We don’t know what the future holds for Eli Tomac. Eli Tomac himself probably doesn’t know. The Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing rider ruptured his Achilles tendon at the Denver supercross just a few weeks ago. He won’t be lining up to defend his AMA Pro Motocross championship, which marks the first series he’s missed since the start of his professional career back in 2010.
One thing, however, is crystal clear—it’s been a hell of a ride so far no matter what happens next. Eli is already a certified legend. Soon, the news will flip to who won round one at Fox Raceway, but before we get there, here are a few of Eli’s most memorable moments.
Hangtown – 2010
“Ladies and gentlemen of the media, Eli Tomac just won the very first race of his career. If you don’t have questions for him, you’re crazy.” Those were the words our own Jason Weigandt used to open the post-race press conference at Hangtown in 2010. And he was right! In just his first race Tomac showed he was going to be a force to be reckoned with. After inheriting the lead and leading briefly before crashing in the first moto, Tomac went out and passed his way into the lead in moto two! This was his professional debut, and he’d go on to win the moto and the overall that day, leaving the racing world stunned. Afterward, on the podium, he wasn’t sure how to pop open his bottle of champagne, and his teammate, Trey Canard, had to show him how. Tomac has since perfected the art.
The First of Many
Tomac won his first title in 2012, the 250SX West Championship, but it didn’t come easy. He had a big points lead that was erased when he crashed out in the whoops in San Diego. Dean Wilson inherited the points lead, but not for long. Tomac would come back strong at the final three rounds, including a ridiculously thrilling duel with Wilson in Seattle that ultimately ended with Wilson on the ground with an injured shoulder.
Whoops!
Not all big moments are epic, and in 2013, after dominating the first three 250SX west rounds, Tomac went down hard in the whoops in Oakland, ending his rampage. Ken Roczen was the benefactor, and although things got dicey when he failed to qualify for the main event in Salt Lake City, Roczen never relinquished the lead. Tomac would win two more races that season but ultimately came up short for the title by two points. He went on to win the 2013 250 National Championship that summer, a series in which he never finished off the overall podium once.
The Beast is Born
We’ve all seen Tomac go full-on beast mode multiple times over the years, and there were glimmers of the monster lurking inside even when he was on a 250, but if you’re going to point to a specific time when Tomac officially unleashed the beast, it’d have to be the first four motos of the 2015 season of AMA Pro Motocross. Tomac was absolutely unreal, and if you never watched those races, just have a look at his margins of victory from those first four motos: 22.332, 1:31.181, 37.610, and 23.426. Has anyone else ever beat Ryan Dungey straight up by over a minute-and-a-half?! Unfortunately, it all came to an end at Round Three at Thunder Valley, where Tomac went down and injured his shoulders, but since then we’ve seen Tomac erupt like this over, and over, and over again. In fact, it’s happened with enough regularity that when he’d start to ramp up the speed at any given race, it almost became hypnotic. “He’s doing it again, it’s happening!”
All Bunched Up
After a slow start to the 2017 season, Tomac found his groove at the third race and launched a big championship comeback. He went Beast Mode in Salt Lake City, raging from about last to first to finally take the points lead. Then he had a weird, bad race in East Rutherford, handing the championship lead back to Dungey. Tomac then found himself in the unenviable position of being nine points out of the lead heading into the final race of the season. The result was the infamous bunching strategy, in which Tomac put himself ahead of Dungey, then slowly rode a wide bike in an attempt to slow Dungey up and allow other riders to catch up and get between them. It sounds farfetched, but it almost worked! It allowed guys like Jason Anderson, Chad Reed, Josh Grant, and Dean Wilson to get into the mix. Reed ended up behind the group after getting taken out by Anderson, who won, and Tomac ended up finishing second. Even then Tomac made up four points on Dungey, who finished fourth. Had things gone just a smidge differently, the history books might be drastically different.
Make it Two!
At the 2018 Monster Energy Cup Tomac had a great night, winning all three races and claiming the $1 Million that came with the clean sweep. The night didn’t come without subplots, however. After winning the first two races Tomac was behind his new teammate, Joey Savatgy, as the race was coming to a close. Savatgy used the back section of the track to let Tomac by, giving him the win and the million bucks. That turned out to be life changing. Not really for either Tomac or Savatgy, but for a fan named Jesse Hebert, who happened to be entered in a sweepstakes in which the rules were, if Tomac won all three races, then Hebert also won $1 million. Well, both Tomac and Hebert left Vegas with a lot more money than they’d arrived with!
Back-to-Back-to-Back
Winning a single 450 National Championship is crazy, winning two consecutively is insane, but winning three in a row? That’s not the stuff of legend, that’s the way of the gods! Starting in 2017 Tomac would prove to be unbreakable at the nationals, weathering literal storms and heavy pressure from the competition to win the 2017, 2018, and 2019 450 National Championships aboard his Monster Energy Kawasaki. Along the way, countless Beast Mode episodes. This was enjoyable stuff.
Pressure Packed
The ET3 Peat in 450MX only intensified the pressure to finally get things done in Monster Energy Supercross, as the title continued to prove elusive. In 2020, Tomac was finally looking good for it until a global pandemic gripped the racing world and threatened the entire season. Eli was the points leader when the racing stopped, but even he said that he wanted to win it the right way, and not simply inherit a title because a season ended early. Well, he got his wish when racing resumed for seven races in Salt Lake City. Could Tomac deliver under pressure? He won the first race back and set the tone that finally led him to supercross glory.
Watch some of Tomac's greatest moments below:
2022
It’s not often a rider’s best year comes late in his career, but you can pretty easily point to 2022 as being the best year Tomac has ever had. After a surprise switch to Yamaha, Tomac rampaged his way back to both the supercross and motocross titles, then finished the year off by leading Team USA to its first Motocross of Nations victory since 2011. Even better, it happened on home soil at RedBud. Not many riders can say they’ve had years like that!
Anaheim 1 – 2023
Tomac had always struggled at Anaheim 1, but he checked the box in a big way this time. He found himself in the lead at the first race of the season back in January, but then he made a mistake and crashed on a tunnel jump. Just like that it seemed like his bid to win A1 for the first time would be over. Enter Beast Mode. Tomac remounted, started clicking off heroic laps, and ran down Chase Sexton in the final stages of the race, just like he’d done to so many other racers, time and time again.
“I guess I just needed experience,” Tomac joked afterward. “This is my tenth round one, apparently it took ten times to finally figure out how to get to it right at round one!”
Denver – 2023
This sport can flip you upside down in an instant, literally and figuratively, and boy oh boy was that apparent in Denver this year. With Tomac all but crowned the 2023 Monster Energy AMA Supercross Champion, Tomac inexplicably pulled off the track while leading the 450SX main early on. Everyone knows the story now, he’d suffered a ruptured Achilles tendon, putting a swift end to his quest for back-to-back 450SX titles in front of a shocked hometown crowd.
Regardless of what the future holds for Tomac, it sure has been a wild ride that started with a bang in Hangtown back in 2010, and never got boring in the years that followed. What Tomac moments do you remember? Let us know in the comments below.
