Pre-season chatter said Max Anstie was flying at the test track, and his speed led him to the early points lead in 250SX East in Monster Energy AMA Supercross. Then came a tough DNF with an engine failure in Birmingham, and too many bad starts, all of which knocked Max from title contention. However, he and his Firepower Honda team never gave up, and Max finally got a good enough start in Philadelphia to make a run for the win. He was patient and made a move on Seth Hammaker to get the lead and then managed it from there. Then Jalek Swoll jumped into Hammaker in the sand, opening up a bigger lead for Anstie.
“I could hear the crowd going a little wild, but as soon as I realized that Seth wasn't behind me, I had a little gap,” said Anstie in the post-race press conference. “I started just taking safer lines. Like I went back to jumping in the whoops. I didn't send the sand as hard. I only had like three minutes left, so I was like, not too crazy. It was quite a nice race. I actually felt like it wasn't too difficult for me. If I needed to step up again, I could push it harder if I needed to, but it was tricky. It was one of those where there was a lot of little rocks and I didn't want to do something stupid, like slide out going into the first turn or even after the whoops, like that turn up the face of the finish jump. So I started, once I had a gap, to search for some easier lines. I started going outside to inside on the smooth stuff. It might have been a little slow, but it was quite easy to do. I was just trying to manage it because I didn't wanna do anything silly and I wanted that bonus check.”
While Anstie stalked Hammaker early, he had a line set up for a pass in the sand, but he wasn’t worried it wouldn’t work. Swoll eventually tried it and plowed into Hammaker. Max was patient with it. “It’s funny because I thought that was a good place to pass but it was also really sketchy,” Anstie said to Steve Matthes. “I was like, unless he makes a mistake and I’m actually alongside him, we’re gonna hit. I was not comfortable risking that. So I thought, maybe the whoops. I went outside and skimmed the whoops, that didn’t really work out because I was outside of him. I tried to square up the finish turn, almost got him but I was on the outside again. I was trying to keep an eye on Swoll behind me. If he got any closer, I needed to attack then because I didn’t want to be defending and trying to attack. I obviously had that bit of a square off thing with Seth, and the crowd was going wild because Seth is a Philly boy. It was pretty cool to be out there with him.”
Matthes asked Anstie if he was actually thinking about wearing Hammaker down, since the Kawasaki rider is just back from a shoulder injury.
“[Laughs] Yeah. I actually was. I went over quite a few times I was breathing, and I was like “Let’s see how strong that shoulder really is!” But again, that’s what happens. I was trying to apply the pressure in that way. But he was riding sick. It was great fun. I can’t take anything away from him. I felt like it was a real supercross race win, a real supercross race, not raining properly. I feel like I’ve made it in supercross at least in the 250 class.”
Anstie and his small staff, small budget Firepower Honda team did snag a win last year in New Jersey, but that was a massive mud race.
“Yeah, East/West Shootout was fun last year and with Honda with swept the podium with Jett and Hunter up there,” Anstie said. “But this one feels like a real supercross. It doesn’t feel like I won a wet race, it’s like, “Alright, cool, I’m a supercross guy now!” And to make passes. We had a battle, it wasn’t like just holeshot and win, you know? Yeah, great night.”
Anstie was asked about a line he found in the whoops, tripling in and then blitzing.
“I actually think I saw Benny Bloss do it in the 450 practice and then picked it up and it worked,” Anstie said to Mitch Kendra. “I felt pretty comfortable skimming the whoops all year, we just haven't had whoops that were, let's say skimmers. Even today, they were kind of 50/50 you know? You could pretty much go the same speed in both. I was just able to do something different. If I just followed him, I wasn't hassling him, whereas if I tripled and started sending it in there, it made it look like I was gonna make a pass. Then when he was going to the inside, he started to skim and, and kind of messed it up a little bit. So, it was more of just trying to hassle him a little bit and do something different.”
Max credited a revised bike setup to allow him to get through the tight turn before the whoops and make it happen.
“No, the way we've got the, the bike set up now…earlier in the year, yeah, I wouldn't have been able to do that,” Anstie said. “It would have been a first gear section for me. My bike was quite smooth whereas now we've changed some primary gear stuff and, and the bike's really snappy now off the bottom. So for me doing that, in second [gear] wasn't too bad.”
Matthes later chatted with Anstie’s Team Manager Martin Davlos for the team perspective.
“Yes thank you,” said Davalos. “The most important thing was that people doubted us with the first win in the wet, because Max is from England. On this motorcycle, we changed the whole motor package. I think after Birmingham everyone has seen what we’ve done. Really excited about it, we’re a privateer team and doing what we’re doing against multi-million dollar teams. I hope people appreciate what we’re doing. Our goal is to show that being on a factory team doesn’t mean that much and we’re extremely competitive. I’m extremely proud of my guys.”
From flying at the test track to finally delivering on the race track, Davalos was happy to see Anstie’s work pay off.
Yeah, and you know I think for me it was the same thing [in my own career], I was fast, it’s just about working with him and see what he needs to do to give him that opportunity. We have struggled with starts but I think he put himself in a really good position today, and he was able to, like I told a lot of people, we haven’t seen the real Max yet. I see it every day, and even thought a lot of the good guys got stuck in the back [off the start] I think Max was able to control the race and show what he’s capable of doing.
The Firepower Honda team is far from a factory effort. Anstie himself was completely out of work not that long ago. What’s next? Max is getting a lot of attention from those big-dollar factory teams for the future. His two-year run with Firepower Honda has set him up well, but it has also proven that this little team can get the job done. Rare is it for a privateer effort to beat the biggest and best in the game. Anstie, Davalos and this squad have pulled it off.
“I’m proud of him,” said Davalos. “We’ve worked really close. Max was without a ride, we believed in him and he believed in us and here we are.”
