T-Dog’s Takes: Josh Cartwright Is the Smartest Racer of All-Time

Notice that this column now has a sponsor? That’s right! Troy Dog joined the Blu Cru and you should too! I have one in my garage right now and I can’t wait to go shred it! Thank you to Yamaha for believing in my ELITE columns on this dirt bike website enough to sponsor me. What a dream come true! BTW: Have you seen the all-new YZ450F? OH. MY. GOODNESS. I can’t wait to test that bad boy.

It’s tax return season, which is always such a fun and stressful time for everyone in the U.S. If you’re stressed because you haven’t filed, then you should call Josh Cartwright. Cartwright is a Supercross racer on the weekends for Psychic Motorsports Kawasaki and a BI Analyst at UT Systems during the week. I’m sure he could do your taxes for you, partner.

Look, I’m not saying this to offend anyone, but I believe Cartwright may be the smartest rider in the pits since, well…ever. He went to college at Florida State University and graduated in 2018 while racing Supercross in the process. In August of 2021, Cartwright moved to Texas for his job. 

“Our company takes care of the University of Texas school’s data for Finance, HR, and Campus solutions,” Cartwright said. “We take that data and build reports for the customer per their requirements. Simple example: How many kids are in Class101 in these schools and organize them by school, year, gender, age, etc. That’s not an actual report, but just an example. Once those reports are built by our team, the customer will take a look at them and ask us for any changes that are necessary.”

That sounds like a pretty good gig, right? Oh, he also only has to go into the office once a week, while the rest he works from home. In all, Cartwright says he works 40 hours a week and then gets to race on the weekends. 

In Texas, Cartwright doesn’t have any family close by, but he does have a lot of friends from his days of traveling as an amateur. To prepare for the season, Cartwright would ride with John Short, Grant Harlan, Henry Miller, Ryder Floyd, Mitchell Oldenburg, and Cheyenne Harmon and this crew had a pick of great tracks to ride from Tapt House, Masterpool’s, Short’s, Ford’s, Springtown, and Underground. 

The 28-year-old says that he enjoys posting easy PEMDAS problems to see who gets it wrong. Look, PEMDAS can be tricky sometimes and Cartwright gets sick enjoyment off of people getting it wrong. 

We shall call him Data Dog from now on. The good news for Josh is that he knows the difference between breathe and breath, there/their/they’re, and he knows his lap time immediately when he crosses the finish. He’s got that internal stopwatch, bro. If I were Clinton Fowler, Feld’s data specialist, I would be scared that my job is being targeted by Cartwright for the future. Yeah, he’s racing now, but when he’s done what is going to stop him from working during the week AND data crunching his favorite sport on the weekends? 

Cartwright had a lot of fun riding over the summer and actually broke his ankle in early October. He only had December to prep in which he “focused on his heat race preparation”. Which makes me believe that with more gate drops this season that he’s only going to get better and he’s already proving that he belongs in every main event this season, which is his goal. 

If you want to find Data Dog Cartwright in the pits he will be with the Madd Parts Kawasaki crew. However, be careful because he may ask you to do algebra. 

Main image: Jessica Reed

Written by Troy Dog

Faster than Slaw Dog. Editor-in-Chief

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