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00:00Well, let's go to a year ago and how well he wrote here. He showed things that a rookie's
00:04never done. The way he could blitz the whoops simply is abnormal for a rookie. So I think
00:09when you look at him, look at his facial expression throughout 2026, not only has the expectation
00:14risen, I think he's carrying that week to week and he's got to get a little bit less serious
00:19and find a win. Good stuff, JT. There is going to be a whole lot go down here tonight that
00:25may
00:26prove to be pivotal in the whole complexion of this championship, whether it be 450 or
00:31250 East Division. Triple crown night and you, I know how much you love these. Oh, I do.
00:39You know why? Because this goes towards your final score right here. This is not a qualification
00:43race. The action is now. The first of three races, 250 East, the triple crown is underway
00:51here in Indy. Daxton Bennett gets away to a really good start. Benick on that Husky.
00:58Here comes Joe Shimoda on the Honda, second place at the moment.
01:02Man, I'll tell you what, Joe Shimoda has been getting some great starts here in these first
01:07two rounds of this championship. But Benick, he was fast today. Again, three weeks in a row.
01:14And this is what we wanted to see. JT talked about it at the top of the show, that number
01:1937
01:19right there. He is in the hot seat for me. A lot of hype built around this young talent
01:24and he's got to show us something.
01:26Look at that rock star energy factory Husqvarna. Benick is just taking off.
01:32Shimoda's got his hands full with Cole Davies.
01:35You want to know what a perfect track is and the perfect amount of traction grip?
01:40You are seeing it live right here on your screen. These guys can lay on the power. A lot of
01:48lean
01:48angle in the corners. Absolutely flying right now. It gets no better than this.
01:53A 20-year-old from Morganton, North Carolina, leads the way through the whoops.
02:01And he's got the world champion chasing him down. Thrasher is in fourth. Jalik Swole's made a good start
02:07in fifth. Where is the Daytona winner in Seth Hamaker? Where is the championship leader in Pierce
02:13Brown? Something's happened to him. He is plummeting. Brown is way at the back of the pack.
02:21That is not what he wanted at the beginning. Every single rider will tell you in a triple crown,
02:26you've got to get a good start, and you've got to keep yourself towards the front.
02:30Well, and that's right. One of the keys to these triple crowns is having a first good race. Why?
02:36Because it kind of takes the pressure off. What you don't want to happen is your main competitors
02:40having a good first and second race, and you're playing catch-up the whole night.
02:45Oh, look at this pass by Davies up the inside. Perfect execution. We've often talked about just how
02:51fast Cole Davies is through those whoops sections. Great pass by Joe Shimoda.
02:56Bottom box. Look for the red plate. There's your championship leader in Pierce Brown as he starts
03:01to make his way back. Well, and this is where you have to go. You can go to damage mode
03:07right now.
03:08Damage control. Pardon me. He's got to pass as many guys as possible.
03:14Got to be heads-up riding, too. A lot of these guys going different lines. Got to predict where
03:20they're going to go and not have a collision.
03:23Daxton Benick leads the way. A lot of racing to come tonight. Want to tell you about SMX betting.
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03:40area and claim bonus offers. Always play responsibly. And remember, every race is another chance to win
03:45big with super motocross. Watch as we come across the whoops. Now, this rhythm lane right here,
03:53some riders doing different combinations, and it's going to get super ruddy as the second and third
04:00race approach the night, tripling onto this tabletop. Now, the whoops right here. This is a passing option
04:07for Cole Davies if he can get a good run into the whoops. Here we go. Look at this. He's
04:12been
04:12blisteringly far through here all day long, and he's done it beautifully. Yeah, watch the difference
04:17here in riding style. How you see Dax, he sits down before that jump. Cole stands up. When you stand
04:23up
04:23over that little jump onto the tabletop, it's actually a little bit faster. The bike doesn't compress as much,
04:28and you're able to drive through that. The 18-year-old New Zealander leads the way. He was pretty
04:35confident in his statements after last weekend's Daytona event. He said, look, if I do what I know
04:43I can do, nobody can touch me. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and again, no surprise. This is what we
04:50expected of him, Will. And Ricky's kind of changed a little bit in his attitude in the sense that he
04:56wanted to win right from the get-go when we started the East round here in Arlington, and he
05:01was pretty tough on himself when that didn't happen. And speaking to the team now, they said he's kind
05:06of learned to just shoulder that a little bit better. He's looking at the positives. That was
05:10bad starts in both of those two rounds, but was able to work his way forward, and now he's able
05:15to let
05:15that go. We do have to remember, Ricky, that this is only a second year racing, so so much for
05:20him still
05:20to learn, and as he cranks off these rounds here, he's figuring that out mentally as well as on the
05:24track.
05:25Well, you're right. It is only his second year, but when you're the talent of him,
05:29and you did so well your rookie year, these are the expectations that come along with that.
05:34This is a guy who went toe-to-toe, right, with Hayden Deegan, and then he went down in a
05:41confrontation with Deegan, but he is uber-talented, but there has been, to Will's point, that simmering
05:46frustration. Maybe up until now, this is going to take the cork out of the bottle a little bit.
