2. Eli Tomac

Here’s the opposite of the Sexton situation. Four-time 450 National Motocross Champion Eli Tomac is not only back outdoors, he’s ready, because his leg injury knocked him out of supercross but did allow him to get back on a bike with time to get ready for motocross. Eli spoke with Swap Moto Live’s Donn Meada last week and said he has far more motocross prep than he’s ever had before. Normally most of April and May are spent thinking about supercross. Eli’s leg hurt more than he expected when he started riding again, but that merely served to shelve any ideas of a supercross return and instead hammer outdoors, full focus. Scary thought for everyone else.

On the flip side, Eli has actually only raced two Pro Motocross rounds since his 2022 title. A lot of time has passed since he was a race winner outdoors. Is he still right where he used to be? We’ll see. These are just guesses.

3. Jett Lawrence

Whoa. Remember Jett Lawrence? He had become polarizing to fans due to, in the opinion of some, too much winning, too much attention, too much praise, too much Jett in general. That might have changed. Two whole championships he’s had to miss, Pro Motocross last year with a thumb injury and supercross this year with an ACL. In between he snuck in the SMX World Championship and a Motocross of Nations Victory for Team Australia. But even those quick hits aren’t the full-scale weekly takeover that seemed imminent.

Where does it go from here? The directions are easy to map out. Down one road, Jett has so much talent skill and ability, especially outdoors, that a year of injuries won’t change anything. He still has only lost one 450 overall in his entire career, when he wadded it at Hangtown last year. He still won Thunder Valley, High Point and Southwick while still recovering. As for 2025, detractors will say this supercross season was a sign that he’d lost his way with the attention, money, cars or success, but the raw data says that right before that ACL injury, there was a good chance he was going to win Glendale and be right in striking distance of the points lead, even with a terrible opening round.

The more likely reason that Jett could be off from his usual standards this summer? The short turnaround from ACL repair. Jett proved with the thumb last year he can get back quickly. Is he ready enough to win immediately? We’ll see. These are just guesses.

4. Hunter Lawrence

Hunter doesn’t jump off the page the way multi-time 450 champs like Sexton, Tomac and Jett do, but don’t sleep on his performance as a 450-rookie last year. He gave Sexton a good push most of the way. Plus, Hunter is known as more of a slow builder instead of a quick flash-and-fizzle kind of guy, so his likelihood of an improvement in year two is very high. He was also injured in supercross but did get back on a bike earlier than most of the other injured guys. Don’t be surprised if he’s way better than expected, even if he should be expected to be really, really good.

 5. Jorge Prado

Stacking unknowns on unknowns here. Coming off of shoulder surgery, Prado will have just five weeks of riding under his belt before round one. He’s on a new bike and team and he’s never raced these American tracks in this American format, which offers very little practice time on the track.

Those are the negatives, but in our Monster Energy Racer X motocross preview videos, our own Jason Thomas makes a very simple argument on the positive side: Jorge has never not been a contender for basically his whole life. From two MX2 titles through his five seasons in MXGP, which ended with titles the last two years, Prado is always at the front. Plus, even his tiny bit of supercross racing this year showed that his start prowess, which is his greatest asset, can translate over. Supercross starts are way different than motocross and he was still pulling them like it was old hat. Outdoors should be just the same. Put a guy with Jorge’s talent up front in most motos, and how could he not do well?