Saturday Night Live: Orlando 1

Indeed it was. Roczen got right back to Webb’s rear wheel after Webb passed him, and it looked like he might get him for a bit. Then Webb put some distance between them. Traditionally, Roczen has been the faster guy at the beginning of the races and Webb has been better later, but this time Roczen put on a late charge to almost get Webb back on the last lap. The final margin was just .9 seconds. Last week Roczen topped Webb by .8!

“Yeah about mid race I lost touch a little bit, after that we kind of yo-yoed,” said Roczen. “I reeled back up again, but I had some close calls in the whoops. Just got kicked a little weird and almost went down. I simply wasn’t fast enough to get back on him and make the pass. I got held up a little by Justin [Brayton], but that’s okay, he was riding awesome, so we were all battling, and Cooper got us both in this turn. Overall you can’t win ‘em all, we had a good solid night and minimized the damage.”

The battle for third was wild. Osborne was off early in the race and got shuffled back. Then he got his lines together—switching from the left to the right in the whoops helped greatly—and started moving forward again. Meanwhile Justin Barcia was on fire early in the race, launching up to third and keeping real heat on Roczen for awhile. Then Barcia almost crashed in the whoops, only a spectacular save kept him from going down. The surging Osborne got back past him. Barcia hung tough but couldn’t get back around Zach, taking fourth. Tomac, about 11^th early, came through for fifth.

The third marked Osborne’s first podium of the season.

“It was one of the toughest days and weeks of my career, I was not feeling the flow after Indy," said Osborne. "I had a bike issue that cost us the second practice. We were just kind of fighting the momentum going the wrong direction lately. Felt good to get a start, that’s where I’ve been really struggling, my starts. I changed a couple of things for the start, it was a complete roll of the dice and it worked out. After such a strong outdoor season to struggle in the beginning of the year has been really tough for me.”

The battles just outside the top five have been furious this year and tonight was not an exception. Aaron Plessinger notched another solid finish with sixth, then Marvin Musquin overcame yet another terrible start to net seventh. Musquin had to battle hard to get Jason Anderson late in the race. Anderson rode better in Orlando day and night than he had at any race all year, but still ended up eighth behind Musquin who made a late move. Malcolm Stewart was ninth, and Adam Cianciarulo grabbed tenth. Brayton ended up 11^th after leading,  he had some up and down laps.

Dean Wilson returned from a broken toe to finish 12^th, and Joey Savatgy was up front and flying early, nearly passing Osborne for fourth. Then Savatgy crashed and lost several positions. Benny Bloss and Vince Friese wrapped up the top 15. Also Shane McElrath returned to action for the first time in 2021 and looked very fast en route  to second place in his heat race, but lost steam in the final laps of the main event and finished 17^th.

In the 250s, Jett Lawrence is suddenly back! The 17-year-old Australian won the second race of the 250SX East campaign but then went through all sorts of drama in the next few races, from horrible starts to crashes and a shoulder injury. Suddenly on this night he got his starts back and went fast enough to even hold off series leader Colt Nichols to the end. Nichols was able catch Jett and nearly everyone else from way back last weekend. This time, Lawrence had enough to hold Nichols at bay and take the win.

“That ride, I finally got my starts sorted," said Lawrence. "I had no idea where Colt was, then halfway through I saw a Star helmet, then I didn’t see anything and I was like “Did he go down?” Then all of a sudden at the end I started hearing the Star bike right behind again! It was a really good ride, I’ve gotta thank the crowd. I love this crowd. You guys need to give yourselves a pat on the back!”

Nichols made an early run at Lawrence then nearly crashed huge over a triple. He couldn’t quite reel Lawrence back in, although traffic and mistakes got Nichols close on the last lap.

"I had a pretty big moment on a triple. I was trying to do everything I could to catch Jett, he had some sections where he was better than me. Hats off to him, he rode good and he got off in front of me on the gate. I was trying but I couldn’t get him tonight. Pretty frustrating race to be that close, but I can’t take anything away from the kid.”

Nichols does add a few points on his teammate Christian Craig, who suffered a huge crash in his heat race while leading. Craig suffered a hand injury but was able to come back for the LCQ, win it, and log steady laps in the main to salvage third.

“I’m in a title chase and there’s no giving up,” he said. “When I got out there in the main event, my adrenaline kicked in, the pain went away and I salvaged points. Only lost a couple, so I can heal up, we’ll see you in Salt Lake.”