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Sign of the (Lap) Times: Las Vegas
Dan Carlson

Dan Carlson

Sign of the (Lap) Times Las Vegas

May 10, 2018 10:00am
by: Dan Carlson
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  • Sign of the (Lap) Times
  • Sign of the (Lap) Times: Las Vegas

The final round of Monster Energy Supercross is in the books, and though I did my best to hype up some potential title-winning scenarios last week, the most likely outcome happened in all three classes. Jason Anderson, Zach Osborne, and Aaron Plessinger all rode great to put their championships to rest. 

There are still some interesting things to look at from the race, though. Eli Tomac had a crazy line coming out of the sand that was next-level dangerous, Adam Cianciarulo and Jordon Smith rose to the occasion in the 250 class, and Osborne and Plessinger latched onto each other for pretty much the whole main event.

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

450SX Class Lap Times

Lap RankFinishBest LapOn LapAvg Lap TimeRider
11st1:00.27151:01.536Eli Tomac
22nd1:00.69661:01.681Marvin Musquin
33rd1:01.06251:02.864Blake Baggett
45th1:01.57351:03.286Jason Anderson
54th1:01.63341:03.203Christian Craig
620th1:02.01751:03.906Tyler Bowers
77th1:02.02771:03.397Weston Peick
810th1:02.38651:04.028Vince Friese
98th1:02.49761:03.623Dean Wilson
106th1:02.52241:03.400Benny Bloss
119th1:02.77061:03.746Justin Barcia
1222nd1:03.19851:04.023Kyle Cunningham
1311th1:03.240101:04.359Chad Reed
1412th1:03.367111:04.477Justin Brayton
1513th1:03.44151:05.373Malcolm Stewart
1614th1:03.64531:06.087Cedric Soubeyras
1715th1:04.62951:07.331Alex Ray
1821st1:04.66551:07.273Austin Politelli
1917th1:05.06731:08.561Dakota Tedder
2018th1:05.23451:07.112Cade Autenrieth
2116th1:05.43041:07.870Henry Miller
2219th1:06.15521:11.045Josh Hill

250SX Class Lap Times

Lap RankFinishBest LapOn LapAvg Lap TimeRider
11st1:01.57561:02.359Adam Cianciarulo
23rd1:01.59831:02.842Shane McElrath
35th1:01.83351:03.494Jeremy Martin
42nd1:01.90261:02.605Jordon Smith
54th1:02.09021:03.233Joey Savatgy
66th1:02.33861:03.383Chase Sexton
77th1:02.49131:03.721Zach Osborne
88th1:02.68161:03.737Aaron Plessinger
99th1:02.95661:04.344Brandon Hartranft
1013th1:03.02061:03.886Kyle Chisholm
1110th1:03.25461:04.129Hayden Mellross
1217th1:03.425101:03.853Mitchell Harrison
1311th1:03.57771:05.034Sean Cantrell
1416th1:03.761121:05.003Josh Osby
1512th1:03.795111:04.759Michael Mosiman
1614th1:03.79961:04.974Luke Renzland
1718th1:03.93261:06.465Kyle Peters
1815th1:04.41341:05.187Justin Hill
1921st1:04.64761:07.317Justin Starling
2019th1:05.02241:06.394Anthony Rodriguez
2120th1:05.45291:06.827Martin Castelo
2222nd1:05.60741:09.034Jacob Williamson

Two Extremes

The 250SX Showdown wasn't jam-packed with action, but it was pretty cool to see Smith and Cianciarulo (both needed to win to have a decent shot at the championship) finish 1-2 on the night. While they were out front, Osborne and Plessinger were in the middle of the pack wheel-to-wheel for most of the race, trying to ride smooth consistent laps.

It's pretty rare to see two groups of riders that have everything to lose and everything to gain by going for the win, so I charted out their lap times to see how much more conservatively Osborne and Plessinger rode compared to Cianciarulo and Smith. First, take a look at AC and Smith's times:

Now look at how much slower Osborne and Plessinger were riding and how close their lap times were to each other. Pretty cool to see to contenders seemingly work together to bring their titles home.

Tomac's Bunny Hop

One of the coolest moments of the night came when Tomac decided to jump over the ski jump out of the stadium from a tiny bump in the sand section before. It was a line many were pulling in qualifying, but the roller in the sand was tamed down before the main events to make the line near impossible. That didn't stop Tomac from going for it.

Tomac jumping out of the sand @pulpmx pic.twitter.com/GxaeBfEtd2

— Travis Marx (@imtravismarx) May 8, 2018

I was curious to see how much faster the line actually was, so I pulled up the segment times and plotted out each lap. Laps nine and ten are where Tomac pulled the line, and you can see it's about a half of a second faster than his average time through the section. He only did it twice, though—no doubt realizing it probably wasn't worth risking his shot at a Lucas Oil Pro Motocross title defense over half of a second. 

Another thing to note: Marvin Musquin was so good through the sand section that his fastest time was only .339 seconds off of Tomac's, without doing that crazy jump.

No more ryans

Finally, for the first time since 2011, we have a first-time winner of the 450SX Championship. Anderson is the first non-Ryan to win the championship since Ryan Dungey won it his rookie year in 2010. Anderson won his championship with four wins, an average finish of 3.6, zero holeshots, and just 27 laps led.

If it wasn't for some broken spokes in Salt Lake City, which was his only finish outside of the top ten, Anderson's race finishes in 2018 would have looked pretty dang close to Dungey's first championship in 2010. And because of those broken spokes, his finishes also look close to Ryan Villopoto's first championship in 2011. Both of the riders went on to win multiple championships after their first, dominating the sport for eight years. Do you think Anderson will win another, or will this be a one-off title win for him? 

Will Anderson win another 450SX title?

Yes 937 votes - 46.8%

No 1064 votes - 53.2%

  • Redux: 450 Contract Landscape Redux: 450 Contract Landscape 4:15pm
  • 30 Greatest AMA Motocrossers: #10 Mike Kiedrowski 30 Greatest AMA Motocrossers: #10 Mike Kiedrowski 3:15pm
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