We’re in Washougal, Washington today for the seventh round of the 2021 Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship. The Pacific Northwest is a welcomed site for the Pro Motocross paddock after Washougal was one of the late cancellations last year as it was initially supposed to be the second round in 2020 but was eventually cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But we’re back this year and the tree covered hillsides still looks just as majestic and ready to host the thunderous roar of riders hauling up horsepower hill again.

This championship is also officially headed into its second half as six rounds have gone, and six rounds still remain. Dylan Ferrandis saw his championship lead stretch to its farthest point thus far after last week’s Spring Creek National when a third overall on the day for the Frenchman was enough to stretch another 13 points out over Ken Roczen. Roczen’s massive first turn crash in the first moto a week ago almost appeared like it may be season ending, but the German rebounded to start out front in the second moto and eventually take home a massive moto victory.

Justin Barcia became the third different winner in six rounds with 1-2 scores and he leapfrogged Eli Tomac for third in the championship as well. As for Tomac, Washougal has treated him fairly well over the years and today could be the day that he puts both motos together to get his name on the board of overall winners in 2021 as well. We’re also back to the normal schedule this week where the 450 class goes second today after they went first last week to accommodate for being live on NBC for the second 450 class moto.

In the 250 class, last week provided the first change in the points lead since the opening round when Justin Cooper’s third overall finally chipped away at Jett Lawrence’s championship lead enough to move to the top spot. Lawrence still went 4-6 on the day, but the downward trend for the Australian has been noticeable of late as he eyes turning it around today.

Jeremy Martin was the big hometown winner last week to make it six different winners in six rounds to start the year and it’s not completely impossible to say this trend might continue today. With riders like Jo Shimoda, Colt Nichols, and Michael Mosiman all finding their way towards the front but not quite cracking through yet, maybe today is the day.

Qualifying is about to begin, and we’ll be bringing you coverage throughout the day. So be sure to keep checking back in as we drop the gates on round seven.

FIRST QUALIFYING SESSIONS

The sounds of 250Fs echoed off the trees as qualifying began at Washougal. It was back to normal with the 250B group being the first to head out on track and the track was certainly moist early on. Christopher Prebula topped the sheets in the first qualifying session of the day as he was in the 2:24s early on.

As the 250A group headed out, times quickly began dropping among the top riders. Jeremy Martin picked up right where he left off from last week’s win as he was quick early and landed himself atop 250 class qualifying with one session in the books. The top three from the first session mimicked the podium from last week with Michael Mosiman and Justin Cooper rounding out the top three.

The 450A group was next to hit the track and it provided some fresh faces near the top. Red Bull KTM teammates Cooper Webb and Marvin Musquin have not had great seasons by their standard, but perhaps things are turning around today as they were 1-2 in Q1. Ken Roczen was third fastest with Eli Tomac and Chase Sexton inside of the top five.

Times were separated by just a tenth of a second between the top three early on and the track has the potentially to get slicker and maybe even slow down in the second sessions. Monroe, Washington’s Colin Jurin topped the 450B session as the local shredders are starting to show their speed around the Washougal track.

SECOND QUALIFYING SESSIONS

The track was certainly starting to dry up during the second set of qualifying sessions for both classes. In the shaded sections under the trees, there’s still a lot of moisture in the dirt, but the heat that is expected throughout the day is certainly starting to bake the track a bit.

The 250 class saw another lap time battle between teammates Jeremy Martin and Justin Cooper. Cooper has been fastest in qualifying many times this year and once again found his way to the top of the board late in the session. Cooper holds the points lead, but last week’s third place overall left Cooper frustrated feeling like he could have won at Millville and didn’t ride to his standards. Now he gets to roll those red plates to the line first in an attempt to rip his sixth and potentially seventh holeshot on the year later today.

Like his teammate Justin Cooper, Dylan Ferrandis not only occupies the points lead but also put down the fastest lap in the second 450 class session. The time was a couple seconds faster than what we saw out of the first session and Ferrandis looks to get back on top today following his four wins in the first six rounds of the year.

So Ferrandis qualifies P1 here at Washougal and did so by a nose over Marvin Musquin who continues to look strong here today. Ken Roczen, Chase Sexton, Justin Barcia, and Christian Craig were all within the same second of Ferrandis and the top four just had a half second between them. It’s shaping up to be a good day at the races as we drop the gates here in the Pacific Northwest in just about an hour and a half.

