After winning the Anaheim II round, racing to podium finishes at Glendale, Denver, and Salt Lake City, and placing a fighting third overall in the final 2023 AMA 250SX West Region Supercross Championship, Washougal, Washington, native, Levi Kitchen, will now focus his collective attention on Fox Raceway and the opening round of the 2023 AMA Pro Motocross Championship, set for this coming Saturday afternoon in Southern California. Heading out of Florida with his Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing teammates on Wednesday morning, Kitchen, who placed eleventh in the 2022 AMA Pro Motocross Championship, has gained a terrific amount of confidence and speed in the past year and is now driven to make a serious run at the 2023 outdoor title atop his Yamaha YZ250F. “Outdoors I definitely expect to win,” declared Kitchen in a recent interview. “So, that’s the goal.” After finishing up what was his final day of practice and training back in Florida before heading out west to California, Kitchen stopped what he was doing to speak about what will soon be the natural terrain motocross task at hand. Confident, excited, and ready to get to work, Levi Kitchen is ready to go racing.
Racer X: Levi, for some reason I thought you were testing and training out here in California leading into the Pala opener. So, you’ve now got to pack everything up in Florida and get out here for Saturday, huh?
Levi Kitchen: Yes. We tried to see if the team would let us stay out there for the first few rounds of the series, but they weren't into it. So yeah, I'll be flying out of here today and then I’ll go back and forth between each of the rounds.
I went back and read everything you've done in the media during the past couple of weeks and you're really ready for this outdoor season, aren't you?
Yeah, I'm feeling really good. I mean, I think coming into the outdoors, I have a lot more experience now that than I did supercross. Yeah, I'm definitely feeling motivated after the way that supercross season went. So, yeah, it's going to give me a little bit of confidence going into Pala, for sure. I also think my starts are a bit better than they were last year and confidence is better too. And you know, for how well it went last year up until I got hurt, I was coming from fifteenth place through twentieth place with the bad starts I had going. So, I think if I start up front this year, I’ll be a lot easier on myself. And I think really the goal is just to be in the fight. I want to be no worse than in that top five, you know? I want to be in the battle all the time. And I think if I'm consistently there and fighting for podiums and wins, then I’ll find myself up towards the top at the end of the season.
What’s your take on the competition you’ll be up against come Pala and beyond?
It's getting deeper and I think everybody is fairly close. Like I think right now there are four or five or six guys who could honestly potentially win races. I would love to be that standout guy but it's going to come down to putting yourself in a good position and yeah, minimizing the mistakes. I'm really looking forward to it. And I think it'll be a great summer.
How is everything with the team and your race bikes?
The bikes are great. The team is good and yeah, man, it's like everything seems to be great. You know, I really want to win and I'm finally in that position now. I've always wanted to win. I think everybody does, but you know, I think it's realistic that I can do that now. But you know, there's several other guys that are saying the same thing right now, but we'll see. I mean, we got we got about a week and we're going to see who's done the work and where everybody's at. You're really flying on the bike outdoors. It's what we grew up doing when we first started riding a dirt bike. So, it's more natural and I think for people the outdoors comes down to just, I mean, having balls and being able to suffer. You're pretty exhausted and then you have to gear up 30 minutes later and go do it again. So, it's a whole different mindset. For me, it's just basically trying to turn my brain off completely and let my instincts and desire kick in.
How about Pala? How do you feel about that place? You looking forward to it?
Yeah, it's okay. It just depends on the prep and everything. It looks like the weather will be good. So, I don't mind the track. I try to do the best I can and be positive with every track and kind of take the positives away from them. I think a lot of people are going into Pala and they might not be the biggest fan of it. So, I'm okay with it. I mean, I think it races okay. I just need to execute my starts. I think it's important to if you want to be in a fight for you know, a championship. I’m going to have to really go for it. I think you got to let them know early. Yeah, I think by round four, you know what’s up. It’s almost like you see everybody kind of fall into place. Like, they kind of just think this is where they belong in the races and even the championship and this might be where they end up. I tried to not do that last year and I came off a with a pair of eights and then I went and won the first moto Colorado. This year I don't want to go into the second round thinking that somebody is much better than me or whatever the case is.
What do you think? Can you win this thing?
Yeah, I believe I have a shot. I’m going to have to fight hard. I'm really looking forward to it. So yeah, I mean, you know, I feel a lot more prepared than I was last year and now that Jett Lawrence is out of the class. Yeah, it makes it a little bit easier. So yeah, I'm looking forward to it.
