If you want some hot tips on the 250s, here are notes from yesterday's Racerhead:

• A week ago, Christian Craig thought he wouldn’t be able to race here due to his thumb injury. He’s been trying every therapy solution possible, and finally on Wednesday got back on a supercross track and decided he was good enough to race. He’s just out to get points.
• Chase Sexton was planning on racing 250SX East all along, until Craig got hurt, which moved him West. Then Sexton suffered an injury of his own to his collarbone, which forced him back to the East Region. He says the injury was minor, and he doesn’t think it cost him anything in terms of prep time for this race. Also, somewhere along the way, Sexton has gotten way taller than I remember him. You forget how young these guys are sometimes. Still growing!
• Justin Cooper is indeed flying at the test track. But he’s only ridden one supercross, ever, Anaheim 1 last year, so he’s trying to mix rookie expectations with wanting to get good starts and run up front.
• Thomas Covington admitted that supercross has been a major learning curve. The whoops have been the hardest part, as well as setting up his bike. He has zero idea what to expect tomorrow and said for now, he’ll just be happy making the main event!
• Jordon Smith is in a good position coming into the season. He said in 2017 he was new to the bike and team, and as he learned they got better as the season went on. Last year, he missed a lot of pre-season time due to an injury suffered at Red Bull Straight Rhythm, so he wasn’t totally ready to go by round 1 of 2018. He says the final race in Vegas last year was actually the best he felt. This off-season has been smooth, and he’s healthy and ready right now.
• Alex Martin would like to tell all of his home fans here in Minnesota that he just wants to get some racing under his belt. As much as he’d like to light it up for the crowd, he has missed a lot of supercross the last few years with injuries, so he just wants to build from here.
• Kyle Peters is going to walk from the truck to the stadium this year. He will not ride his bike through the snow because last year he crashed in the pits (on ice) and tore his ACL.

As for the 450 class, Tomac and his Monster Energy Kawasaki team said they found a breakthrough on set up last week. He won the race, of course, but since it was a mudder, it proved nothing. Tonight is the real chance to see if Eli is about to go next level. By the way, he recently admitted a back injury cost him critical time during the off-season, so it's possible Eli and his motorcycle are just coming into form now. And he already has the points lead!

Some are still buzzing about last week's lime-in-the-dirt situation. There will be a media meeting held this afternoon at the stadium so we can learn the latest on that topic.

For now, it's back to racing. Timed practice is coming up next.

250 Timed Practice 1

The expected suspects were up front throughout this practice, with Mitchell Oldenburg and Jordon Smith swapping the top time early, and then Chase Sexton moving to the number one spot. Sexton looked very smooth and in control while nailing fast times, until the Star Yamaha duo of Oldenburg and Justin Cooper struck back. Cooper’s time held out for the top spot—so he’s translating his “flying at the test track” speed to the race track. However, remember this is just his second career supercross race (he raced Anaheim round 1 last year and then crashed out of round two) so he doesn’t want to get too far ahead of himself.

 “Yeah, it’s definitely pretty stressful,” Justin said after his qualifying run.

Austin Forkner had a rough one. He crashed earlier in the free practice and then had a big endo when he clipped a triple in the timed practice. It could have been ugly but he managed not to go back-first into the face of the next jump. He remounted and looked okay. His teammate Martin Davalos is usually lightning fast in qualifying, but didn’t show too much aggression in this session. When practice began, most riders took off like it was a race, but Marty went slow and cruised at the back of the train for a few laps.

Alex Martin and Jordon Smith also looked good throughout these timed sessions. 

450 Timed Practice 2

One section of the track has already broken down here. The whoops are very tough, but a small groove across the top has allowed riders to start jumping across, and that seems much faster and safer than skimming. As has been the case most of this year, the Red Bull KTM duo of Marvin Musquin and Cooper Webb seem to be at their best in this situation, and they ended up 1-2 in this session.

