Now with another three year plan Beirer and his orange army wants to dominate the American racing scene.

It was back in 2006 that Pit Beirer and Stefan Everts teamed up to produce what is now the dream team of the Grand Prix paddock. Four years after deciding to work together the KTM Company is weeks away from making history with World titles in both the MX1 and MX2 class.

We decided to sit down with Pit and ask him about their American plans, and what type of riders might be included in those plans.

MXlarge: Pit, are you happy with how it’s going in America at the moment with the KTM team?

Beirer: America you asked if I am happy, for sure not, but actually we are where we planned to be, we had this new bike coming and at the same time we decided to take it very easy with a low budget and take our time. This season without a Supercross team with just two riders in Motocross, we don’t want to stay like that. We have learnt from the European race team that you can’t change things overnight. It took us three years or more to become the team we are now in Europe and we don’t expect to be like our European team in America overnight.

MXlarge: Is it possible to have a similar type of team in American like you have now in the FIM World Motocross Championship?

Beirer: We have very good people in America and around them we will build a really strong team, for sure we don’t want to stay the same size as the team in America, we want to build on that, we want to have very good technical people, and add one or two riders. Bringing Marvin (Musquin) to America next year will also bring us forward, but like I said we have a vision to be one of the top teams in America, but that will take two or three years. In four weeks from now we will have more information.

MXlarge: With the American market such a strong market compared to the rest of the World is it possible you might have an even bigger team in America, bigger than your GP team?

Beirer: This means we would need seven riders. I think what we are doing in Europe now that is the maximum of riders you can have at this level. If you do more riders the quality will drop. We handled well having three riders in each class, and I think we have a good team around these riders. Our American team shouldn’t be bigger than this. We also know we can’t copy the European team in America. We need the best people in the American racing to build it up separately. Of course we can use some of our knowledge, the basics are all there, but America is a different World. Making a big team in America is on our list and we will do that, we don’t want to do it by half.

MXlarge: What type of riders would you be looking at? The top guys are pretty expensive or not?

Beirer: It isn’t so easy, because salaries for the top riders in America are really high. It’s crazy; you don’t have a mid range like in Europe. In the World Motocross Championship we have a lot of riders who make good money, but in America it is like the top riders make really good money, but the next level don’t make hardly any money. I would say the top five guys are making money in America. For a number seven guy you have the same cost for the bikes, mechanics and that type of thing, but with the second level guy you can never win, you can’t show how good you are, so we have to eventually enter the level of the very top guys.

MXlarge: Of course the American riders don’t make the crazy money they used to make do they?

Beirer: As always the good thing about a bad thing is that the crisis bought everything to a normal level. The Motorcycle industry is living from motorcycles sold in the shop and nothing else and I think everything is now bought into balance, which makes it easier for us to step in now. I think before the credit crisis, when the economy was really strong it wasn’t interesting for us to step in. Now we are in a position to go for it.

MXlarge: What about the level of the KTM team in America this year, how would you rate that as far as expenses go?

Beirer: We said this year we are on the zero level, where we race with the minimum, but still we have a structure, we have Casey Lytle, plus a good engine guy and a good suspension guy, also Tommy and Mike have great mechanics, but we don’t have the big show around it, but for sure we want to step it up and I think it takes three years to get to that target. I don’t want to tell you we want to win the Supercross in January, because that isn’t realistic, I am realistic, but I am not a dreamer. I think it’s possible to maybe do that in three years time.

MXlarge: There were all those rumors about James Stewart racing for KTM. Was there any truth in those rumors, are you dealing with him?

Beirer: It isn’t really a realistic first step. We have learnt that lesson in Europe when you add the superstar before the bike or team is ready (in 2006 KTM signed Seb Tortelli and Mickeal Pichon and both failed miserably), it doesn’t bring you anywhere. Maybe that rumor came because of our close relationship with Red Bull, but James Stewart is not our main target today, we are focusing on many other things. We want a strong Supercross bike for next year and get a really good rider, nothing around the other story.

MXlarge: What about a Ben Townley. I know you guys dealt with him for this year?

Beirer: Ben is a KTM friend and he was World Champion with us and he still has a friendship with us and our boss. Ben is always a rider we would consider to have, there is no war between us, but his dreams and ideas didn’t match with our plans. We talked to him for this year, but he still had a plan to succeed in America. Our first thing was to have a strong in Europe, and he is also pushing for only doing Outdoor in America, but we need to build up a level also in Supercross. We didn’t really try seriously and he didn’t really try serious (to make the deal happen), so it is always open to work with Ben.