Sexton easily could have cruised
it in for a layup ride, collected
his trophy and ridden off into
the sunset. But instead, he rode
like a true champion and took a
wire-to-wire victory on the wet
and slippery Salt Lake soil.
"To win tonight under those
circumstances, that was prob
-
ably one of the better main
events I've had," Sexton said.
The championship was math-
ematically already his before the
final main event even began due
to last week's injury to Eli Tomac
at Denver. Tomac held comfort-
able lead in the Championship
going into the Denver race and
was leading the main when he
suffered an injury to his Achilles
tendon, which required surgery.
Without Tomac racing in SLC,
ROUND 17 / MAY 13, 2023
RICE ECCLES STADIUM / SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH
SUPERCROSS I MONSTER ENERGY AMA SUPERCROSS / SUPERMOTOCROSS WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
P68
238 HAIDEN DEEGAN
8TH 250SX
Haiden Deegan won the 250SX East
heat race and later finished eighth in
the main. "I was able to win the heat
race, and with the showdown, it was
pretty much half the main event for
the heat race, so I was definitely ex-
cited to win that. In the main event, it
started raining, and I slid off the gate
and didn't get a great jump and had
to work from the back. I made my way
up to eighth and ended up securing
second in the points because Antsie
was right in front of me, which was
where I needed to finish to get sec-
ond. So yeah, second in the points,
three podiums and two heat race wins
in my rookie season; I'm pretty hyped
about it!"
128 TOM VIALLE
14TH 250SX
Tom Vialle also went through the
LCQ but finished 14th in the last race
of his rookie Supercross season.
"The day didn't begin so well, as I had
to go through the LCQ. Happy to fin-
ish third there and transfer through to
the main event, though I had almost
the last gate pick. Thankfully, I got a
great start, I was third, but a couple
MYOWNRACE
Team Honda had a lot of celebrating to do.
