Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1489777
VOLUME ISSUE JANUARY , P121 that made up the A1 track. But the man of the night was in no doubt Eli Tomac. I love it when a rider wears the number one and does stuff on the mo - torcycle deserving of it. The way he decimated the best riders in the world after his get-off over the bridge jump was reminiscent of Valentino Rossi's legendary fightback at Phillip Island in 2003 when he got docked 10 seconds for passing under a yellow flag. In that encounter, Rossi not only recovered the 10 seconds but kept the fire lit and jammed an extra five seconds on top just to hammer home his superiority. This was vintage Tomac, as he delivered the kind of fightback we'd seen him do so many times when he was on the factory Kawasaki. Judging from that first bout, you'd be a brave man not to put your money on Tomac retaining that number-one plate for Su - percross and maybe that will be enough to get him to reconsider his planned retirement at the end of the Supercross season and aim to add the first SuperMoto - cross World Champion title to his long list of accomplishments. With Tomac's performance, the atmosphere inside Angel Sta - dium and the new direction the sport is going in, things are look- ing up for already the best show on dirt. If it's been years since your last supercross, or if you've never been, it might be time to get your backside trackside and get reinfected with a love of stadium racing. CN The however many people that rocked up to Anaheim were treated to one of the best main events in recent memory. to note this is a world champion- ship in name only, not an official world championship as sanc- tioned by the sport's governing body in the FIM. I brought this rather touchy subject up to Feld Entertain- ment's Sean Brennan, Senior PR Manager and the point of contact for all the journalists who wish to write anything on this championship. "The best riders in the world compete here, that's the bottom line," Brennan said emphatically. "Yes, you can go and visit many countries and be a geographi - cal tour, that's one way to look at it. But here in America, we're blessed that we have a 50-year history of crowning champions in this sport. That's been built over time. It's been earned. Kids all over the world have posters of Ken Roczen and Chase Sexton and Eli Tomac on their walls. If you ask Marvin Musquin, he grew up with posters in his bed - room, dreaming about coming to America. We're fortunate to be in that position, but that's been earned. "We're not affiliated with the FIM anymore. Nobody owns the words 'world championship.' The FIM certainly owns the term "FIM World Championship," but no one owns those words. If you ask the winners of the Super - bowl, are they world champi- ons? The same as Major League Baseball. From our standpoint, the best athletes in the world compete here, therefore, it's a world championship." It's hard to argue with Brennan on that one. Brennan's optimism in this new venture was clearly shared by the fans who turned out in droves for the start of the season. I've been lucky enough to go to A1 seven times since arriving here in America, and I've never seen the parking lot so completely rammed as it was at 5 p.m. on race day. The place was so packed that our own Ryan Nitzen couldn't get his fiancée a ticket, and he's the guy who writes the race reports. The however many people that rocked up to Anaheim were treated to one of the best main events in recent memory. The rain that flocked down over So - Cal in the lead-up to the race thankfully stayed away and allowed the world's best to put on a clinic of just how to ride a knobby-tire motorbike. Supercross is one of the most beautiful and brutal sports out there—Austin Forkner's bone- jarring crash off the start of the 250 main was in direct contrast to the performance of Jett Law - rence, the Aussie who seemed to dance his way around the roughly 5500 cubic yards of dirt