250 MOTO 1

As the first gate drop of the day commenced, a surprise shot out of the outside as Carson Mumford grabbed the holeshot and led the first few laps of the race. Unfortunately, Jalek Swoll hit the ground in the first turn and would be carted off to the Alpinestars Medical Unit. Swoll was checked at the Medical Unit and is reportedly going to attempt to race in the second moto.

Back out front though, Justin Cooper broke through to get around Mumford for the lead on the third lap of the race and Mumford lost positions quickly as he worked on settling into a pace. That allowed RJ Hampshire, Pierce Brown, Jeremy Martin, and Michael Mosiman into the top five and all five riders began to stretch it out in the lead.

Hunter Lawrence was sixth early on and second place in the championship, Jett Lawrence, suffered from a bad start and was only into the top 10 by about 10 minutes into the moto. The battle for the lead started to heat up a bit as Hampshire closed in on Cooper and Jeremy Martin was also closing quick onto Pierce Brown and was bringing Mosiman with him.

Martin made the pass stick on Brown and then Mosiman tried to get his teammate quickly as well because he had Hunter Lawrence closing on him. Hampshire then started closing on Cooper again with about 10 minutes left to go in the moto and the battle was on out front.

Jett Lawrence made a move on Colt Nichols to get into seventh pace with about seven minutes still to go but was about six seconds down of his brother in sixth place by the time he got there. With Jett sitting down the order and Cooper battling for the lead, the points lead only looked to extend by the conclusion of the moto.

Michael Mosiman finally made it around his teammate Brown around the same time and quickly caught up to Jeremy Martin ahead of him. Martin was closing on the leaders here and there but seemed to fall back a bit as the clock continued to click down.

Cooper dealt with the pressure from Hampshire late in the moto quite well and actually began to stretch it back out a bit with a few laps to go. In the end, Cooper held on for his third moto win of the year across the line from Hampshire and Jeremy Martin on the podium.

450 MOTO 1

Chase Sexton ripped the holeshot in the first 450 class moto of the day and immediately opened up a small gap. His Honda HRC teammate Ken Roczen quickly found his way into second place around Cooper Webb who also had his fellow teammate Marvin Musquin right behind him.

Eli Tomac was about ninth early on but was quick to move forward and was into fifth before the first few laps were complete. Last week’s winner Justin Barcia was running sixth early on with championship leader Dylan Ferrandis behind him in seventh.

Musquin was the first to make a move as he made his way up into third place around his teammate Webb. Both riders had already fallen back about four seconds off of Roczen in second by the time the pass was made but Musquin immediately started sprinting to try to get away from Webb behind.

It wasn’t long though before Tomac quickly made a move on Webb as well to get into fourth place and keep tabs on Musquin ahead of him before he got away. Behind all that chaos, Ferrandis was working on Justin Barcia for sixth place and they both were catching up to the Tomac/Webb battle in a hurry.

At the halfway point, Sexton had stretched his lead out to just over five seconds from Roczen as Roczen maintained a three second gap back to Musquin and then the four-rider battle for fourth was essentially still nose to tail.

Suddenly, Musquin was the man on a mission as he was all over Roczen within just about two laps and the battle was on for second. Roczen began to ride more defensively, and they lost more touch with Sexton out front who had opened out his lead to over seven seconds.

Musquin made the move on Roczen and before Roczen could even catch his breath from the battle, Tomac was right on him as well. Within a lap of Musquin making the move into second place, Tomac was also around Roczen and into third with about eight minutes remaining in the moto.

Roczen continued to fall back as Justin Barcia caught and passed him with about five minutes left and Ferrandis was all over him as well just moments later. Ferrandis made the move around Roczen to get into fifth place and was once again gaining points in the championship fight.

With three laps to go, Musquin made a mistake and fell back behind Tomac into third. Musquin was right back on the charge though and he stuck right on Tomac as the two-lap board came out. About 10 seconds behind that battle came the Barcia/Ferrandis battle for fourth where Ferrandis tried a few times to make something happen on Barcia, but Barcia continued to defend well.

In the end, Chase Sexton held on for his first moto win of 2021 and the second one in his 450 class career. Sexton led home Tomac who actually closed up quite a bit on the last few laps and Musquin who finished third.

250 MOTO 2

Justin Cooper grabbed the holeshot in the second moto away from his teammate Jeremy Martin and the two battled for the first lap with Cooper eventually able to keep Martin behind. Cooper was fired up early and tried to sprint away on the opening laps once he established the lead.

