Late in the first 250 Class moto of the day at two of the 2022 Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross Championship, RJ Hampshire had a crash that cost him a finish inside the top ten, where he was most of the moto. Following his 16th, Hampshire did not lineup for the second moto. The Rockstar Energy Husqvarna rider’s 16-DNS landed him 21st overall on the day and through two rounds, the #24 sits 11th in the 250 Class standings with 37 points.
Husqvarna said the following on Hampshire in the post-race press release:
“After just narrowly missing the overall podium at Round 1, Hampshire came into the weekend looking for redemption in the form of a top-three finish. Fifth in qualifying, Hampshire started off the day strong but he found himself battling just inside the top-10 for most of the first moto. He experienced an issue late in the race, setting him back to a 16th place finish, and later made the decision to not line up for Moto 2.”
This afternoon, Hampshire provided an update on Instagram. Below is his full post:
“Not the post I wanted to make.
Had a crash the first moto with a few laps to go, I was hurting but didn’t think it was too bad. Turns out I was wrong. I landed on one of those stakes on the side of the track and it went under my arm pit, through my rib cage and cut the top of my right lung. I had surgery Saturday once I got to the hospital. They cleaned the cut up and placed a chest tube in to keep my lung from collapsing. I had to spend a couple nights in the hospital because of the tube but looks like I’ll be out of here soon. It sounds gnarly but the good news is that it won’t take long to heal up! Be back soon 👊🏼👍🏼
Hampshire's teammate Jalek Swoll, who had a crash on the opening lap of the first moto of the year last week, was a race day decision on whether he would race the second round due to his banged up shoulder. Swoll decided to in fact race and was running inside the top five until on the 14th lap he went down on a wall jump while battling Seth Hammaker. Swoll would finish the race ninth. Then in the second moto, he would suffer a crash on the opening lap and not finish the race. Swoll said the following in the team release:
“This was my first time riding this track and I had a really good start in Moto 1. I was running top-three for most of the race and my fitness and speed felt good but the crash that I had from Pala kind of just beat me down today. My shoulder wasn’t ready to go but we still showed up and put our best foot forward and it kind of gave up on me in the later stages of the day. Trying to get this thing fully 100 percent for Thunder Valley to do the same things. We're in a good spot, we just have to keep pushing away.”
