Tim Ritchie doesn’t like me to say it, but Millville is, in my opinion, the best track of the 11 AMA Pro Motocross Championship rounds. And this weekend, although I wasn’t there, showed that again. The track looked amazing, Mt. Martin is incredible to watch (although probably not amazing to send it off the top, but hey, what do I care?), the sand whoops are great, the start is ballsy, and all in all, Millville is a fantastic track.
So, seeing what we did at the first two races, it was pretty unbelievable to think that Martin could do what he did in Minnesota. The moto gods helped him out with Jo Shimoda’s rear brake going out in moto two, but hey, it was worth it (sorry, Jo!). Martin’s fitness is elite, and to see him dig deep and lower those lap times when Haiden Deegan was catching him in moto two was pretty cool. Two holeshots, also!
Martin was on the PulpMX Show and mentioned that he got a start map dialed in to help, and that Tuesday before the race, he really had a great day of practice. He was thinking if he could bring that to Saturday’s race, he would be alright. And was he ever!
We joked with him that maybe it’s time to go to Washougal, and he laughed and said nope, that was it. He moved into second place in 250MX history behind Larry Ward with the largest gap between his first-ever moto win and his last.
Something we talked about on the show is the fastest brothers to ever race. I think the Lawrence brothers have this on lock right now, right? Jett is close to what James Stewart achieved championship-wise; Hunter’s probably better than Malcolm, as Malcolm just has the one 250SX title. Then it’s the Martin brothers, with Jeremy’s two titles and Alex’s solid stats, Tyson and Tallon Vohland in there, Marty and Mike Tripes, and then Garry and Dewayne Jones as well, with Gary’s titles pushing the Jones boys up there. It’s hard to say for sure while Malcolm and the Lawrences are all still active, but now officially the book is closed on the Martin brothers, and it’s not too bad!
Okay, we’ll get back to the 250s shortly, but Jett Lawrence won again. The only issue he’s got is he, for the second straight moto, fell on the opening lap. This cost him the moto sweep, as he could only get up to second in moto one to his brother Hunter. A couple of things: Jett went by Eli Tomac and Chase Sexton like they had boat anchors attached to their bikes, and they’re all-timers. Also, Jett was catching Hunter late in the moto and even put in a ridiculous 1:55 at one point, but on the 12th lap, Hunter stopped the charge with almost a second faster lap than his brother. At that point, Jett started mailing it in and losing time from there to save himself for moto two.
And what a moto two it was. The kid phenom took off with the win after passing big brother, and it was over. He’s won every overall this year, he’s only lost three motos all year, and he continues to amaze us all. I don’t know what else to say. He’s something else to watch out there.
Hunter getting that moto win was massive. He’s almost 40 points clear of third in the points (like, how did that happen so quick?), he’s got the second most laps led, second most podiums, second most holeshots, and yeah, you get the drift. He’s also got the most second places, which probably isn’t awesome for him. He’s yet to win a 450MX overall despite doing 99 percent of the work to actually win one. And it’s his brother that’s stopping him. I know…awkward, right?
![Jett Lawrence]()
Jett Lawrence Align Media ![Hunter Lawrence]()
Hunter Lawrence Align Media
I don’t know; Chase Sexton seems happy to be back at the races as he got third at Millville. All his interviews seem to be of a resigned, “I’m not where I need to be yet, but I’m happy to be back,” type of vibe. Like, if you’re Chase and Hunter beats you by 40 seconds in the second moto, are you that stoked? Sexton’s amazing, but how does he make up that gap to Hunter with just eight motos to go? I understand that every moto is different, but both Lawrences' starts have been amazing, and then they have everything else to match or beat Chase. So how does he stop this train and get into first or second? Count me as shocked that Hunter Lawrence, with Chase Sexton starting with him like in this second moto, gets 40 seconds put on him.
Yeah, man, I don’t know what was up with Eli Tomac either. In the first moto, he just went…backwards? He had the third fastest lap of the moto, but yeah, not ideal as a lot of guys that don’t usually beat him caught and passed him. In the second moto, he started 11th and made it to ninth. So…yeah. He made the podium two weeks ago (although it was shocking to see Hunter catch, pass, and drop him) and was in podium position when his bike let go last week. So, it’s not panic button time here for Tomac, but hey, he’s 32 years old, the DNF last week likely ended his very-remote title chances, and maybe he was just not feeling it. Hey, it happens. We’ll have a better idea this weekend on a track he’s great on which way his year is going to go, methinks.
Breaking news: We got this quote from the Yamaha PR that is most likely made up: “It was a difficult couple of motos this weekend. We’ll get back to work and try to be stronger next weekend.”
Well then!
Check out this great write up by Weege that covers some theories as to what is up with Tomac.
Back to the 250s, and Haiden Deegan toughed it out to win yet another overall. You could see he wasn’t his usual self after being “banged up” (I predict this will be the new catchphrase for 2025!) and not riding all week. He took what he could get out there, and even in moto one, where he won, it was more Jo Shimoda saying, “I don’t want this moto win, you have it Haiden,” after moving into first. The second moto was just Jeremy Martin channeling his inner 2017 J-Mart, and Deegs knew he had the overall.
Poor Shimoda. Had he been able to lay the hammer down in moto one instead of doing a 2:00 lap time (he did a 1:58 to get into the lead!) and had his rear brake not gone out (I blame Lars), he was looking at another 1-1 day like he had at RedBud. Still, he got third overall and has really separated himself for second in the points, but oh, what could have been!
I know this 2025 season hasn’t been the best for, like, excitement in the title chases (thanks, Deegs and Jett!), but to me, there’s plenty of stuff going on that made this summer. What are those? Well, allow me to list them for you!
-In the 250s, there’s been a lot of chaos behind Deegan. It looks like Shimoda has it now, but we’ve had Chance Hymas, Levi Kitchen, and others appear that they can challenge for wins or at least second to Deegs. The battle behind Deegan has been good! Behind Deegs has been exciting!
-Michael Mosiman is back! The talented rider has been hit hard by injuries, but he’s put in some great rides this summer and has been consistently fast, which is not something we’ve been able to say about Mosiman for a number of years. Mosi is exciting!
-Garrett Marchbanks has passed a lot of guys from the back this summer. He’s been exciting!
-Jorge Prado has been exciting for all the wrong reasons. His Millville race was amazing; he appeared to just quit in moto one as he was going backwards, and moto two was a fifth. His sub-par results have been the buzz of the pits. That’s exciting!
-Seeing Swiss rider Valentin Guillod get top tens on a stock motor (just an exhaust) with a stock ECU has been exciting! He told us on the PulpMX Show he hasn’t had his suspension oil changed since before Pala! Pulling top tens on a stock bike with blown-out suspension oil—that’s exciting!
-Holeshot, crashing, saves, sending it—all of it, sometimes in one moto, Coty Schock is exciting!
-On that note, Jordon Smith is ALWAYS exciting!
-The legend Tony Cairoli doing two races in the USA on the all-new Ducati? C’mon, that’s exciting!
-And yes, nothing else this year will beat the Jeremy Martin Millville story. YOU WANT EXCITEMENT??? THAT’S EXCITEMENT!!!!
Sometimes you just gotta look around a bit to see it, people!
Thanks for reading OBS from Millville. We’ll see you all at Washougal and at the live show Friday night at the track. Maybe at the HRC holeshot contest even! Email me at matthes@racerxonline.com to chat about this or anything else.
