Going into RedBud things were heating up in the 450 Class. Little verbal jabs had been thrown in the press conferences and on Twitter by Blake Baggett, Eli Tomac, and Jason Anderson, and the points battle was tighter than we have seen it in years. 

This past weekend, though, Tomac may have delivered a huge blow to Baggett's championship hopes as he went 1-1 on the day and earned a 13-point lead in the championship as Baggett fell in the second moto and could only work his way up to 10th. 

Let’s dive into the lap data to figure out how these races were won and lost with this week’s Sign of the Lap Times. First, our traditional lap time charts.

450 Class Moto 1

Lap Rank	Finish	Best Lap	On Lap	Avg Lap Time	Rider
1	1st	2:03.084	17	2:05.538	Eli Tomac
2	2nd	2:03.262	16	2:05.747	Blake Baggett
3	4th	2:04.507	7	2:07.608	Jason Anderson
4	3rd	2:05.172	7	2:07.631	Marvin Musquin
5	9th	2:06.535	5	2:10.242	Justin Bogle
6	7th	2:06.715	6	2:10.134	Justin Barcia
7	5th	2:07.242	7	2:09.026	Christian Craig
8	6th	2:07.956	4	2:09.946	Cole Seely
9	10th	2:08.054	5	2:09.678	Josh Grant
10	8th	2:08.460	11	2:09.873	Dean Wilson

450 Class Moto 2

Lap Rank	Finish	Best Lap	On Lap	Avg Lap Time	Rider
1	1st	2:04.870	10	2:07.173	Eli Tomac
2	2nd	2:05.641	10	2:08.327	Jason Anderson
3	4th	2:05.918	4	2:09.038	Weston Peick
4	10th	2:05.974	7	2:10.296	Blake Baggett
5	6th	2:06.010	3	2:09.854	Justin Barcia
6	3rd	2:06.324	6	2:08.327	Marvin Musquin
7	5th	2:06.669	5	2:09.192	Josh Grant
8	7th	2:06.845	5	2:09.315	Justin Bogle
9	9th	2:07.977	7	2:10.584	Cole Seely
10	8th	2:08.228	7	2:09.862	Dean Wilson

250 Class Moto 1

Lap Rank	Finish	Best Lap	On Lap	Avg Lap Time	Rider
1	1st	2:05.806	5	2:07.232	Jeremy Martin
2	2nd	2:05.917	6	2:07.408	Zach Osborne
3	3rd	2:06.012	13	2:07.487	Alex Martin
4	5th	2:06.500	3	2:09.193	Dylan Ferrandis
5	4th	2:06.676	3	2:09.229	Austin Forkner
6	6th	2:06.687	3	2:09.474	Aaron Plessinger
7	9th	2:06.865	4	2:09.848	Shane McElrath
8	36th	2:06.967	2	2:09.253	RJ Hampshire
9	7th	2:07.468	3	2:09.629	Mitchell Harrison
10	12th	2:07.618	7	2:11.141	Chase Sexton

250 Class Moto 2

Lap Rank	Finish	Best Lap	On Lap	Avg Lap Time	Rider
1	11th	2:06.611	6	2:11.808	Aaron Plessinger
2	3rd	2:06.621	4	2:09.506	Alex Martin
3	8th	2:06.710	6	2:09.644	Jeremy Martin
4	1st	2:06.808	3	2:08.796	Zach Osborne
5	2nd	2:07.608	4	2:09.408	Mitchell Harrison
6	4th	2:07.833	7	2:09.231	Dylan Ferrandis
7	6th	2:07.926	4	2:10.293	Luke Renzland
8	7th	2:08.102	7	2:10.152	Chase Sexton
9	12th	2:08.196	6	2:12.258	Colt Nichols
10	5th	2:08.480	3	2:10.027	Justin Hill

Tomac vs Baggett: Moto 1

We've been waiting all season for a straight-up one-on-one battle between Tomac and Baggett and we pretty much got that toward the end of the first moto. Tomac started the moto behind Baggett and eventually made his way into the lead as Baggett struggled to find the pace early. Then, in classic El Chupacabra fashion, Baggett started to drop his lap times around the halfway point of the race. On the second to last lap, Baggett had chopped the gap to Tomac down to just over a second, but then Tomac put the nail in the coffin by logging in the fastest lap of the motos on the very last lap of the race.

Here's what Tomac had to say about Baggett reeling him in toward the end of the moto: "It was a combination of a couple things. One was lappers and then I made a mistake on the second to last lap before that table top. I stepped out and he probably gained easily a second right here. He was right on me. It got close at the end but we were able to hang onto it and that’s what matters."

Take a look at their lap times and the distance between the two for the race.

Tomac's Lap Times	Baggett's Lap Times	Tomac's Distance to Baggett
—	—	-1.854
2:07.577	2:08.285	-1.146
2:07.022	2:07.455	-0.713
2:06.496	2:09.251	2.042
2:05.206	2:05.484	2.32
2:05.266	2:06.335	3.389
2:03.993	2:04.529	3.925
2:05.115	2:05.770	4.58
2:05.801	2:05.735	4.514
2:04.589	2:05.690	5.615
2:05.801	2:05.922	5.736
2:05.420	2:05.505	5.821
2:07.648	2:04.550	2.723
2:06.293	2:06.028	2.458
2:04.512	2:04.621	2.567
2:04.785	2:03.262	1.044
2:03.084	2:03.533	1.493

J-Mart vs Osborne: Moto 1

The 250 Class press conferences are pretty much the exact opposite of the 450 Class press conferences. They're light hearted, relaxed, and the riders will feed off of each others answers. The battles on the track are anything but relaxed, though. 

In the first 250 moto, Jeremy Martin and Zach Osborne ran first and second respectively for the entire race and were in a tight battle until the last two laps when Osborne's times finally dropped off. The championship for the 250 guys may have cooled off a bit but with battles like this, they are delivering some of the most exciting racing this year. 

Jeremy Martin	Zach Osborne
2:07.00	2:06.728
2:06.037	2:05.924
2:06.154	2:06.219
2:05.806	2:06.243
2:06.402	2:05.917
2:06.650	2:06.652
2:06.942	2:06.460
2:06.848	2:07.493
2:08.936	2:09.061
2:07.077	2:08.055
2:08.236	2:08.270
2:07.140	2:06.585
2:07.280	2:06.470
2:07.843	2:07.707
2:07.085	2:09.344
2:10.288	2:11.410

The Leap

At RedBud, the debate in the 250 Class always seems to be whether or not to go for LaRocco's Leap. In the first moto, J-Mart went for it while Osborne chose not to. I timed both of them from the moment they left the lip of the jump until they reached a stack of hay bales in the following corner and it turned out to be about .3 seconds faster to jump The Leap. 

In the post-race press conference, Osborne did acknowledge that it was a little faster to jump, but felt he could make up that time on other parts of the track. He said, "I think jumping it takes a little bit of pressure off of you for the rest of the lap. You have to be a little bit more perfect around the track to not jump it and still be fast. But I think you can make it up."