2023 Horizon Award winner is..

Not to debate it but Bennick  swept his motos in one class and Towers didn’t win a single one I just don’t know how they make these decisions. 

Correction, Daxton Bennick won the Horizon Award. I originally posted that Towers won it on wrong info.  Thanks for the correction Jacob Hayes. 

Good for Daxton. Good parents, bright future ahead. 

The awards were a little bit disjointed based on their schedule that we had with all the weather. Dax Bennick absolutely got the award on stage in front of his peers.

Obviously, it should have gone to Mike Brown😂

they need to start giving out a secondary award to the first non-factory guy. 

You get a trophy and you get a trophy and everyone gets a trophy...come on man....

No kidding.....Let's give "secondary awards" at the National Championships.  

We could call it the Meister award...

HAA!! that was golden! haha going to see Oppenheimer here in a few, needed a laugh haha

Can Mike Brown present it?

Haha!! Perfect!

The factory kids put in the results that's how they got the factory ride. Everyone's got 24 hours in a day so make it happen.

I must have missed this one because I don’t get the joke!

ty 4 the thread cleanup 

Congratulations, Daxton!

would be interesting to know how many Horizan award winners went on to win titles once pro? Any one got the stats

It's from 2021, but here you go...

https://racerxonline.com/2021/08/13/the-list-motocross-horizon-award-winners

It looks like ten of those riders have gone on to win titles, and 18 of the 26 recipients (not counting 2023) have won a professional level AMA Supercross or Pro Motocross race.

The most obscure winner for me is Evan Laughridge. I would've been about ten years old when he got the award after winning two A titles in his final year at the ranch. I don't remember the name. In 2002 he beat Josh Hansen, Justin Brayton, Michael Blose, Josh Summey, Clark Stiles, Gavin Gracyk, Troy Adams, Willy Browning, Dave Ginolfi, and more for his two titles.

He raced a few nationals at the end of 2002, a handful of races in 2003, did two rounds 125 West Coast and some more outdoors in 2004, and two nationals in 2005. His final race at Steel City was a career-best with a top ten overall in the 250 (now 450 class).

Here's an interview from 2018 that Aaron Hansel did for Racer X: https://racerxonline.com/2018/08/21/where-are-they-now-evan-laughridge

There's a comment in there about Cole Gress screwing him a bit and interestingly enough if you scroll down, Cole responded below the article in their comment section. 

"Evan was great to work with and really delivered some clutch rides in 2002 but from what I remember his SX skills needed some work and we decided to go the AX route to develop him and not rush the process. He needed some time in AAA. It sucks that he recalls me “screwing” him and him missing out on a dream PC ride. I put a nice program together for him in 02 and put him in a position to “raise his stock”. As is in any sport, sometimes gifted hard working athletes do not make it all the way to the top."