In the 250 class Sexton's Honda teammate Jett Lawrence still has a nice lead but didn't have his best day in Maryland. The overall winner was RJ Hampshire of the Rockstar Energy Husqvarna team, his first of the season. Jett has a 37-point lead over Monster Energy/Pro Circuit Kawasaki's Jo Shimoda and could possibly clinch tomorrow, though it's a bit of a long shot. And big brother Hunter again had an inconsistent day and is now third in the championship, another six points down from Shimoda.

The bigger noise at Budds Creek came in the form of Troy Lee Designs/Red Bull/GasGas rider Justin Barcia tangling with defending champion Dylan Ferrandis in the second moto. After Ferrandis passed Barcia in the off-camber section at the top of the track, Barcia went off the inside of the track in the next corner, cut across the access road and then went out and slammed into Ferrandis on the outside berm, knocking Dylan down and out of the race. (And he's out for this weekend as well.) This all happened in front of AMA official Jerry Newby, who was managing that section of the track. After the race Barcia came into the AMA/MX Sports office with his team manager Tyler Keefe to discuss the crash. Barcia explained that he went off the track, got airborne and "whiskey-throttled" it a bit and didn't mean to hit Ferrandis as hard as he did. The referee decided to disqualify him from the moto results for aggressive riding. He was not fined, though he did forfeit his purse money. 

On Monday, Barcia posted his GoPro video footage of the incident, as he had a camera mounted in his front number plate. The footage was not shown to officials at the race; their call was made based on what the official saw firsthand. When he posted it Barcia wrote, "3 sides to every story, his, mine and the truth. Here is the GoPro footage showing I didn't T-bone anyone and me going off the track and that the hit was a racing incident."

All of that is debatable of course, though it should be pointed out that Barcia went off the track and cut the corner, did not chop the throttle or slow down, and made contact with Ferrandis on the other side of the track in an attempt to pass him back. Had he checked up like he was supposed to when going outside the boundaries the collision would not have happened. We all know that Barcia is a very aggressive rider, with a history of contact with other riders that includes both SX and MX. Was this one enough to merit a DQ from the moto? The official and the referee thought so. Barcia fans and some veterans like Jeff Stanton, Weston Peick, and Denny Stephenson certainly didn't not think it was that bad, which they made clear on social media.

Besides Barcia's GoPro, there were the photos by Cycle News (and sometimes Racer X) contributor Chris "Browndog Wilson" Ganz, who was nearly hit by Justin as he was in the corner shooting, right where Ferrandis would eventually roll to a stop. Here is his photo and his description from Instagram:

I was not involved in the decision-making process nor the debate after the race, though I did speak to Tyler Keefe this week and gave him my opinion: Barcia went off the track, did not slow down, went to the outside and slammed into Ferrandis, knocking him off the track and out of the race. It sucks that it happened, sucks that Ferrandis is out again hurt, and sucks that Barcia got DQ'd as a result of aggressive riding. Hopefully the next time he finds himself in a similar position he will check up, because he was going to lose at least that spot anyway for cutting the track, as well as for not slowing down to re-enter the track. 

What do you think?

Good Luck Team USA! (DC)

The FIM Junior Motocross World Championship is taking place this weekend in Finland and my buddy Jeff Cernic is over there helping manage with a bunch of fast young American kids: Collin Allen, Casey Cochran, Seth Dennis, Landon Gibson, Carson Wood, Maddox Temmerman, and Tayce Morgan. This race has always been a cool one for kids—it's where Jett Lawrence and Jo Shimoda first met as 65cc class rivals maybe ten years ago. We will have updates from the race as they are reported, and you can follow each of these kids on their social media, but we just wanted to wish them good luck and good racing here, and thank you for representing American motocross!

To Scoop Or Not To Scoop? (Keefer)

With Ironman coming up on Saturday and the talk of tires is imminent, here is an article that can give you some insight on what it's like to ride on a scoop, when compared to a standard soft-intermediate terrain tire. 

FOUR TO GO (Matthes)

What a season it's been on the track in the Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross Championship. Four-time outdoor champion Eli Tomac has one point up on Chase Sexton and this weekend’s race at Ironman should prove to be pivotal I would think. We've seen some unforced errors from Chase Sexton (he was able to overcome one of them to win the second moto) and Tomac missed his chance for some breathing room in his second moto at Budds Creek. No matter who wins this thing, both of these guys have provided us with some cool memories this summer. When I was once a mechanic I never had a championship chase to worry about but I've been on teams that did and worked closely with the wrenches behind all of this. These guys are great mechanics, but you always want to try to not think about all the things that could go wrong on the motorcycle when it's out there. You don't want to change what you've normally been doing. As a team as the whole, don't alter your routines or try something new on the bike at this point.

This title could mean so much to both Yamaha and Eli Tomac as it's probably Tomac's last outdoor season and he'd love nothing better than go out a winner and do something he's never done before as in, win both 450 titles in the same season. Yamaha would love to win the 450MX title two years in a row of course, and Honda, well I don't have to tell you that they haven't won a 450 title since some guy named Carmichael left which is a lonnngggg time ago at this point.

Can't wait to watch how this unfolds!

DV12's Take on the Takeout (DC)

Longtime factory rider and GP/SX/Outdoor National winner David Vuillemin no longer works with Dylan Ferrandis, but he did have an opinion of the takeout at Budds Creek, as well as the video that Justin Barcia posted. We thought we'd share what he posted here: 

To be honest, I don't understand how this video changes people's mind about Barcia action...

1. He gets passed clean from the inside in an off camber.
2. He could've let off, braked instead of forcing the issue. Dylan made the pass. 
3. He knows the track and where he was and by forcing the issue that would put him super tight, or in this case off the track, for the next turn
4. He jumps off the track inside the yellow marker. He had another opportunity to jump on the brakes but decided to keep his momentum to make a counterattack.
5. He went straight to the exit of the corner to make the pass. Once again, he just cut the track or went off the track, put it the way you want, and went to the exit of the corner to pass someone. Cutting the track to go block pass someone isn't very allowed and it's very dangerous... There's no way Dylan knew Barcia was gonna do that because he squeezed the inside and left no room for a counterattack.
6. I've ridden there before. I've raced Budds Creek many times. I took that turn many times. I can put myself on that turn with someone doing what Barcia did and I can put myself making the turn like Dylan did. I can assure you if you'd see a drone footage of this action, you'd be like, WTF was he thinking!

Hey, Watch It!

Check out Kellen Brauer’s Race Examination from the Budds Creek National: