Morning Warm Up

The first group of Nations out there included USA, Australia, Belgium, Italy, Germany, and more. The times appear to be about 10-15 seconds slower than yesterday’s lap times we saw early on in qualifying but perhaps the track will get a little bit better in the next session as it gets wore in a little bit more.

Tomac was fastest of the first group with a 2:12.525 with Hunter Lawrence on a 250 behind him on a 2:13.571. Justin Cooper and Jett Lawrence were next with both of them in the 2:14s as was Jago Geerts. Antonio Cairoli was in the 2:15s along with Chase Sexton, Tanel Leok, and Mattia Guadagnini. Sexton apparently was able to hit the leap once as well, so the track is wet but there it some good soil in there right now soaking it up.

The final Nations group that went out featured Switzerland, The Netherlands, France, Spain, Norway, Great Britain, and more. The entire session saw the rain hold off until near the end of the session when it started raining again and now it’s raining pretty good at the moment as well.

Jeremy Seewer went fastest in the second session with a 2:13.728 which was over a second faster than Kay De Wolf at a 2:15.040. Maxime Renaux and Ruben Fernandez both were in the 2:15s as well with Kevin Horgmo, Jorge Prado, and Cornelius Toendel in the 2:16s. We have about an hour now until the B final and it’s expected to rain fairly consistently for the next half hour.

B Final

The B Final commenced at 11 a.m. local time and consisted of every country who qualified outside of the top 19 teams yesterday. Only one nation would go through, and they could do so off of two of their three scores as the lowest score in the B Final would be dropped.

Early on, New Zealand’s MX2 rider Brodie Connolly was out front and had Venezuela’s Anthony Rodriguez right behind him. Team Japan’s Jo Shimoda got another bad start and was well down the order as he tried to catch up to the front runners. Then he crashed a few laps in and had to try to come back through everyone. Things just kept getting worse though as when he made it back into the top 10, he crashed again and by that point the chances of Japan making it through were very slim.

The battle came down to New Zealand versus Venezuela as eventually Lorenzo Locurcio caught up and pass his countryman Rodriguez and then went and got Connolly for the lead. New Zealand’s Josiah Natzke was then catching Rodriguez who slipped behind Brazil’s Ramyller Alves and Lithuania’s Arminas Jasikonis. When Natzke got to Rodriguez, he also got passed by Stuart Edmonds of Ireland which could have helped him hold steal the victory away for New Zealand as they both went around Rodriguez.

In the end, Locurcio won from Connolly and Rodriguez held on for seventh. Natzke finished sixth which left Venezuela and New Zealand tied but Venezuela had a better drop score of 22 versus 31 for New Zealand. As such, Venezuela has won the B Final and qualified through into the main race coming up later.

Race 1 – MXGP & MX2

The first race of the event featured the MXGP and MX2 riders for each nation and Team USA elected to put Justin Cooper down the inside with the first gate selection. Despite that, Eli Tomac was still able to select right in the middle of the gate after the 19 other picks though as he slotted just to the inside of the box in the middle.

When the gates fell, Tomac launched out to the holeshot as he got off the gate beautifully and controlled it all the way into the first turn and out of it. Glenn Coldenhoff fell right away pushing Netherlands into a bit of a tough spot. Tomac led the way with Jago Geerts, Maxime Renaux, and Jeremy Seewer behind him.

Justin Cooper got off the line in about seventh but shuffled back to ninth by the end of the first lap. Hunter Lawrence put Australia in a solid position as he was able to get ahead of Cooper and be the lead MX2 rider from the beginning and Mitch Evans was right inside of the top five.

For much of the first few laps, the battle between Tomac and Geerts started to develop. Geerts in his 450 debut was launching LaRocco’s Leap every lap and slowly started to run quicker times than Tomac out front and close up on the American.

Tomac seemed to realize that Geerts was doing the leap behind him and started doing it as well to counter but Geerts was still applying the pressure. The cat and mouse battle between them started to push them away from the rest of the pack as Renaux back in third fell into a battle with Seewer behind him.

