Ken Roczen’s success with the HEP Suzuki team has saw Suzuki Japan reinvigorated and stepping up to help the HEP Suzuki team with more support and parts for 2026. With Roczen now joined by Jason Anderson, Suzuki are really starting to make their presence felt again in SMX.
We asked Larry Brooks about the impact of Suzuki Japan being back involved and he told us the following:
“Yeah, they’ve been coming to the events and we do video meetings every Monday. And so they’re really interested in what we’re doing. You know, we kind of had the reins and ran with it for three years before they came back, so we’re pretty confident in what our program can do. But we’re just excited to have them on board, hoping that they can bring that extra percentage that would make the team and the motorcycle better.
“Yeah, I mean, that kind of the idea is to keep improving the bike. We made some big improvements last year, running a different transmission. You know, from here on out, all the riders will have that factory transmission. So I think it’s better for the whole team and all the riders. But yeah, Suzuki is making different parts now, parts that they used to make when they were involved more. So I think it’s only going to get better from here.
“We kind of had the ball that we had to run with it and keep the Suzuki brand out there and going. So, you know, now that Suzuki is more involved, now they’re going to bring the information in and help us develop new parts or anything that we had trouble with, they would really help us with it. So I think it overall, it’s going to be much better for the Suzuki brand.”
You can get the full interview below:
