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/1490735
ROUND 2/ JANUARY 21, 2023 SNAPDRAGON STADIUM, SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA P56 SUPERCROSS I 2023 MONSTER ENERGY AMA SUPERCROSS SERIES how I wanted to. Obviously Coop and Eli broke away and I wasn't able to close that gap. Kenny raced me good, and we talked after the race and he was stoked on it and so was I." 250SX West San Diego looked like a near carbon copy of Anaheim 1 for Jett Lawrence. What eventually became a perfect day didn't start out as such. He quickly put a crash in qualifying behind him and set the second-fastest time of anyone, 450s included, on the track (.09 seconds off Malcolm Stewart). He swept the night with a heat-race win and a wire-to-wire victory in the main event. Despite chaos at the start and heaps of lapped traffic, Lawrence continued to pour it on. As Cameron McAdoo and RJ Hampshire inched closer, the Honda rider, Lawrence, knocked down his lap times and kept the margin needed to take his second win of the season. "As a few laps went on, I could see McAdoo was there," Lawrence said. "The main guys to push the rhythms hard and ride like myself, which I think is critical." Justin Barcia landed on the box in San Diego and showed that he's a front-runner this year. After a crash while lead - ing in Anaheim 1, Barcia, who's in a contract year, looked eager to prove the naysayers wrong. The number 51 tailed Jason Anderson early in the main event, and you can't help but speculate if their heat-race run-in fueled Barcia's motiva - tion for the night's final race. Anderson's fall bumped Barcia to third, but the intensity didn't end there. Ken Roczen wanted a podium as well and pressured Barcia for nearly all 25 laps. However, the Factory Gas - Gas rider, Barcia, managed to keep the number 94 in his rear- view mirror for the duration of the main and held on for third. Barcia is sixth in overall points, 19 behind the leader. "It was a really intense race," Barcia said. "I felt like I didn't breathe the entire race and got super tight. I rode well but not NOT GOOD It's not often you see a factory rider not make the main event, but that's what happened to Red Bull KTM's Max Vohland. Now in his third season, Vohland made critical mistakes in both his heat and Last Chance Qualifier (LCQ) that left him sitting in the pits when the 250 main event took off. "In the first heat race, I had a very bad start, made my way up to sixth, and then the red flag came out. On the restart, I crashed in the first turn and, with only two laps to go, I was outside of the top nine and had to go to the LCQ. In the Last Chance, I worked my way up to a qualifying position but then made a mistake on the last lap and went down, unfortunately putting me out of the main. Of course, I am very disap- pointed." "MEDIOCRE NIGHT" Chase Sexton described his night as "mediocre," but it seemed worse than that. The Factory Honda rider had a crash in his heat race, and his bike's fuel tank was demolished after Aaron Plessinger ran into his downed motorcycle. As a result, Sexton had to ride the 450SX LCQ for the first time of his career. He won that but got taken out in the 450SX main, where he went from 10th to fifth. Briefly...