After missing last weekend’s Nashville Supercross East/West Showdown, Kawasaki's Seth Hammaker is returning to the starting line today. The Pennsylvania native is excited to race in front of his home crowd as he anticipates lots of support from family and friends. We caught up to the #43 during press day for an update on his shoulder and to hear his thoughts heading into the weekend.
Racer X Online: Seth, walk us through the shoulder injury, the recovery from that and everything.
Seth Hammaker: Yeah, I crashed at Foxborough, like pretty early on in the main event. Went down in the whoops and kind of busted up my shoulder a little bit, nothing too serious. But took last weekend off, just kind of wasn't strong enough to get back on the bike yet. This week, I got back on the bike and rode two days, felt good, felt strong. And we're a lot better, ready to go for this weekend and didn't want to miss this one.
Talk about this weekend being a home race for you. I believe you did the visits with local news stations this morning. You’ve got family and friends coming out. What’s it like being the guy for a race.
Yeah, it's been awesome to be here. Got in yesterday and showed up and just like, “All right, it's time to go.” So, I've been thinking about this one all week and been excited. So, got a lot of family friends, like you said. Super excited to perform in front of them. A lot of them have never seen a supercross before so super excited.
We saw you were selling some merch; you expect some support coming out here to the stadium. How many times have you raced pro in Pennsylvania? I think just at High Point Raceway in 2022, right? So, just talk about how cool it is to be able to have a race in your home state, let alone so close to home.
Yeah, it's awesome. I raced High Point in 2022. But like the outdoor stuff, it's a little bit different than supercross because I feel like supercross attracts like more of a city audience rather than like the outdoors is just more of like a hardcore fan. So, and same for like my family and stuff, like a lot of them have been to an outdoor but they never been to a supercross, I mean, there just hasn't been any, like, super close for them to go to. So, this is right down the road and I'm super excited for them to check it out because it's a lot more of a show, a lot more cool to watch, I feel like, than an outdoor.
So, despite the injury you really wanted to race this one. Now you’re here. Do you feel like extra pressure knowing there's gonna be a lot of people watching you?
Not really, honestly. I mean, I always feel I like pressure. I think pressure is a good thing. And if you have pressure, I think that means you're a winner, you know, like you're trying, it's what you want to do. And I feel like that doesn't really change [for a home race]. I feel the same way as if I was at any other race, but it'd be special to get this one, a win in front of them.
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You have kinda had a rough year so far in terms of results. Thinking big picture, Pro Motocross, going healthy into that and even SMX, with the injury, have you kind of shifted your goals? Like, are you thinking like Pro Motocross is the goal now, and even long-term SuperMotocross is the goal?
Yeah, I mean, for the rest of the supercross, we got this one in Salt Lake City left, so just try and put in my best results I can for these two. And then after that it's on to Pro Motocross and I obviously want to be up there and just improve on like what I've done in the past on outdoors, really. Be a podium guy there and, you know, just be consistent. I feel like I'm good outdoors: I have the speed, my endurance is better than it has been. So, I feel like I should be good there. And then obviously SuperMotocross just kind put myself in a good position heading into that. and there's a lot at stake there. So, I'm really excited to go to go race the SuperMotocross series again and see where we end up in that.
And obviously, this is a whole new venue, we've never raced here before. We haven't been in Philly for over 40 years. What would you anticipate the dirt being like? Is it gonna get rough and rutted? Is it gonna be a little bit of that kind of Foxborough for almost kind of like a little bit rocky looks like there's a little bit of stuff in it so far. Like, do you kind of know what to expect of the dirt so far?
A little bit. It's hard to tell exactly. But I feel like it's kind of gonna be looser on the corners, not as rutted. It does look like it's… Foxborough, kinda the same as that because doesn't really get too rutted either. But, it's kind of reddish, but I don't think it's gonna get super rutted. So, I think it's gonna be more like that slide in the rear brake, drifting the rear end around a little bit in the corners. So, yeah, but I'm actually, I'm glad it's like that. I like that style.
So, what was your training program like growing up? Pennsylvania, we have winters that are pretty harsh. As you transition into the pros, obviously changed a little bit, but what was your training program like throughout the year as an amateur?
Like as an amateur or, well, when I was growing up riding, I mean, when I was 10, we moved to a house that had like 10 acres and we just had a little turn track. And I would ride there as long as I could throughout the year, then when winter would hit and I would just kind of be sitting around snowboarding, whatever. [Laughs] And then when spring came around and start riding again. And then once I kind of took it more serious as my later years, got on the 250s, got hooked up with team Green and Kawasaki and kind of had to take it more serious, so, I would go down to Florida during the winter, keep up with my riding and stuff. But, yeah, I definitely miss being home in Pennsylvania. It's just, I don't know, it's where I grew up, I've done most of my riding here all my life, so it feels good to be back. I don't know, just something about the air feels a little bit fresher here.
Being from here, are there PA guys who you grew up racing or guys from around here within the state or nearby? Like, is anybody specific you had a rivalry with when you were growing up as an amateur?
As an amateur, me and Logan Leitzel. We grew up really close together. He's from Dillsburg, I'm from like Harrisburg area and that's really close and we…he would always beat me a lot growing up, like, as an amateur, he would smoke me. We would battle and stuff. But, yeah, that was like my main rival, I guess at the amateur races growing up. And, yeah, we would see each other every weekend racing.
Who was one pro rider from Pennsylvania you looked up to when you were an amateur? Someone you saw and thought, “Maybe that could be me someday.
I would have to say it's Lowell Spangler. He was from PA. I can remember this one race, I was at Miles Mountain, and he was there, he was in the A class and he was just smoking everybody and he just did that race for whatever reason. And he was on Team Green at the time, and I was like, “Man, that guy is fast,” and I just wanted to be like him. [Laughs] But, yeah, he's cool.
Main image by Mitch Kendra
