Interview with speedway rider Max Dilger

Max Dilger started his track career at the age of 5. At the age of 14 he started in the speedway league and at 19 he ventured into the English league. Now, this year, he has won gold with the German national team at the World Long Track Championships.

We interviewed the speedway and long track rider to give you an insight into his career:

Max, who exactly are you? Tell us something about yourself.

My name is Max Dilger, I am 32 years old, I come from the beautiful Black Forest and I do motorsports. I’ve been riding speedway since I was 5 years old, competing in World Championships, European Championships, German Championships and because of that I spend the summer months all over Europe.

What are your favorite sports?

Of course, I have many favorite sports. I try to stay fit with many different sports. I ride my bike a lot, whether mountain bike or road bike. In winter I like to snowboard and otherwise I like everything that has two wheels.

Take us back to the beginning please… how did your career start?

My career actually started when I was 5. I saw other kids racing at that time, and then I really wanted to race myself. My father used to race as well, so I actually grew up on the racecourse. And then at 5, I entered my first race event and since then I’ve actually been infected with this virus and can’t get away from it.

What are your experiences with sponsors?

There are always positive and negative ones, of course – I think every athlete who works with sponsors has experienced that. I would say the positives definitely outweigh the negatives. For me, it’s just always important that it’s a win-win situation for both parties. I can’t always want, want, want from the sponsor and do nothing for the sponsor in return. I have to deliver value to the sponsor and also try to bring value to the brand so that then both parties get something out of the sponsorship.

Did you already have sponsors and if so, which ones? And how did you find the sponsors?

Of course, I have had some sponsors in the past and I still have some sponsors who help finance the whole season – without the sponsors, it’s not even possible to do motorsport at the level I do because it’s just far too costly.
I actually searched for all my sponsors myself and managed to find them. There are several ways to approach companies. But since I still see a need for improvement, I actually came up with the idea of working with become-a-pro – simply to deepen and simplify the connections to companies in order to get a bit more professional input.

Which sponsor would you most like to race for and why?

I don’t have a favorite sponsor. I think there are always a lot of cool brands, a lot of top sponsors! The important thing for me is simply that the cooperation fits, that it is a win-win situation for both parties, and then it can become a great and good cooperation with every sponsor.

How often do you participate in competitions?

In general, it’s a bit seasonal for me. I have different disciplines, different countries to ride in. Generally, between 35 and 45 events are planned per season on average. Our season always runs from March to October, so our schedule is quite full during the summer months.

How often do you practice your sport?

How often I practice… that’s not so easy on the motorcycle, of course, and quite difficult for us. We have few training opportunities. Before the season, we usually go somewhere in the south, where the weather conditions are much better than here in Germany. This year I was already in Croatia for 3 days at the end of February for testing and due to the high number of competitions that I then have distributed throughout Europe, there is quite little time for training on the bike. But of course, physical fitness is also extremely important, and I’m actually in the sports program every day, whether it’s on the mountain bike, on the road bike, running, in the gym – there are actually various training options for me.

What has been the best competition so far and why?

I think there are too many…too many good competitions. I have already been able to win several titles, I am multiple German champion in the individual and in the team. I could win the 2nd Polish League, I could win the pair European Championship with the German national team. So, there are already some titles that have been nice achievements and of course you like to take home trophies.

Who are your idols?

I have a few role models, very sport-specific, but of course there are also other greats like Michael Schumacher, like Valentino Rossi – these are simply people who influenced me in my childhood, who did an incredible amount for the respective sport and who were simply outstanding sportsmen.

What do you think are the benefits for an athlete to sign up on become-a-pro.net?

The advantage of registering with become-a-pro is simply networking. I think this is becoming more and more important! It is increasingly difficult to approach companies. So, it is always more important to have a direct contact person at companies and until you reach someone there, until you know someone there, that is just extremely difficult. And then to really get someone on the line there is even more difficult, because they simply don’t have the time for something like that. They get too many requests. And I think with become-a-pro you simply have the advantage that you are already categorized, you are filtered and companies are addressed that already have a target group that is interesting for them and that simply makes life easier. You don’t waste unnecessary time with thousands of emails, company requests to any info@ email accounts and so you can find potential sponsors in a more targeted way.

You could already get to know a part of the become-a-pro team – what is your impression?

My impression of the become-a-pro team is absolutely positive – incredibly nice, helpful people who really take care of the entire process very, very well, who provide incredibly good assistance – whether it’s about creating the profile, what’s important, what you have to pay attention to. So far, the cooperation has been really, really positive!

What do you think will happen next with become-a-pro?

I think become-a-pro will grow significantly in the next few years because the demand is simply increasing. The whole business, all the sports, the whole professional life – it’s all so fast-moving and you don’t have the time to look through thousands of sponsor requests one by one. And I think that if a sponsor is interested in addressing a certain target group, then you can simply filter that beforehand and become-a-pro can look for suitable athletes for the companies’ demands. And I think that’s just a win-win situation for everybody.

How do you assess that become-a-pro can support athletes?

Become-a-pro can help every athlete because there are so many companies behind become-a-pro that have a direct connection to each other. There are direct contacts and become-a-pro knows exactly what a company wants and become-a-pro also knows exactly what the athlete needs, what the athlete wants. And in this way become-a-pro can simply be the interface here and really bring together what both are looking for and so the search for sponsors is much faster and much easier.

What are your plans for the future?

My plans for the future are still the same. As in the past, I would still like to continue racing successfully for a few more years. I’m qualified for the World Championship again this year – of course I’m aiming for a top 5 finish. I have several league contracts in foreign professional leagues, so of course this year I’ll try to go to as many events as possible and take part in them, and then we’ll see what happens at the end of the season.

👉 In the meantime, Max has won gold with the German national team at the long track world championships 🏆

You can find more information about Max Dilger here.

If you are looking for suitable sponsors to advance your career, simply register now at become-a-pro.netand take advantage of the opportunity to introduce yourself to attractive sponsors.