What a race! The Oakland SX brought the action for the second straight year, and we'd have to think the gnarly, chewed up, rutted track conditions have something to do with that. Last year, Eli Tomac pulled off an epic comeback to track down Ryan Dungey for the win late in the race, and this year Cole Seely, Ken Roczen and Jason Anderson took turns leading. Roczen appeared to have it under control, but the track struck and Kenny made a mistake that allowed Anderson to catch him. That set up a fantastic duel over the final two laps, with Anderson pulling out a clutch win.
The tough track will be a theme of this week's Sign of the (Lap) Times, as we have several ways to illustrate that. But first, let's start with our traditional lap time charts.
450SX Class — Main Event — Lap Times
| Lap Rank | Finish | Best Lap | On Lap | Avg Lap Time | Rider |
| 1 | 1st | 50.930 | 5 | 52.664 | Jason Anderson |
| 2 | 6th | 51.083 | 6 | 53.298 | Cole Seely |
| 3 | 3rd | 51.154 | 6 | 53.076 | Blake Baggett |
| 4 | 2nd | 51.239 | 5 | 52.809 | Ken Roczen |
| 5 | 4th | 51.365 | 5 | 53.359 | Marvin Musquin |
| 6 | 5th | 51.436 | 7 | 53.383 | Justin Barcia |
| 7 | 12th | 52.170 | 4 | 54.155 | Weston Peick |
| 8 | 7th | 52.202 | 7 | 53.697 | Cooper Webb |
| 9 | 9th | 52.305 | 6 | 54.124 | Justin Brayton |
| 10 | 21st | 52.347 | 6 | 54.394 | Tyler Bowers |
| 11 | 10th | 52.374 | 7 | 54.589 | Josh Grant |
| 12 | 15th | 52.683 | 4 | 55.339 | Vince Friese |
| 13 | 20th | 52.758 | 5 | 55.275 | Benny Bloss |
| 14 | 8th | 52.864 | 4 | 54.425 | Broc Tickle |
| 15 | 11th | 53.172 | 8 | 55.122 | Dean Wilson |
| 16 | 14th | 53.279 | 5 | 56.890 | Chad Reed |
| 17 | 13th | 53.307 | 2 | 55.327 | Eli Tomac |
| 18 | 17th | 53.577 | 8 | 56.506 | Justin Bogle |
| 19 | 18th | 53.820 | 8 | 56.908 | Kyle Cunningham |
| 20 | 16th | 54.860 | 6 | 57.432 | Alex Ray |
| 21 | 19th | 54.705 | 7 | 58.298 | Ben LaMay |
| 22 | 22nd | DNF | DNF | DNF | Malcolm Stewart |
250SX Class — Main Event — Lap Times
| Lap Rank | Finish | Best Lap | On Lap | Avg Lap Time | Rider |
| 1 | 4th | 51.498 | 3 | 53.279 | Christian Craig |
| 2 | 1st | 51.556 | 9 | 52.870 | Aaron Plessinger |
| 3 | 2nd | 51.987 | 3 | 53.016 | Joey Savatgy |
| 4 | 7th | 52.010 | 3 | 53.059 | Adam Cianciarulo |
| 5 | 15th | 52.060 | 3 | 53.581 | Shane McElrath |
| 6 | 6th | 52.070 | 8 | 53.684 | Chase Sexton |
| 7 | 3rd | 52.204 | 10 | 52.956 | Justin Hill |
| 8 | 5th | 52.468 | 5 | 54.085 | Alex Martin |
| 9 | 10th | 52.629 | 6 | 54.746 | Hayden Mellross |
| 10 | 9th | 52.774 | 6 | 54.597 | Mitchell Harrison |
| 11 | 8th | 53.102 | 2 | 54.472 | Kyle Chisholm |
| 12 | 11th | 54.120 | 2 | 56.297 | Justin Hoeft |
| 13 | 16th | 54.196 | 3 | 58.436 | Cole Martinez |
| 14 | 17th | 54.493 | 3 | 58.224 | Ryan Breece |
| 15 | 12th | 54.747 | 3 | 56.948 | Jean Carlo Ramos |
| 16 | 13th | 55.303 | 3 | 56.973 | Justin Starling |
| 17 | 14th | 55.340 | 9 | 57.866 | Martin Castelo |
| 18 | 19th | 55.661 | 3 | 58.143 | Chase Marquier |
| 19 | 18th | 57.086 | 5 | 1:01.143 | Julio Zambrano |
| 20 | 20th | DNF | DNF | DNF | Dakota Alix |
| 21 | 21st | DNF | DNF | DNF | Killian Auberson |
| 22 | 22nd | DNF | DNF | DNF | Phil Nicoletti |
Roczen vs. Anderson
Now, onto that Roczen and Anderson battle. Watching two supercross superstars fight for the win on the final two laps is all too rare. What's interesting is to see the impact that battle had on lap times. While Roczen and Anderson were no doubt pushing to their limits on the final laps, they were also making mistakes, passing each other and slowing each other down.
Have a look at the lap charts below, specifically on laps 21, 22 and 23. Anderson was running a strong, consistent pace, but his times slowed up significantly when the battle began. Same for Roczen, who is probably losing some sleep thinking about those final final laps.
Also, check out Anderson versus Roczen on laps 23 and 24. That's getting it done under pressure.
Tricky Track
Last week's track in Glendale was challenging, but Oakland was next level. Let's compare the lap time consistency of the race winner for the last two weeks.
The difference between Anderson's best and worst times at Oakland was 4.45 seconds. The difference between Eli Tomac's best and worst times at Glendale was 2.682 seconds. This data gets slightly skewed because Tomac holeshot the Glendale main event, so he got to run on clean race track, while Anderson spent much of Oakland battling through traffic. Still, the charts tell a story. There are larger variations in Anderson's times on the tricky Oakland track in comparison to Tomac's night leading in Glendale.
Anderson's Oakland Lap Times
Tomac's Glendale Times
The Deficit
Oakland was not kind to Tomac this time, as his 13th-place finish stopped the momentum of back-to-back wins in Anaheim 2 and Glendale. After failing to finish Anaheim 1 and not racing in Houston, Tomac's title hopes were slim anyway, but now things are even darker.
Last year Tomac pulled off an amazing comeback and was actually able to wrestle the points lead away from Ryan Dungey at one point. This year's comeback would be far, far crazier. Here's Tomac's points deficit after round five for both 2017 and 2018.
