Jordon Smith Interview: St. Louis Press Day
March 30, 2024
Talk us through your main last weekend!
Yeah, well it was going good. Track was really tough and it had changed a lot from the heat race, so it was tough to kind of get it figured out, but started figuring it out. Levi kind of pulled a little bit of a gap and I started closing it up a little bit. I was just trying to focus on and stay hitting my marks and hitting my lines, and ended up going down and yeah, it was kind of a mess from there. Just knocked the breath outta myself really bad and then bars were twisted whenever I got up. Just trying to ride in those ruts with twisted bars was tough. Went down again, got stuck on a tough block, and then getting back on the track, clipped a rider, and clipped another rider. So yeah, it was pretty messy from from there. But yeah, it was going good and just a small mistake that I wish I could have back.You still ended up 14th, right? That's not too bad all things considered.
Yeah, I guess it could have been worse for sure. I could have just been laying there for the rest of the main event. 14th does seem like a last at this point, but yeah, it could have been worse and it's not over yet. So we'll keep trying to get some wins and see what we can do.Can you take us through that first crash?
Yeah, so those ruts were really gnarly and I did the first triple, did it really good and was really lined up, but some of the ruts were kind of crooked on the face of that next one. And I think I just hit a little bit of a crooked rut and both wheels were in the right rut, but it just kind of caught the edge and whenever it did that, it lost drive up the face and kind of threw me into an endo. Another foot or so and I probably would've been able to clear it enough to ride it out. But yeah, I took the bars right underneath the rib cage, and it was kind of the worst spot to land.You okay?
Yeah, I'm all good. My stomach felt like I got hit by Mike Tyson for a couple days, but we're good now.Presumably you were pushing forward trying to get the win in that moment. Talk about the difference between trying to push forward and taking a step back and settling for second in those conditions.
I think that thinking back on it, I wasn't necessarily pushing forward to try to get the win. I was really just trying to focus on hitting my lines and if I catch Levi, I catch him. If not, then it is what it is, you know? So, yeah, I don't really feel like I had the wrong mindset or anything in that moment. I could've probably doubled through that rhythm section and finished third. We had a pretty good big gap on third, so it's unfortunate, but it, it happens, so yeah.Now you're 21 points down. Where's your head at, and what's the mindset moving forward?
We still have four rounds to go with two east, west shootouts, so those can get pretty interesting sometimes. So you never really know what's gonna happen. So definitely a change of mindset now though. A little bit more of just go for wins and not necessarily worry so much about what Levi's doing or what RJ's doing. Just kind of go out and do the best I can. If I win, I win. If I get second or third, like it is what it is. Not really worry about points so much and just see how it ends up. I've been a part of pretty crazy championship battles myself - everyone would've counted Zach out in 2017 in Vegas, but he came back and won, so you never know! I'm gonna need some help for sure, but anything can happen and championship pressure, it's definitely real. You've seen some guys go down last rounds and stuff, so you never know.