Martin didn’t let Cooper get away though as Hampshire settled in right behind as well and Austin Forkner was also towards the front with a fourth place start just ahead of Pierce Brown. Jett Lawrence got a better start in the second moto as he was in sixth early.

Jeremy Martin was putting all kinds of pressure onto Cooper for the lead, and they were slowly stretching out a little gap on Hampshire behind. Martin then darted to the inside before the whoops and completely shut the door on his teammate to take the lead.

The pass on Cooper allowed Hampshire right into the picture of the battle and he tried to make a pass on Cooper before the mechanics area but then stalled the bike right after the mechanics area and lost third to Pierce Brown in the process. Forkner had just fell while running third and remounted eighth so that promoted both Jett and Hunter Lawrence up into fifth and sixth, respectively, behind Hampshire.

Hunter Lawrence then slid out while right behind that battle and slipped back to behind Jo Shimoda in 10^th. Suddenly, the battle for third heightened even more as Pierce Brown managed an attack from RJ Hampshire coming from behind with Jett Lawrence lurking all the while.

Hampshire forced his way through after Brown made a mistake at the bottom of horsepower hill with about nine minutes left to go and suddenly Jett was not in the mood to wait around. He and Brown engaged in a back-and-forth battle where it appeared like Lawrence made the pass only for Brown to get back around and then Brown made another small mistake and lost the position after collecting the mistake.

Jett Lawrence then quickly caught Hampshire and made the move into third place with about two minutes left on the clock. By then, Cooper was about six seconds ahead of Lawrence and it seemed like that would be as far as Jett’s charge would get.

With two laps to go, Justin Cooper started to actually close up a bit on Jeremy Martin. He wouldn’t need to pass Martin to win the overall, but obviously the points on the line to win the second moto and go 1-1 would be very valuable.

Out of nowhere, Justin Cooper crashed out of second place halfway up horsepower hill. The bike was pretty twisted up when Cooper remounted and Cooper himself seemed a bit out of it as he remounted in seventh place. Michael Mosiman then got around him as the white flag waved.

Jeremy Martin claimed the win in the second moto and his 3-1 scores were good enough to become the first two-time winner in 2021. Jett Lawrence then finished in second place in the moto with RJ Hampshire in third. Cooper pulled it together on the last lap to cross the line in eighth. Second overall on the day went to RJ Hampshire with Cooper still ending up third overall.

450 MOTO 2

As the final moto of the day got underway, it was Cooper Webb who grabbed the holeshot, but Dylan Ferrandis was quick to make the pass on the KTM man to take over the lead. Moto one winner Chase Sexton was right on Webb early with Christian Craig in fourth and Ken Roczen inside the top five.

Aaron Plessinger made a couple of quick moves to get into fourth place and was right on Webb for third before long. Plessinger then shot around the outside of Webb to move into third and seemed keen to go after Sexton for second place before long as well.

Cooper Webb continued to get shuffled back early on as Eli Tomac was the next rider to move around him into fourth place. Ken Roczen then sat in sixth behind Webb with Craig, Musquin, Barcia, and Coty Schock rounding out the early top 10 spots.

Marvin Musquin made a couple of quick passes before the first 10 minutes of the moto were done to get into sixth ahead of Roczen. Craig then was all over Roczen as well as they then battled for seventh spot.

The lead trio was still all stacked together with Tomac about three seconds back of them as the moto moved into its second third. Tomac slowly brought the gap down to Plessinger over the next few laps as the top four were only separated by just about four seconds as the halfway mark approached.

Tomac then launched passed Plessinger over the finish line just beyond the halfway mark, but the top four still were virtually nose to tail. Tomac began pushing up to Sexton and Sexton started responding by upping his pace which pushed him back up to Ferrandis.

Ferrandis seemed to feel the pressure starting to mount from behind as he also lowered his lap time to go almost two seconds faster than he was going. By this point, the top three were starting to get away from Plessinger in fourth place as the battle intensified.

With almost no time remaining on the clock, Tomac finally sized up an inside-out pass on Sexton to move into second place. If he stayed there though, Sexton would still win the overall so Tomac would need to run down and pass Ferrandis for the moto win to also take the overall victory as well.

Tomac closed right up and put two of the best laps of the race together, but Ferrandis was able to respond all the while and he held on to win the second moto. But it was Chase Sexton’s day as he went 1-3 on the day for the overall victory at Washougal.