Anaheim 1 is finally in the books and the 250SX class did not disappoint as far as excitement goes. RJ Hampshire may have set himself apart as championship favorite after taking the win, but Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing’s Jordon Smith and Pro Circuit Kawasaki’s Levi Kitchen are not about to make it easy for him. Smith and Kitchen rounded out the podium and then sat down with the press afterwards to talk about their night.
Jordon Smith | 2nd Overall
For you, Jordan, I feel like you primarily race east most. You, so how many times you raced West? And what was it like to do to the Anaheim 1 thing?
I raced [West Region] one time, in 2016. A1, I was in podium position until like five to go and I fell. So, that [tonight] was good. Always, I feel like more nerves coming to A1 than it is even the first round East Coast. Like you're obviously nervous either way, but it's even more here. But it was good. Got good starts and rode good and made some good changes on the bike throughout the day. So really can't complain with how it went.
Jordan and then RJ, if you guys can both answer this, Jordan first, you guys have been racing each other forever. I can think of going back to milestone when Mike LaRocco was your team manager. You guys were doing scrimmages looking like that heat race. How is it to battle with a guy that you know really well. You've raced against for seven, eight, ten years at this point. How is it in that mindset? You know, he's probably not gonna do something sketchy, but he's gonna go for it just as bad as you want to.
Jordon: I mean, if you think we're still sketchy, you should have seen us on the scrimmage days in 2015.
RJ: I don't know how we’re still here right now [laughs].
Jordon: But, no, it's good. I mean, you know what you're gonna get with him. He's gonna be fast every night. He's gonna do the big lines. He's gonna get good starts. He's gonna put himself in good positions. So, you just have to try and be better and tonight you were really good. We actually got tangled up, him and I did in the second turn and both got stuck and had to untangle our bikes. But he made some really good passes in the beginning and just kinda checked out. So, maybe you have to work on a little bit of intensity to match his for the first few laps.
RJ: Yeah, I mean, we have the same respect for each other and then it shows up on the racetrack when, you're gonna get your best for both of us. I told him before the start today and I was like, “Man, I hate racing, you.” We're both gonna try to kill ourselves just to try to win like it doesn't matter. And yeah, we had a good battle there in the heat race. And I knew I had to make it kind of happen quick there in that main event to try to get away. It's cool though that we're battling for wins at Anaheim 1. Where, you know, eight years ago we were on the same team came in as rookies and both had our struggles.
Jordon: We were battling to not be the slowest guy at the track that day.
RJ: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we made it through the whoops on the gnarliest days, which was a surprise.
Jordan, the talk is always the Star Racing Yamaha 250F. Everybody knows that it's fast and you guys have a new bike this year and from the outside looking in just from the stands, everybody was wide open and given it everything they had and it seemed like you could hold a little bit smoother around the track. You weren't having to ring the bike out for every little ounce of power. It seemed like you just had an extra edge on everybody in the power department. It's not a new topic but, you do have a new bike so talk about just how that bike adapts to race conditions.
Yeah, the bike is really good. It's mainly chassis differences. I think that the engine is actually, I think the exact same, maybe some small changes. But power wise we're pretty close to that. We make little improvements every year. But, yeah, Brad and Trevor and Georgie, those guys on the motor side, they got it dialed in and the bikes are really good. So, the new bike overall was good. It passed the eye test today, I think we definitely made some changes. We did a lot of testing. You know until last year I really didn't do a whole lot of testing. Like the bike was already like so solid. They knew the base platform and it's kind of where we were but this year we had a lot more testing to do with it being a new chassis and all that stuff. So, it was good to come here and get that first race out of the way and it handled it.
Jordan, 20th podium. You might not realize it, you're tied with Eli Tomac and Mike Brown in all time podiums [125/250SX]. There are only 14 guys ever in the history of the sport in the 250 class [to podium more than you]. Does it feel like that? Do you feel like the young buck?
Yeah, we've been in it a long time, but to be honest with you, no it doesn't feel like that. It feels like I've had two different careers to be honest with you. I've said it a couple of times but, it feels like I've had a career from 2015 to 2019 and then it feels like I took three years off and started back again in 2022. So, yeah, it's kind of just like from 2022 kind of built that year on the Firepower team and then got the ride at Star and got some podiums last year and we had a good year but just not quite on that level and I feel like I've taken the next step now and it felt good tonight to be up there and like I said it doesn't feel like that because I feel like I've had two careers. That's what it feels like.
Jordan, you got into second place about five minutes left in the race. How beat up was the track? How comfortable were you feeling on your setup? And were you gonna go for the lead at that point or just stay in second?
Yeah, I mean, RJ had a pretty big lead by the time I got to second. So, there wasn't a whole lot of separation on the track time. It was definitely tough to get that long rhythm, but I mainly wasn't really focused on trying to go for the win or anything like that. It was just focused on putting my laps in, just trying to stay focused in the whoops. They were not hard tonight, but they got tricky in the main, they were pretty tore up.
