Chase Sexton spoke to the media after THAT comeback ride in the second moto at Hangtown coming from last to first.
On what’s going through his head after crashing around the first corner…
I’m an idiot, that’s pretty much all I was saying… I was like this is probably the dumbest thing I could have done and I just slid out all by myself which made it even worse so I was just I’m like I’m just going to go as fast as I can for as long as I can and see where I get. So, that was kind of my mentality and it worked out. You don’t get to do that very much especially in this class so I’ll take it and it was pretty exciting.
Looking back at the moto if he can remember much about it or if he was just in the zone and really focused…
Yeah, I mean, like I said, it’s one of my best races I think I’ve ever had. I mean I was pretty conscious of what was going on. I knew that I really had to send it to get back to where I needed to be. I had a few hairy moments down the hills probably like two so those kind of get you back into the realization of what’s going on. I think for me today I was just really comfortable with my bike and even though my starts are still pretty bad we got the bike working really well. I was able to really push to my limit which is something hasn’t really been happening. I haven’t really gotten that in the last year so I was happy with that. Obviously it was a bummer to see Jett go down, that’s not how you want to beat somebody and his crash was really gnarly. I’ve had a few of those but yeah he’ll be back and the boys are riding good all day. It was a tough race but like I said I was just comfortable and able to really push my limit.
On how he was able to gain time on the down hill section…
To be honest after I watched press day yesterday I’m like dude these guys need to take out some of these because they made these jumps, these singles I don’t really think they plan us jumping them but they made them close together and you’re going downhill so you have a lot of momentum and I saw Hayden all those guys doing those doubles. I was like this could be pretty bad so they eventually cut them down but I mean those downhills get really gnarly, enough that they don’t really need to put rollers in them and I feel like the speeds compared to past Hangtowns like the the first downhill was really fast, I was a big fan of the off camber so I don’t know… I wasn’t a huge fan of the downhills but the rest of the track like with the changes that they did make, I thought were really good. I actually enjoyed the track, the jumps are fun, the downhill is just a little bit too fast for my liking.
On coming through the pack on the first lap after going down at turn one…
To be honest I feel like I was very well aware of what was going on. I didn’t jump a few jumps the first lap just because I mean I already put myself on the ground it’s not worth going down again and when you have that many guys it can get pretty sketchy. I really took my time and picked my places where I would keep my wheels on the ground and where I could make passes. I didn’t want to risk it if someone didn’t jump and if they did jump I was like I’m just going to single or double it. I’m not going to risk landing on somebody but once you get through the first couple of packs and you can kind push forward and start being aggressive. But the first two laps I was really on my toes and trying to pick around people because I mean in my mind I never thought I was going to get back to first so I was like well if I can just salvage a podium after being down on the first lap that’d be awesome. I was being pretty smart I feel like.
On how many tear offs he pulled and when he started to think he could win the moto…
I pulled a lot of tear offs the first couple of laps. They watered the track quite a bit so, yeah I was using a lot of tear offs and then I was pulling, like I don’t know how many I had on, like maybe 24 while it kind of gets hard to pull the same. I grab two at one time or three at one time and then I have one flying off the side. You know what’s funny is the first lap I couldn’t pull my first tear off, it was like stuck for some reason so I don’t know I pulled a lot of tear offs. I didn’t really think I could win. I mean my whole goal was just to get past Hunter when I saw they were close enough but I didn’t think that was realistic when I went down and then when I got past those guys I saw AP and I was like man I’m already this far I might as well just keep going so I kind of took like a lap breather, not a lap breather but I kind of like regathered myself and then I just went all in on the last lap and I was close enough. I knew I was fast on this side of the track with the rollers, that’s kind of where I made all my passes so I sent it down the hill and my bike was fairly straight for the moto, I was pretty confident I was going to get in there and then AP… he saw me and he twisted the gas a little bit more so it was fun and that corner after that before the mechanic start was my favorite corner all day so once I got in there I was like okay, we’re good.
On the track conditions…
Aside from the downhills I think they had to keep those somewhat smooth because with how fast they were that just makes it even sketchier but I think coming into the turns it still got rough. The turns are rough but when they don’t water it as much I think it actually allows you to use more of the track. I think you see a lot of even Pala, there was places that we didn’t even really use because it got really deep in the turns and here I think we used pretty much the whole track so I mean you can look at it both ways. It doesn’t get as gnarly with the ruts and when it’s super deep once you get in the rut you can’t move. Before the finish line there was 10 lines in that turn and I think but yeah it’s just preference. I think for me you can move around more when the track’s not as deep.
On testing going into Hangtown and if he made any big changes to the bike…
We went back to the drawing board last week. I didn’t even think in the second moto when I was behind Jett (at Pala), I didn’t feel like I was riding that great and I feel like my bike was just beating the crap out of me. So I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do this for 11 rounds. It’s not fun when your bike’s beating the crap out of you so we tested Tuesday at Pala, made some changes but then we went to this track in the hills on Thursday and they ripped it super deep and the hills were pretty good for testing and then also the ruts were good. So, we did some really good with the team, they found some good changes in the shock and we changed the fork a little bit. It was way better, I was able to really accelerate out of the turns better today. Last week I was really losing a lot to Hunter and Jett out of the turns and I was just losing overall comfort. I was really having to send it and not be like precise. I feel like when I’m precise but can also send it that it’s the best of both worlds, trying to find the middle grounds hard but today I feel like we found it.
On the amount of effort he put into the second moto but he didn’t even look tired after race two…
I wouldn’t say I’m an emotional guy on TV or even after races but I feel like I showed quite a bit of emotion after I crossed the finish line. I had chills, it was it was really special and I mean you don’t get a lot in someone’s career. That’s something that’s going to be pretty special for me. Yeah, when you get in the flow and I mean we’ve seen Eli (Tomac) do it, we’ve seen a lot of guys do it, Jeffrey (Herlings) too. I think it’s not impossible obviously but I’m just happy I was able to do it and I was pretty emotional crossing the finish line.
On going through dark times and if he thought he’d ever get back to this point…
I was in a pretty dark spot I’m going to say during the middle of Supercross and even preseason so to be able to climb myself out of that towards the end the Supercross, I felt good. Even now I’m pretty proud of what the team and I have done done. Especially for me, I feel like I really had to work on my mental side and just try and be positive through the the hard times. I’m a pretty emotional person when it comes to like races and stuff like that so when it’s not going my way I I usually would get down. But I was able to kind of claw myself back out of it and yeah the never give up mentality is something that will always be with me and it’s something I’m pretty proud of.
