What happened Saturday night at Chicagoland in the last 450 moto was something of a head-scratcher. Team Honda's Jett Lawrence, while leading, slowed down and waved Progressive Suzuki-mounted Ken Roczen by for the moto win. Jett thought that it would help him in the ultimate quest, which is to win that $1 million SuperMotocross World Championship (SMX) bonus. To Lawrence's thinking, elevating Roczen would narrow the points between himself and Chase Sexton, but it did not—Roczen's 3-2 would have beaten Sexton's 2-3 anyway in the overall tally, which is how SMX rounds are scored, rather than points per moto. Jett's "baby gift" to Roczen (Ken and wife Courtney had their second baby last week) got a lot of people talking about the infamous "Let Brock Bye" moment at the end of the '77 AMA 125 National Championship, but it turns out that's not the only time one rider slowed down and waved someone past. And sometimes, for much different reasons than Jettson's...
(And if we missed any big ones, please let us know in the comments below!)
Read: Jett Lawrence Given Written Warning for Roczen Wave By
1974 Swiss 250 Grand Prix finale: This was the race where Czech rider Jaroslav Falta was literally assaulted by the Russian teammates of Gennady Moiseev, as they took every chance to block and even T-bone Falta. Some even slowed down enough to get lapped late in the race so they could have another crack at taking Jaroslav down. In the end Falta held on to win the race, with support from the American GP legend Jim Pomeroy, who waved Falta by and then went and blocked the Russians for him. In the end it was all for naught as Falta would be protested by the Russians for allegedly jumping the starting gate and was docked one minute, which was enough for Moiseev to clinch the title. The whole thing was one big farce and a black eye for motocross.
1977 San Antonio 125 National: "Let Brock Bye." In a nutshell, Yamaha’s Broc Glover was five points behind Suzuki’s Danny Laporte going into the final moto in San Antonio. According to the introduction to 1977 in the Racer X Online Vault, “Yamaha asked Hannah to help Glover win the title. On the last lap of the final moto in San Antonio, Hannah's mechanic Keith McCarty was told to write ‘Let Brock Bye’ on Hannah's chalkboard—the most notorious pit signal in motocross history (even with two grammatical errors). Hannah grudgingly obeyed, Glover tied LaPorte on points at 240 apiece, but was awarded the title based on the fact that he had two wins—including the controversial one in Texas.” The fact that Glover, the youngest 125 National moto winner ever, went on to win five AMA Pro Motocross Championships and the Trans-USA title makes him one of our sport’s all-time greats. He didn’t ask for the help in Texas that hot afternoon, but it’s unfortunately something us journalists and race reporters have to bring up from time to time—like right now.
1985 Rodil Cup: After the FIM implemented a strange inverted start policy for the main event, design to put the faster Americans in the second row of the main event, top U.S. riders like Johnny O'Mara, Jeff Ward and Ron Lechien, as well as a couple of Europeans, all tanked their qualifiers in order to line up in the front row. This infuriated Rick Johnson, who had won the first heat going away. So he took to the stadium PA system and let his fellow racers have it!
1986 Motocross of Nations: At the end of maybe the most dominant day in American motocross history, David Bailey slowed down in the final 250/500 moto to wait for Team USA stablemate Rick Johnson so they could cross the finish line together arm-in-arm. This same scenario would be repeated in 2011 in France when Ryan Villopoto slowed down to let Ryan Dungey catch up and they could ride across the finish line together.
1992 Los Angles SX finale: The slow meltdown of Damon Bradshaw overshadowed the fact that both his Yamaha teammate Jeff Emig and his rival Jeff Stanton’s Honda teammate Jean-Michel Bayle both rode slow behind Damon as neither wanted to pass him and make matters worse for the Beast from the East, as if it could have gotten any worse…
1992 Budds Creek 500 National: A couple months later, in his last AMA Pro Motocross National, Bayle slowed down again to help Kawasaki’s Mike Kiedrowski—unnecessarily, as it turned out—clinch the 500 title over Stanton again. Bayle and Stanton were actually Honda teammates, but their relationship was, well, not very good at that time.
2001 Steel City 125 National: After Red Bull KTM rider Grant Langston's rear wheel collapsed, assuring Mike Brown the title, the Pro Circuit Kawasaki rider slowed down and let Factory Connection Honda rider Branden Jesseman by for second in the moto, with gave the overall win (and the all-time 125 record to that point) to Ricky Carmichael, who had dropped down to a Kawasaki KX125 for that last national in an attempt to get that record. RC ended up with a 3-1 to Brown's 1-3.
2002 Unadilla 125 National: This was the beginning of the James Stewart-Chad Reed rivalry. Kawasaki-mounted James waved Yamaha of Troy's Chad by, just so he could pass him again in one of the ultimate motocross flex moves. It should be mentioned that Reed was just coming of a shoulder separation at Southwick and probably wasn’t 100%, but after that he and James would spend the rest of their careers seemingly ready to drop the gloves and go at it.
2003 125 Nationals: Red Bull KTM teammates Langston and Ryan Hughes were battling for the 125 National Championship, but Kawasaki’s Stewart was closing rapidly after missing the first few rounds of the season with a broken collarbone. But when he returned, he won every single moto! KTM team manager Larry Brooks ordered several other KTM teammates to slow down for Langston and Hughes in different motos toward the end of the season. Turns out Stewart’s bid for a comeback ended too early, as did the Langston/Hughes duel. The Kenworth’s National in Troy, Ohio, was postponed due to flooding, moved to the end of the season, and then canceled completely after the floods returned. Langston ended up edging Hughes for the title, based on having the points lead leaving the Steel City National, which ended up being the finale after Kenworthy’s was canceled.
2005 Glen Helen 125 National: Remember when Red Bull KTM’s Mike Alessi took out Monster Energy/Pro Circuit Kawasaki’s Ivan Tedesco early on in the last moto of the championship, then tried to prevent Tedesco from getting started up again? Everyone probably does. But what’s been mostly forgotten is that Tedesco’s teammate Matt Walker stopped and tried to help Ivan, which in turn led to a penalty from not only Alessi but Walker as well.
2017 New Jersey SX: Red Bull KTM’s Ryan Dungey got a gift from teammate Marvin Musquin after Eli Tomac had a terrible main event and basically lost his title shot. Musquin took the race lead from Dungey and poured salt on the Tomac wound by letting Dungey by on the last lap of the 450 main event—a race that was ultimately the future AMA Motorcycle Hall of Famer Dungey’s last ever AMA Supercross win.
2017 Las Vegas SX: This Meadowlands meltdown led one week later to Tomac trying his own desperation move in the Las Vegas main event, slowing throughout the race while leading Dungey. The goal was to keep the pack close and try to shove enough riders (and points) between he and Dungey to steal the title. The last laps turned into a crazy fiasco of a race. The ultimate winner that night? Jason Anderson. The champion? Ryan Dungey, for a fourth time.
2018 Monster Energy Cup: Joey Savatgy infamously let his Monster Energy Kawasaki teammate Tomac go by in the final moto, giving Tomac the $1 million win bonus that came with sweeping the night. Joey meant well, Eli made a million, and all of Las Vegas frowned on the idea of race-fixing in a time where betting on sporting events is getting more and more popular.
Main image by Jim Gianatsis
