After a difficult start to the 2025 Pro Motocross Championship, Levi Kitchen rebounded during Hangtown’s second round of the season, capturing third overall in what were scorching Northern Californian conditions. Check In with Kitchen as he recounts what was a tough day at the office, and how important this result was.

Image: Octopi Media.

Levi, congratulations on rounding out our podium here at Hangtown. After the recent changes to both training and diet, would you credit that to your overall podium today?

I’m not sure, it was a suffer either way today. I’m doing my best to be better obviously, there is still a lot of room for improvement, but overall, after getting 16th last weekend, this is a good step forward for me, so I’m excited to keep going and get better each weekend. Especially when we go east, I enjoy those tracks a lot, so I’m looking forward to that.

What did you do in the days leading up to this race, knowing that it was going to be miserable with the heat?

It’s tough for me, I’m sure Haiden [Deegan] had a good week down in Florida, and maybe he didn’t need to change too much. For me, I was at Pala until 4:30pm on Tuesday, trying to do some stuff with the bike, so you kind of need to manage your days too, which is tough. I think that’s important, and now I’m sure everybody this week is going to take it pretty mellow.

Image: Octopi Media.

You had the mechanical last week, which was unfortunate. How important was it to get back on track this weekend with a podium?

Yeah, it was super important for me. That was out of my control, I think a rock hit my chain and it derailed so…but either way, last weekend, I think I might’ve got ninth overall, which wasn’t really where I wanted to be. Mitch [Payton] chewed my ass a little bit throughout the week, telling me to step it up [laughs]. Today was a lot better, this is where I need to be. We need to be in the fight a little more, and I need to work on starts, but other than that, it was good.

They added a lot of sand to the track this year. Did it race any differently?

I think this was the best Hangtown that I’ve ridden so far. I think it raced well, you could move around a little more, but there were also some ruts, so I thought it was really good. Sometimes it sucks where they prep [between the sessions], but I thought today it was pretty smart and it made some of those turns fun, you could rip them during the first few laps.