After a fall in the heat race and a bad start in the main, it looked like Jo Shimoda’s debut ride on his Honda HRC was off to a bad start. However, Jo kept charging and by the end of the night he finished just off the podium in fourth. Coming in a favorite to win, fourth is not ideal, but considering the way his night started it could have gone a lot worse. Our Kellen Brauer caught up with Jo after the race to get his thoughts on A1.
Racer X: All right, Jo Shimoda, A1, you can exhale a little bit because we're through A1, you got a fourth. That's not exactly what you want, but at least now we're racing, right?
Jo Shimoda: Yeah, we're back. I mean, last time I was here, I'm pretty sure I went to the hospital. So, that's a good thing. But, yeah, overall, I feel like everyone knows, but I made it tougher on myself making mistake on the heat race which put me into really far outside of the gate, which had no [good] options. Yeah, just gotta do better.
Can you walk me through the heat race fall a little bit? Was it just the tuck of the front or anything like that?
Yeah, they watered after practice, and it was a little bit slick and it's kind of hard to see with the lights. Like it all looks the same, I'm pretty sure on the TV it looks super tacky but no, when I just grabbed a front brake, and started to turn more than I thought, and I just fell down.
I guess in the end though, the riding in the main event was what you wanted, I assume?
So, the recovery was good. Good part today I didn't make it terrible. I feel like from where I started, usually in the past I'm slowing the pace. What I'm trying to work on, [is] to do that better. Today they said I had a good pace during the 15 [minutes]. So, improvements there, but for sure, next week, stay focused.
Right. I know everyone comes in and says, “My bike's great. Everything's awesome.” Then race time happens and things can be a little bit different. Did you feel that you found some things in this first round that you're excited to work for next week?
For sure, yeah. Like you said, my first time on this bike, you know, on racing and, even getting used to how the vibes are in the pits where everything [at Honda HRC] is at. But yeah, it's only one round, so I think fourth won't hurt much. But definitely have to catch up.