So, then with the red cross flag coming out, it kind of just like, it was hard to keep pushing. I think we all slowed down quite a bit. Like if you go back and look at the next segment times of it, the whole track slowed down quite a bit once the red cross flag came out because it was hard to get that intensity back going after we had to roll really the only big rhythm section on the track. So, uh, yeah, I was pretty happy with where I was at. Just need to make some passes a little earlier a little quicker to have a shot at pushing RJ. But overall, it's good.
Jordan, the new bike was mentioned, and you can test and test the test during the off season, but nothing compares to what you're gonna learn on race night. Was there anything that you felt you learned that you wanna change?
Yeah, my bike was pretty good today. In press day yesterday, I felt very uncomfortable. I didn't feel good at all. I had a couple actually close moments on a triple that was very steep. And they had brought a [suspension] setting to me a few weeks ago, that they felt like was gonna be better for me. I didn't like it at the practice. I rode it for almost a week and I just didn't feel comfortable on it. I went back to my other stuff and felt really good right away and so that's what I was on, but we changed back to it after press day just like you said, you can't replicate tracks. They're so steep the way that they are built, it's completely different and you could have them built the same way, but in two days they're way more mellow after couple of rains. You know, the middles get washed in and filled in. So, yeah, we can go home and kind of build off of that and kind of fine tune that setting for me at home and see if we can get it maybe even a little bit better for San Fran. Overall, it was good.
Jordan, you mentioned the three years you kind of took off. What have you learned throughout those years?
In 2019, my wrist injury, I wasn't really even sure if I was gonna be able to come back from it. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with my wrist. There was nothing broken, there's nothing torn like we couldn't figure out why I hurt so bad, but I couldn't do anything. And then an ACL 2020, a shoulder in ‘21 and those are pretty big injuries as well. So, yeah, learning from those years, you know, some of the crashes were my fault, some of them weren't but, you know, in a roundabout way they were. You have to put yourself in good positions. You have to be smart those first couple laps because people are gonna be going everywhere. And yeah, I think as you get older, from all the other injuries, your body hurts. So, you don't wanna hit the ground anymore. So, you figure out a way not to.
And then one last one I would say with your family, just talk a bit about that and how that has changed your perspective and just kind of helped you out mentally a little bit as well.
Yeah, it's awesome having my wife and my little girl here. Having her around, it makes the good times better and it makes the bad times not as bad. So, it's cool coming back to the truck whether you do good or too bad and she'll put a smile on your face. It's a cool feeling having her here and how much she's grown up from last year and she recognized me podium tonight when Katie brought her down there. So, that's cool. A special moment for sure.
Levi Kitchen | 3rd Overall
Levi, it was a little chaotic at the end with the Red Cross in that big rhythm. You passed Max [Vohland] there and I think [Jo] Shimoda also passed Max there. As a rider, is that going through your mind? Like, when to jump and jumping and passing there? And were you thinking about that afterwards if like the AMA would be questioning that pass?
Levi Kitchen: I knew Max would be probably pretty pissed about it, but I've been racing for long enough now, once you're past the guy who's on the ground, you’re all good. So, it was kind of weird, the Red Cross [flag] was not on the first jump either. So, the first time I think I three’ed in and there was no Red Cross and then it's like they started it, it was a weird deal. You had people rolling the whole thing thinking they had to. Max, he just happened to roll too much. So yeah, it was a kind of a greasy move of me, but I mean, it is what it is.
Levi, correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like you had the option to stay with Star, but chose to go with Pro Circuit. You might be one of the first guys ever that's willingly left that program. What was the thought process there? And what were you thinking that you could potentially gain by moving teams?
There's a lot to it, honestly, probably more than I can fit in. But just the big thing was, I think I needed a little bit of a change and kinda wanted to go back to some of the things I did before I got on the team and that was just kind of almost work a little bit more alone and just be around, you know, some different people and have a little bit of freedom. So, Mitch was more than willing to do that for me. And you know, he's letting me still be in Florida and I'm over at Sandbox, obviously. I got a good group of guys around me. So yeah, I just need a little bit of a change and I think I'm a little bit happier. I'm kind of enjoying it a little bit more. You always still have to put the work in but I have a smile on my face every day.
Did it feel like more, I guess, almost like a football team in a sense? Like everyone noticed there that like the motos start at the same time, it’s like scrimmage, scrimmage, scrimmage. Is that almost the way that that team is like building itself in a sense?
Yeah, I think so, I think a lot of teams, maybe even RJ at Aldon's is similar to that, and I still do that obviously. Like me, Ken [Roczen] Chase [Sexton] and Tom [Vialle] will do motos like that, but there's a couple of things I wanted to work on personally. And that's kind of why I changed a little bit. Every once in a while, if I wanna take a day and really work on something for myself, then I could do that. So, just the freedom side.
