The 250SX East Region begins next weekend in Atlanta, and it’s wide open. Lots of contenders, lots of storylines. Most people don’t want to talk about them. Too often in the short 250SX championships, the favorite ends up faltering.
The industry is starting to catch on.
A few weeks ago I asked Troy Lee Designs/Red Bull KTM team manager Tyler Keefe about Justin Hill. A year ago Hill was coming into supercross with huge momentum. At the Monster Energy Cup, on a 450, he shadowed Trey Canard for most of the first two main events, and left the rest of the 450 regulars, including Ryan Dungey, behind. Hill finished fourth in the 2014 250SX West Region Championship behind Jason Anderson, Cole Seely and Dean Wilson. As they moved up, I fully expected Hill to take command—in fact I picked him to be the favorite.
I didn’t see Cooper Webb’s level of domination coming. But Hill’s season was a disaster anyway. He had a concussion not long before the season began and was out of sorts. He won heat races but crashed, faded and struggled in the mains. He finished fourth in the standings again, but dropped from four podiums to two, and scored 43 fewer points. (The series was one race shorter in 2015 than it was in 2014.)
This year could be a bounce back for Hill, but when I asked Keefe about his prospects, he didn’t want to get into it. “Every year when there’s a favorite something goes wrong,” he said. “We like being under the radar.”
Those words were ringing especially true that night. Two hours earlier, Cooper Webb had just DNFed a race when his bike inexplicably stopped running. Now Cooper, who seemed ready wrap this championship up early, is fighting just to win at all.
A few days before Anaheim, I wrote about this scenario. Webb was the favorite, but the short series only affords one mulligan.
“That’s what Webb is up against. If he’s as dominant as everyone expects him to be, he can even jack up one race and still win the title. If he has two blunders, all bets are off.”
We’ve seen it play out this way so many times—Eli Tomac dominating early but then ultimately failing to defend his title; Wilson throwing away countless opportunities—that it shouldn’t be as surprising as it actually is.
The good news for Webb? The short series works in both directions. The east contenders all fear the big crash or mistake that ruins it all. Those same issues can apply for current West points leader Joey Savatgy, too. He’s in the points lead, but he’s also one mistake away from losing it all. In these short series, everyone is trying to keep the pressure off, but there’s no denying that it’s about to be on.
