorsport headlines but rest assured, he is as relevant now in motorsport as he was then as a competitive athlete racing the Canadian Superbike circuit. A rider throwing a leg over their first dirt bike is most likely unaware that is going to be the first step to their life-long career.
For Welsh, that is exactly how it began. The stepping stones that followed, the experience gathered and the education from the ‘School of Hard Knocks’ made Welsh a lucrative candidate for one of the top automotive manufacturers in the world. Now earning a living as the marketing manager for BMW Motorrad, this former CSBK champion brings a plethora of transferrable skills only acquired through experience.
“Most people don’t realize motocross is the most demanding sport in the world,” said Welsh during a telephone interview. “Those athletes are the upper echelon in terms of physical abilities.”
I personally attest to that statement, as I have attempted to motocross only to feel the wrath of the athletic experience on muscles in my body I did not know I had.
“I was competitive in motocross super young. Competing was such a grind that by the time I got to 13, 14 years old, other competitors were burning out of the sport. They got new interests. When a lot of other kids stopped, I transitioned to road racing because my dad was in that realm.”
By his second year road racing, after winning the Pro Rookie of the Year the prior season riding a Triumph 675 Daytona as part of a privately funded team, Welsh became a member of Canadian Kawasaki Motors factory team in the Superbike Championship while enrolled in a sports management program at Brock University in St. Catherines, Ontario.
“I was in my early 20s, racing for Kawasaki. All major OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturer) were spending big. I was making as much racing six weekends a year as I do today in my current role. Some racers were making $300k plus a year. I thought I was going to do that for a living when the financial crisis hit, and everybody stopped spending. They [Kawasaki] cut the big dollar race program and as I was considered a factory rider, the opportunities went away. As a factory rider, Kawasaki had everything in place for me. I just showed up.”
As dedicated and disciplined of an athlete as he was, he immediately realized being an athlete was a business and a successful business required a strong team of people. Little did he know, at 24 years old, he would become the CEO of himself in order to continue racing. Racing for a factory team, an athlete is supported with coaches, mechanics, engineers and other field experts. In this type of setting the rider is the one scouted. However, when an athlete loses a place on a factory team but is determined to continue competition, it becomes a completely different story.
“As an independent rider,” continued Welsh, “much like today, there might be a bike or two available from a manufacturer, a parts budget but really, it’s on you to start filling in the pieces like outside sponsorships to cover payroll, technical expenses and travel budgets, all that kind of stuff.”
His entrepreneurial skill soon developed as he secured and activated the funding just to stay competitive. He had to not only find a support team, but also the right field experts that understood his vision. Four members of that team are still field experts to this day.
“I made the transition into a kind of support role with Suzuki, getting some bikes, a bit of a budget and filling out my own thing. If you’re a kid with a dream to play hockey, it’s not like the NHL is going away. The ability to make a living racing a motorcycle just doesn’t exist anymore. Because of that, I was part of a smaller Suzuki program.”
“I was still very fortunate. What ultimately ended up happening was I had budget to go racing, but I didn’t have anything left after the bills of each weekend were paid. The only way I could make money was winning. I would not break even if I placed second. So, my motorcycle racing career was expiring and the writing was on the wall. I didn’t want to stop chasing this dream, but the reality is that the dream wasn’t what it once was. I didn’t want to be 30 and starting at the bottom of my career.”
Welsh reflects, “Yes, you’ve got to have dedication and perseverance as an athlete. I’ve got buddies in competitive hockey, some OHL/CHL, some drafted to NHL, they always had people in their life if they got off track. They had people dragging them into practice. In motorcycle racing, you determine your own fate. Nobody is making you go to the gym. Nobody is making you practice. So that’s one of the things I learned. You are responsible for you.”
His racing career continued intermittently until retiring in 2014. He would later go on to join the marketing team at BMW Motorrad. By 2019, a year before originally planned, BMW Motorrad released an all-new S 1000 RR Superbike and Welsh, after a near 5-year hiatus, would take the saddle behind the bars. One of the key factors in returning to the circuit was the support of BMW.
“It all comes down to people. The right people, the right team. I used to think you had to find the CEO or the CMO who had that spark of interest in motorsports or racing in general and that was what really lead to a successful partnership. In reality, that’s true in all sponsorships really; even when I stopped racing and went to an agency specializing in golf sponsorship dealing with PGA professionals.”
“In almost every case, the brand has some kind of relationship with that individual golfer – they met through a Pro-Am Tournament or a Foundation activity – and that’s where the relationship stems from. It seems to always come down to people and relationships. Good people. Good teams. Good brands.”
Another key ingredient to success Welsh says is positivity.
“I try to remember to preach that today,” he said. “The reality is, you’re going to lose more than you win. You just need to take it with a positive attitude or at least take the losses as they come. That mentality helps me probably more in the corporate world than anything else. I was able to benefit unknowingly from that.”
We wrapped our conversation on the future outlook of his career and Welsh feels there is a lot of work to do on the motorcycling side of BMW.
“I live and breathe motorcycles,” says Welsh. “We still have many people out there in our market that don’t even know BMW makes a motorcycle. From a sales perspective, we are a global leader but in North America, we’re still a bit unknown. A smaller, niche brand. I look forward to increasing that awareness.”
Riders can look forward to more options in electric offerings in the near future. Currently BMW offers a maxi-scooter in the CE-04 that tends to cater to a European market but is starting to catch on in North America. Most recently, BMW announced a 2024 CE02 scooter targeting the young urban commuter. Stay tuned.
