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WORDS: BRETT SMITH
PHOTOS: COLLIN SPECKNER
Sweet-talking local government offi cials,
operating heavy machinery, winning races—
it’s all in a day’s work for Team Rocky Mountain
ATV/MC-KTM-WPS rider Blake BaggettIF I’M EVER GIVEN A CHOICE OF what I can
take with me in the event of being stranded
on a desert island, it’s Blake Baggett. Mind-
bending motocross skills are useless in a sur-
vival situation, but racing dirt bikes is far from
the only thing Baggett does well. On an island,
I would be shuddering and sobbing beneath a
coconut tree, resisting the urge to befriend a
volleyball, but Baggett would be laying a foun-
dation, erecting a shelter, and, if he can fi nd
the resources, wiring the place for electricity.
Then he’d fi gure out how to communicate
with ships passing nearby. Because build-
ing things—whether a steel structure, a dirt
mound on his practice tracks, or a gap over
second place—is what Blake Baggett does.