"Malcolm was the only one who could consistently ride the razor’s edge without going over the line"

There was a shot of Eli Tomac warming up on an exercise bike on the broadcast, which is a common practice. But after getting warm, how do riders stay warm when they’re on the line waiting for the 250SX race to end? Is it even harder when there’s a red flag and restart in the 250SX Class, like there was in Tampa?
It’s really difficult but warm temperatures help. The goal is similar to any sort of combustion engine. For best results, you’d want to have everything humming at an optimal operating temperature. For riders, that means there won’t be any sort of lag period or shock to the system when heart rates go from 100 to 190 within 30 seconds. They are priming their bodies for what’s to come and the workload about to be placed upon it. For Eli, he was also loosening up that leg. The more he could keep it from going into “healing mode,” the more conducive it would be for the race.

On the red flag, riders are still warm, it’s more about maintaining focus and mental intensity. This is where interval training really helps. The muscle memory of doing a few laps, coming to a stop, resting, then going hard immediately again will feel familiar in a red flag situation. We witnessed how important it is to be ready right away in the heat race. Pierce Brown lost two spots in a matter of seconds simply because his guard was down. Contrast that with Max Anstie blitzing away in the main event on the restart.

Last week Jett Lawrence tore his ACL and is now out or the season. Cameron McAdoo tore his ACL just a few days ago, raced anyway, and took third. He looked great, too. Help us understand the difference in these two situations
Every knee injury is different and reacts differently. Could Jett have raced Tampa in some fashion? Probably but it wouldn’t be 100 percent and he would also be compromising something down the line. For McAdoo, he really needed to be out there and give it a chance. Jett and Cameron are in different places in their careers. Jett has championships and just signed a very lucrative, long term contract with Honda HRC. The most important factor is ensuring that he’s healthy for the long term outlook. For McAdoo, his future is less certain and missing this east series would have been a tough blow. Will McAdoo have to sit out Pro Motocross? Probably, but it’s also fair to say that SX is his most likely avenue for success. It’s all about determining what is the most important short/long term goal and weighing every outcome.

The 250SX East Class was, as expected, bonkers. RJ Hampshire finished a lap down after getting stuck to a Tuff Block, Daxton Bennick took second, Levi Kitchen finished ninth, Chance Hymas took sixth after barely riding at all, Cullin Park took seventh, and plenty more. What stood out to you as the biggest surprise of the evening?
I fully expected chaos to reign. There were far more questions than answers coming in and that’s how it played out, too. We are going to see inconsistency in this class. These riders are prone to it and the added depth just exacerbates that likelihood. On the upside, Anstie, Brown (until the crash), and Bennick were incredibly impressive. I was the most disappointed in Kitchen on the downside. I never saw him up front at any point or flash at all. He needs to bounce back in a big way in Detroit.

Malcolm Stewart earned the first 450SX win of his career in Tampa, and one of his strongest sections of the track was the whoops. What was he doing differently that gave him such an advantage through the whoops?
Malcolm has always been a monster in the whoops. We haven’t seen him have a big advantage there since he climbed aboard the Rockstar Energy Husqvarna but his skills didn’t just evaporate. Those Tampa whoops were incredibly challenging and really shined a light on proficiency. Malcolm was able to enter with a lot of speed and stay right at the top of each whoop and hold his Husky straight. That takes a lot of confidence and conviction. Entering with speed makes blitzing easier but it also increases the odds of crashing. Any sort of big mistake or unexpected move, and it’s much more difficult to save. That’s the risk/reward of increasing speed in the whoops. The slower you enter, the easier it is to hit the brakes and slow things to a manageable outcome. Malcolm was the only one who could consistently ride the razor’s edge without going over the line. That one dynamic is what determined the outcome of the main event.

Chase Sexton crashed in the whoops while leading, and afterward it seemed like he was either hurt or something was wrong with the bike. Take us through Sexton’s post-crash laps.
I could see that his motorcycle was bent up as he was out there and he later shared that his front brake lever and throttle sustained damage in that crash. He was likely furious that he couldn’t defend his positions in the waning laps but the thing he couldn’t do was turn that into a 14^th place finish with another crash. He’s still the points leader and another contender had a big setback. Swallow the mistake, find the silver lining, take a deep breath, and head to Michigan with the right mindset.

The lappers got bad very early in the 450SX main event. What was it about this track that made lapped traffic so bad, and how does a frontrunner handle such heavy traffic while trying to maintain pace?
The track was very one-lined and lappers really had nowhere to go. The golden rule is to hold your line so that the leaders know where to pass. If “holding the line” is the only line, that creates a real issue. Making an erratic move, especially in traffic, can have very bad results, so what’s the appropriate move? That’s the question that lappers are asking. What they can do is try to be aware of the situation and track dynamics and take alternate lines where possible. As the lapper, if you know the inside is faster, take the outside when the leader is right behind you. The toughest part is when lappers are battling for position (yes, they are racing for their spot, also) and they can’t determine who is who. That’s what happened as Roczen came by and Jeremy Hand got off-kilter in the sand. Bad deal all around but as a rider that faced this for a decade, it can be very challenging to navigate while in a battle.