Foxborough - The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly 1

Grant adds his picks for each category. If you've been in the forums you know there are no shortage of opinions after last weekend.

450 Class

The Good: Rider Drama

Whether you think that Marvin Musquin's move on Eli Tomac in the Main Event was dirty or clean, you should be able to agree that tension between two of the sport's biggest stars is something that will benefit the series. I mean, did you see the 450 press conference? Best one of the year, by far. Tension is exciting, and with the season coming to what is expected to be an anti-climatic end championship-wise, some animosity between the two guys behind the points leaders could make these final two rounds very interesting. Will Eli retaliate? Will Marvin anticipate retaliation and strike? Will it be all talk and no action? Hell, even if nothing happens, just the anticipation that something could happen is going to make the next round more fun to watch. If these two end up at the front in Salt Lake City and one starts closing in on the other...hold onto your butts. Now, obviously, I want it to be clean between these two, but they can rub a bit and still be clean.

The Good Bonus: Daytime Race Schedule

Does anyone not like the daytime schedule? I don't see how you could dislike it. Sure, everyone has to get up a bit earlier than usual, but the races are also done much earlier than usual, resulting in the entirety of Saturday evening becoming open for whatever. It allows the riders to catch a mid-evening flight home if they want (or to Austin for MotoGP the next day, like Chad Reed did). It also gives the teams a bit more time to prepare to move on to the next round, and fans the rest of the night to do whatever they please. Also, for us media guys, it gives us a head start on Sunday's work. It works out for just about everyone, unless you are absolutely, positively against waking up somewhat early. I'm not saying that the entire Supercross series should be switched to a daytime race schedule, but I'm all for a few more rounds switching over to it.

The Bad: Christian Craig | 11th Place

Christian Craig started off his stint with Team Honda HRC with an impressive combo of fifth place in Atlanta and fourth place at Daytona. Since then, though, he has struggled to reach the top five again. His results since Daytona have been 9-16-11-9-11, which is fine for a fill-in rider, but not terrific for a rider who probably hopes to be on Honda's factory 450 team full-time in the near future. I know he has shown potential on the 450 outdoors and that he's contracted to contend the entire series for Honda, but if I'm the team manager and I'm looking at this Supercross stint as a tryout for a spot in the future...I'm not convinced he's the guy to hire as of now. Of course, I don't think there is a full-time spot to be had on the team right now, assuming Seely's recovery going smoothly, but the team will probably look back on this when a spot does become open. I think Christian's a cool dude, and he's a pleasure to watch when he's riding, but he could really use a couple of eye-opening results to cap off this season.

The Ugly: Fan Drama

And now for the downside of rider drama: fan drama. Like I said earlier, I'm all for tension between riders because it makes the series more exciting. However, with tension between riders comes tension between fans, and I don't think I'm making an outlandish statement when I say that a fair portion of Supercross fans would rather argue and call each other (and the riders) names than actually debate the topic at hand. I get it, your dude got taken out by another dude, or another dude called out your dude. That makes you wanna throw off the gloves and jump right in to defend your rider's back and attack the other one. But, it is possible to have a debate with other people about it. It doesn't have to merely be jabs and angry typing. Just my two cents. 


250 Class

The Good: Kyle Peters | 3rd Place

Torn ACL and MCL? Not a problem for Kyle Peters, apparently. When I heard that Kyle would be racing Foxborough with a torn ACL and MCL, I admired his toughness but fully expected him to either pull out of practice, or at least pull out of the Main Event early. He didn't do either of those things, and he ended up finishing in third place. That's...that's freaking impressive, folks. The amount of pain he was in all day must have been excruciating, but he is clearly determined to show the JGR guys that he's willing to work through anything to get them the results that they hired him for. I said it earlier in the season and I'll say it again here: I wouldn't be surprised if Peters is offered a spot back on JGR for the 2019 Supercross season. He has earned it, in my opinion.

The Bad: Jeremy Martin | 4th Place

Jeremy Martin was on fire all day, until the first lap of the Main Event. There's only so much that being the fastest qualifier and a heat winner can do for a rider on the first lap of the Main Event. Sure, a better gate pick is a thing, but sometimes stuff simply happens on the first lap. In Jeremy's case, it was a small crash that pushed him all the way back to 22nd. From there on out, he was on absolute rails and blitzed through the field to a fourth-place finish (and he was closing in on third), but on paper it's a fourth-place finish. The journey to that fourth place isn't listed on the standard results sheet. So he lost out on another win/podium by virtue of a first lap incident, but he still showed that he is scorching hot right now. So, eh, I guess it was a give and take day for the #6.

The Ugly: Michael Mosiman | 21st Place

Michael Mosiman is a rookie who made his Supercross debut a little later than expected due to a string of concussions that concerned the team a bit. And I totally agree with that decision. Head injuries are absolutely no joke, and I think that riders should always wait until they are fully back to 100 percent upstairs before hopping back into racing. Anyway, he's the Ugly this week because he had another rough round in what has been an up-and-down first season indoors for him. We've seen bursts of potential (his best finish is an eighth) and I think he's going to develop into a well-rounded Supercross/motocross rider, but I'm still waiting for that breakout race. Hopefully he gets a decent start in one of these final two rounds and shows us what he can do.


Words by Grant Dawson
Photos by Steve Giberson

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