Slaw
Two things we rarely see from Jett Lawrence happened at RedBud: he was caught, passed, and gapped in a moto, and he publicly showed frustration.
The Lawrence brothers are typically measured in everything they do—on and off the track. They typically don’t fall into “trash talk” antics. They speak truthfully and provide forthcoming answers post-race. Whether you agree with what is being said or not, at least you know it’s an earnest answer.
And while Jett was able to win the first moto at RedBud after Hunter caught and passed him and opened a gap before falling on the final lap, he was visibly frustrated with the progress of his foot injury.
On Monday, the Title 24 podcast, hosted by Ricky Carmichael and Ryan Villopoto, shared behind-the-scenes footage from RedBud that showed a visibly frustrated Jett discussing his inability to ride at full strength.
Jett expanded on those frustrations during the post-race press conference, explaining that his foot continues to limit him—especially in the deep RedBud ruts, where he struggled to stay balanced and ride the way he knows he’s capable of.
You are now three points down in second-place here in the championship. It looked like you had a little bit of a rough day and you alluded to that on the podium.
Jett Lawrence: Normally I really like these conditions and I can ride them well. I don’t lose it just out of nowhere. I just struggled with my foot today and trying to be balanced, especially with these ruts. This like muddy sand, just pulls you in and obviously I have all my weight on my left foot, so then coming in, it just really makes it more drastic instead of being even. So I struggled a lot with my balance. And I gave my foot a good few flex. So, this was a rough day in the office, but we’ll go back and get better and try and be a little bit better for Southwick.
Is your foot feel more sore after maybe dabbing it a couple of times out there?
A little bit. After the race, it was pretty stiff and sore.
I saw you talking to Jorge for a minute. You had a highlight real moment today where you both did a little bit of gymnastics. What did Jorge have to say?
I came around the first turn in qualifying and hit the soft stuff. I thought it was going to be okay, but the mud that they swept to the side just pulls you in and it stopped my rear wheel so much that it pulled the front in down and it ripped my right hand off of the throttle and I went down. I got out of it pretty smoothly. And then as I’m trying to slow down and I turned back around and poor Jorge went for a bit of a ride. I was like, I didn’t know what to react about it because it just all happened so quickly. And I was trying to look if the flaggers were out or nothing, so AP was coming next. I threw my hands up, but thankfully he saw. A little bit of a gymnastics, you could say.
Speaking of your foot, I was looking to how you were referencing to the crew behind the podium and I saw you were kind of like motioning. I don’t know if you’re motioning about brake pedal position. I know you typically run high, you’re able to get very far back under braking, you’re a pretty lanky build. Is that something that’s really tough for you right now is being able to ride in the position you normally want and actuate your controls?
Normally I weight the rear quite a lot and I’m struggling to do that with one leg right now and coming into braking is where I really need it to hold that rear end. I can’t get my knees back and brake as well. It’s just a bit of a struggle on just my behalf. It’s difficult because I’m trying to work it out myself, but also the team’s obviously helping and trying to make the bike that will make it a little easier on me as well. It’s a bit difficult trying to race with one leg.
You were very frustrated with that Moto 1 victory because you felt like you inherited the win instead of earning it straight up. And then Moto 2, you get a good start early, but you have the couple mistakes. Was there any anger that spilled over a little bit and really made you think like, “Oh, I got to go up there and get these guys and really prove that I can win this race?”
I don’t need to prove anything. everyone knows my record of wins, so it’s not like I need to go out there and prove something to everyone. It’s just more so racing for myself. It sucks right now because riding right now is normally my … I normally love riding and right now it’s been a pain in the butt with my foot so it’s taken one of the things I love doing. It’s just a struggle and obviously, Hunter, that first one, he deserved that one. He caught me; passed me. I was just kind of not having a really good flow. He had a bit of bad luck with getting a rock stuck in the chain, which stalled the bike and then it’s just like you’ll take it, but you obviously know deep down you can’t say like, “Yeah, I won that first one.” I just got gifted.
With the foot, is there even a mental battle to that within the moto where you could be in the flow and everything’s going great and maybe you dab it once and it’s hard to find that flow again because it stings or it just kind of takes you out of it for a minute.
100%. You can be in a pretty good flow, but it’s hard with the mental because I’m doing stuff on the track and I may have a good flow, but I always have in the back of my head, imagine if I had another good ankle, I could be going so much faster and making it could be a lot easier because I’m just having to work twice as hard, almost. Every now and then, flex it, give it a good tweak and a little quick yell out of pain, but then we kind of try and get back into it.
How about off the bike training? I know during the week you’re trying to not ride as much trying to save your ankle, but is there anything off the bike that you’re even able to do that doesn’t affect your ankle? Do you think that that’s affecting fitness in the long run on hot days like today?
Yeah, 100%. I can cycle, but it still swells up after I get done in my cleats and it still hurts to unclip. That’s one way of getting our cardio up. I obviously can’t run, so that’s out of the option. And even with swimming, you’re still pushing quite down hard with your foot, which really flexes. It’s a bit of a pickle, but we’re just putting up with it really. I’ve come this far. I obviously can’t say quit here where we’ve been able to kind of maintain and be able to work my way around it. I think this today was not an ideal track for it. But I’m not riding as much during the week to try and save it and obviously it could be effecting, it could not. Who knows? We’ll see.
You’ve mentioned in the past this season about having to manage your pace to manage Hunter. Sometimes, earlier in the race, maybe back it off because you know how strong he’s going to be at the end. In that first moto, even with the difficulties you were dealing with, how aware were you of Hunter’s position? Did you know that he was going to get you?
No, I thought I might be able to fight him off. I knew if he got to me, I just didn’t have that explosive to hold the bike with my legs and send it. I had not too bad lines, but I just had a really bad lap with lappers and he just caught right up and once he got next to me, I’m like, “Oh yeah, this one’s a bit done.” Just because it seemed like he just had a bit better pace going. I try and keep tabs on him, but I try just to focus on my flow and my lines.
Photos: octopi.media
