Cycle News

VOL. 50 ISSUE 50 DECEMBER 17, 2013 Tomac says. "With the 250, I can just kind of muscle the thing around and throw it wherever I want it a lot of the time. You obviously have to develop the bike to a certain point, but with the 450, just the way the whole engine works and all the crank weight and all that stuff, you have to really ride the bike, if that makes sense. I think you have to dial in a 450 a lot more. But in a lot of ways, even though setup is more important, it's actually easier for me to feel what the bike's doing." trying build up super big or any"It was a little bit tough at first," Tomac says. "I wasn't super worthing special." ried, though, because first off, I didn't want to believe it. But sec>>RACING IN PERSPECTIVE With all of the lessons learned from ond, I told myself she was going 2012 to 2013, the biggest and most to beat it and she was going to important lesson for Tomac came get healthy. I was just like, 'Man, I from an unexpected source. Late don't believe she has this.' I think in the 2013 Supercross season, it would be different if I didn't Eli's mom Kathy was diagnosed believe she was going to get through it." with breast cancer. Part of the reason Eli was so Facing a realistic possibility of losing a parent tends to put stubborn about accepting the things in perspective. Racing is illness was because of how he was raised. Being the son of two just racing, after all. highly competitive, successful athletes, the last thing he wanted to do was coddle his mom. He wanted to be clear that he expected her to beat the disease. And that's how she treated it the whole time, too. She wouldn't tell people, but the truth was that she hated that so many people kept asking her how she was doing at "For me it was a total shock be- the races. She didn't like being cause you don't really ever want treated like she was sick, even if to believe something like that," she was. "That was just the attitude I Tomac says. "You always hear took toward it," Tomac says. "I about the horror stories of other people having it and maybe your wanted to show that attitude to relatives or your friends having her, like, 'You're going to beat cancer. It's never good, so at first this thing. Period.' I didn't want to you don't want to believe it – espe- be all down about it. I'm not that cially when you see her, because kind of guy. I'm more of the hardshe's always so fit and healthy. It's ass, tough-love guy." Kathy is finishing up radiation kind of wild how that disease can now after having the cancer rejust come out of nowhere." Eli took solace in the fact that moved and things are looking his mom is a competitor at heart, very good for her recovery. In so he believed from the start that the end, it's yet another lesson to she would beat the disease – add to the list for Eli Tomac. And there will be many more even though he knew deep down that it wasn't a guarantee. on 450s in 2014. CN ONE "I USED TO BETHERE OF THE WORST LIKE TESTERS OUT AND NOW I'M ONE OF THE MOST SENSITIVE GUYS ON THE TRACK. " The final thing for most 250cc racers when they move up to the 450cc class is they begin to train differently. A lot of guys have to consciously do a lot more work with weights to add muscle mass in order to ride a 450 to its potential. But Tomac is already bigger than the bulk of the racers out there. "I haven't really been like, 'All right, let's get big for the 450,'" Tomac says. "What I kind of do in the pre-season months, I do a little more heavier weight stuff that builds a little bit of muscle. Then, obviously during the race season you kind of just tone all that stuff down and do more reps. I'm on that same program now and not P149

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