Coldenhoff was making good progress through the field and was into the top 20 before the halfway mark of the race. His Dutch teammate Kay De Wolf was the third best MX2 rider on the track as he ran 10^th for a long time slowly reeling in Cooper ahead of him. De Wolf has to pass Italy’s Andrea Adamo to get there, and he brought Belgium’s Liam Everts with him as Belgium was sitting second with Geerts and Everts running in the top 11.

Jorge Prado for Spain was in sixth pushing up to Mitch Evans in P5 for a long time as well but just couldn’t quite seem to get to him. When he did get to him with about 10 minutes to go in the moto, Prado made a big mistake and lost a lot of ground. That was a similar story for Switzerland’s Jeremy Seewer who pushed up to France’s Maxime Renaux around the halfway mark and then fell which caused him to lose touch with Renaux.

Tomac started to inch away from Geerts out front after the Belgian made a few mistakes, particularly one where he got sideways by the pit lane and had to nearly come to a stop to collect it. He wasn’t done yet though as he spent the last five minutes of the race chipping a five second deficit down to two.

But Tomac was simply too much in the first moto as he emphatically won his first ever Motocross of Nations race in front of the home crowd. Geerts crossed the line second with Renaux third, Seewer fourth, and Evans rounding out the top five. USA unofficially leads now on 10 points with Australia on 13, Belgium on 14, France on 17 after Marvin Musquin ended up 14^th, and Italy on 22 with Antonio Cairoli finishing 7^th and Andrea Adamo in 15^th.

Race 2 – MX2 & Open

The second race of the day featured the MX2 and Open class riders as we got our first look in the races of Chase Sexton, Jett Lawrence, Dylan Ferrandis, and more. Off the start, it was Mattia Guadagnini who came through and grabbed the holeshot. He was followed by Chase Sexton, Jett Lawrence, Justin Cooper, and Hunter Lawrence inside of the top five.

Dylan Ferrandis went down in the first corner and was way back which could have been a big blow for France given that Ferrandis showed speed of a race winner yesterday. But he was far from done as he picked himself up in last and started charging.

Hunter Lawrence crashed on the first lap of the race in the tree corner after the off camber and slipped from the top five to outside of the top 20 which was also a tough break for Australia. Sexton and Cooper in second and fourth were comfortably putting USA into the provisional lead early on.

Guadagnini led much of the early stanza of the race with Sexton and Jett Lawrence hot on his tail. They began to put a bit of a gap on Justin Cooper in fourth but not too much. Spain’s Ruben Fernandez was coming up from fifth though making it a breakaway top five.

Sexton put in a few charges on Guadagnini and finally made the pass into the lead around the 10-minute mark of the moto but then Guadagnini jumped the leap and re-passed Sexton who made a mistake before the finish line jump.

Jett Lawrence also pounced to move around Sexton and get into second. The Australian didn’t wait around long before he also sized up a move around Guadagnini for the race lead and had it done before the halfway point. He immediately went to work on opening the gap out front while Guadagnini slipped back to Sexton behind him.

Ferrandis was absolutely flying through the field and made it all the way to sixth with about 10 minutes to go. He then tossed his goggles on the Leap the next lap and looked ahead to see where Fernandez was in fifth. The gap was massive, but Ferrandis put his head down and charged. He would stop for goggles two laps later and then begin lapping over three seconds faster than anyone.

Sexton made it around Guadagnini around the same time Ferrandis got into sixth and Sexton was able to put a bit of a gap on the Italian. Justin Cooper actually started to catch Guadagnini for third and was bringing Fernandez with him

Right in the last two laps, Ferrandis caught the trio that was battling for third and the fight was on. Guadagnini defended well to keep Cooper behind him, and Fernandez was doing whatever he could to not let Ferrandis through either. Ferrandis ended up colliding with Fernandez on the last lap and crashing again, but he would remount to finish sixth.

The rest of the top five stayed the same as Jett Lawrence took the win in his 450 debut ahead of Sexton, Guadagnini, Cooper, and Fernandez. USA now leads going into the last moto on 16 points ahead of Australia on 24, France on 32, Italy on 40, and Belgium on 41.