 Another potential separator could be a new jumping line where the first turn hooks into the track The standard move is to single, race across the flat section when the first turn connects, and then triple-triple-triple into the turn. Several riders tried doubling in, leaping all the way over the flat ground. If anyone can double in and then pull off the next triple, in will be fast, however, the double in has proven too tough—the riders can land it, but the landing and transition doesn’t give them enough pop to start tripling the next set of jumps. This line probably won’t end up being fast, in that case, but on a track expected to get rutted, any sort of alternatives could be helpful later in the program.

250 Timed Session 2

Lots of track work between sessions resulted in a rebuilt whoop section, and that made skimming the way to go after jumping started to develop in the last practice.

The crashes that plagued Austin Forkner in the previous practice didn’t slow him one bit in this one—he was wide-open immediately and went to the top of the lap charts. He later fell in a corner, his third crash this afternoon, and then Justin Cooper went back to the top of the board. Then Forkner ripped another fast lap and took the top time back! That lap held on for fastest overall of the 250s.

 “Kinda bounced back from that last one [where] I fell a couple times,” said Forkner. “Tried to clean up my corners. I might have to change my lines through the whoops, I was blitzing but we might have to be jumping. I’ve been ripping the turns in Cali where I’ve been riding, and they feel pretty much like this.”

We talked to Justin Cooper between sessions and he confirmed that, with these lap times, he's going for the win tonight and definitely not just hear to learn. 

"I mean, you've got to be smart about it, but I want to win," said the New Yorker, who has only raced one supercross in his career at this point. It definitely doesn't look that way!

450 Timed Session 2

In the first timed 450 session, it was the KTM boys ruling the roost, and that was the case early in this one, with Musquin, Webb and Blake Baggett all dueling near the top of the charts. It became Monster Energy Kawasaki’s time to shine later, though, as Eli Tomac and then Joey Savatgy shot to the top of the charts. Savatgy’s time held on to give the rookie his first-ever top qualifying day in 450SX, with his teammate Tomac second.

 “The last two or three weeks we’ve made good progress, and I’m excited I’m starting to feel better and better,” said Savatgy.

The rebuilt whoops were back to being "skimmers" in this session, which is totally different than the first timed session. Which technique will prevail in the main event? We'll see, but remember to take all of these qualifying times with a grain of salt. The track is going to change a lot.

250 Heat 1

Jordon Smith grabbed the holeshot over Alex Martin and Justin Cooper, while teammates Jayce Pennington and Josh Osby went down on lap one. Christian Craig also found himself way back in the pack early. Craig started charging forward and made some moves to get near qualifying position, including passing Thomas Covington, who was struggling in 12^th. Also, privateer Live It Extreme KTM rider Marshall Weltin went down while in 9^th. Late in the race Osby and Covington were closing on the final transfer spots when Lane Shaw and Hunter Sayles collided, allowing Covington to sneak past them and get into the transfer. Shaw went down, but Sayles saved it and held off Osby at the finish for the final spot.

Up front, not much to report: Smith held on over Alex Martin and Justin Cooper.

250 Heat 2

Monster Energy/Pro Circuit Kawasaki teammates Austin Forkner and Martin Davalos battled for the holeshot with Forkner getting the nod, while Chase Sexton went down on lap one. Then Davalos went down, leaving Mitch Oldenburg and Blake Wharton to battle for second. Then Wharton made the pass on the factory Yamaha rider for second! Moments later Wharton jacked up a rhythm lane and went for a wild ride, and he barely hung on, allowing Oldenburg to go back around him.

 Sexton’s march to the front included another crash when he collided with a four-pack of riders scrambling for the final transfer spots. He picked himself up and passed them all to get into qualifying position.

450 Heat 1

Cooper Webb snagged the holeshot with Eli Tomac and Ken Roczen right behind. Then it was Friese, Plessinger, Reed, Wilson and Chisholm.

There were two battles to watch, first the Webb/Tomac/Roczen tilt for the lead, and then a Friese/Plessinger/Reed/Wilson battle next. Plessinger made the move on Friese, then Friese bobbled and went off the track. Tomac got next to Webb at one point but couldn't get around, and Webb then pulled back out to win the heat.

450 Heat 2

Justin Bogle continued his hot s tarting with the holeshot, but Justin Brayton bulled past him on the first lap. Bogle came back with a block pass to retake the lead! Brayton got back around on the next lap. Musquin the snuck into second and started to put heat on Brayton for the lead, while Barcia made contact with Baggett to make a pass.

Late in the race Musquin went down on the base of a dragon’s back, which let Brayton open it back up. On the next lap, Musquin fell in the same turn again! This allowed Justin Barcia to take second, while Brayton won the heat. 

For the final transfer spot, Alex Ray caught his teammate Adam Enticknap to take the ninth place position.

250 East Main Event

With seconds to go before the main, Jordon Smith was getting a rear wheel change on the line, they barely had the bike ready as the gate dropped. Forkner and Davalos led into turn one with Alex Martin right behind, then Sexton and Smith. Blake Wharton went down in the whoops on lap two and went to the back of the pack.

Smith slipped past Sexton, and at the 11 minute mark, Smith made the pass on Martin for third, with Davalos right in front of them. Smith then passed Davalos, then Martin ran it in on Davalos and took him down!

At the halfway mark Sexton then tried to make a move on Martin, clipped him and went down. Martin had become the immovable object out there. Then Smith crashed in a corner, moving Martin back up to second. Smith got back up and repassed Martin for second. Then Cooper started making moves toward Martin to try to steal third, but Martin pulled back away in pursuit of the podium. But with two to go, Cooper caught back up and sliced inside in the turn before the finish, block passing Martin for third and sending Martin off the track. Martin missed the finish line, which meant he didn’t hit the transponder on that lap, so even though he finished the race behind Cooper in fourth, at the end of the race he was scored a lap down in 11^th. His JGR/Yoshimura Suzuki team asked for a manual override of the scoring to get him back into 4^th,  so expect that change to happen soon. Sexton was fifth.

Davalos had a few more crashes after his run-in with AMart to finish 16th.

450 Main Event

Webb grabbed the holeshot but Savatgy got around him to steal the lead, Webb ran it in to get him and the battle was on, with Roczen and Baggett right there, and Tomac in the back. After their first-lap skirmish, Savatgy regained control of the lead over Webb and started clicking off laps.

This was a tremendous race early, with Webb trying to make moves on Savatgy, Roczen trying to make moves on Webb, Baggett trying to make moves on Roczen, and Brayton and Musquin just behind trying to make up ground.

Justin Barcia fell down a few laps into the race, when he picked it up Tomac, who had just passed Reed, was right behind him. Tomac and Barcia put heat on Bogle, Bogle bobbled and they both went around.

With eight minutes to go, Savatgy bobbled, doubled the big triple, and Webb finally got around him. Savatgy narrowly held off Roczen to maintain second.

Roczen, Baggett and Musquin continued to apply relentless pressure on Savatgy. Savatgy was struggling with a rhythm on the far side, but no one could figure out a way to turn that into a pass. Finally, Roczen busted through, and then Musquin and Baggett attacked him together. Savatgy somehow held them off, but then he over jumped a triple in a rhythm, landed hard, and Baggett got around. The mistake took the steam out of Savatgy, and Musquin went by as well….seconds later, Baggett wheelied too far into the pocket on a set of rollers, and crashed hard. He was shaken up and out of the race, but was able to get up after a few minutes and ride back to the pits under his own power.

In the later stages, the order was set, with Webb leading Roczen and Musquin. Savatgy hung on for fourth ahead of Brayton, Tomac, Reed, Wilson, Barcia and Plessinger.