05:51Right. This is, again, this is what we expected of him, and JT talked about it, and JT, I just
05:56got to ask, were you expecting this at the first race?
05:59I was, but hey, let's think about Hayden Deegan's first race at Tiffany West this year. Did not go
06:04to plan. He found it at race two. Maybe it's race three for Cole Davies, and Ricky, that
06:10entry speed, he talked about the whoops. Watch how fast he is entering these whoops. He is decimating
06:16everybody else at entry speed.
06:19You can see the number 10 there, Seth Hammacher trying to play catch-up. Pierce coming up through
06:25the pack. He's worked his way up only to 15th, and the thing that's really hardly in these
06:31triple crown races is these guys only race 10 minutes plus one lap. It's almost like a heat
06:36race, so a lot of these riders have the fitness to go super hard for that short amount of time,
06:42which makes it more difficult to make passes. Trying to work his way by Liam Olof.
06:48Great to see Olof out there qualifying for the main event, running up in the top 15.
06:58How about in the bottom box, this battle for third last week, Seth Hammacher. That was an awesome ride
07:04to get that Daytona win, so special in his career, but considering what had transpired earlier in the day,
07:09where he had a very heavy fall, hurt his shoulder, bike was damaged, couldn't go on in qualifying,
07:15and then to bounce back that way. He also had like a little drop in his heat race as well.
07:20Right. So as he works his way further forward, got a little squirrely there through the whoops.
07:24Yeah, the whoops are starting to get chewed up. These riders are going to struggle,
07:28and this is going to be a challenge.
07:29Keep your eye out. They're probably going, a lot of riders are probably going to start jumping those whoops.
07:34They were doing it earlier today in qualifying practice.
07:38Probably a little more consistent for them to do that rather than blitzing.
07:43Will?
07:44I think a quick question about when they learn, when they start jumping here.
07:48I asked a few riders today, and they were like, it's going to be a combo between when you feel
07:53like
07:53it's getting uncomfortable to keep skimming. And also when the team is saying, hang on a second,
07:58this is not faster anymore, and then they have to communicate that to the mechanic who puts it on
08:02the pit board. So at what point here do they say, hang on a second, I've got to call this
08:06and go,
08:06the jump line is, Cho makes the faster.
08:08Yeah, that's a nice pass for Cho Shimoda to get by Dax. But I think as a rider,
08:13you know, you have to be super intuitive, and you have to make that call. You have to be aware.
08:17And see here, Dax tries to defend the position. He doesn't. That was a great pass by Seth Hamaker
08:23to get by. Keep an eye out on those inside lines right there. You see that Dax tried to go
08:28sneak
08:29up in there, make the pass back by Seth. He's going to come up a little short.
08:34Meanwhile, Cole Davies has opened up a four-plus second advantage over Cho Shimoda and Seth Hamaker,
08:42just two minutes left. You see Seth right there, and even Joe, they weren't able to do that
08:46combination through the rhythm section. And that is because these rhythm lanes are getting
08:52ruddy already. And this track is going to be absolutely brutal as these races go on here
08:59tonight. A lot of fun to watch. Let's work our way further down the order,
09:02and let's give a shout out to Nate Thrasher, top five at the moment. Cody Shock is in sixth.
09:08Nice start. Jaleek Swal aboard the Triumph. How about Devin Simonson? He's from Terre Haute here in
09:14Indiana. So this is a home race, although he calls North Carolina home now. And then you've got
09:18Cullen Park in the top ten. Seven Towers as well. Simonson doing a great job this year. I feel like
09:25this is a breakout year for him, working with Chad Reed over at that Club MX Yamaha team. And you
09:31just
09:32have to believe that one of the reasons, not only from the team perspective, but that coaching and that
09:37knowledge that a champion like Chad Reed has. This has been quite the comeback. We watched Joe Shimoda
09:43by championship leader Pierce Brown. He's almost breaking into the top ten after being last on the
09:49opening lap. Yeah, it's just, it's so tough with these triple crowns. Like I was talking about, man,
09:57if you have a first bad race or not up here with your competitors at that stage, you're just playing
10:03catch up the rest of the night. Having to force certain situations or circumstances.
10:10Shimoda's a fan of the of the triple crown. He said, look, you got three chances to either keep
10:15doing what you've been doing or fix some mistakes or errors. Yeah, it really takes a lot of discipline
10:22and puts these riders in a situation. Uh oh, that did not look good. No, puts them in a situation
10:27to
10:28where they have to execute multiple times. JT, tell us more about Joe. I'm just watching the
10:33timing here. He's closed that gap down to under three seconds. Yeah. And in front of Cole Davies,
10:38he has a lot of lap traffic. So you sit bigger with eight seconds plus the lap to go. Maybe
10:43Davies
10:44can manage this thing. But Joe Shimoda's done a great job of digging into this gap. I'm just,
10:48I mean, I'm just super pumped for Joe. I mean, this is a rider had a gnarly injury that he
10:54sustained in
10:55the offseason. I don't know that he was certain he was going to make it back. Obviously, the goal
10:59was to. But man, he comes out at Arlington, has a great finish, riding exceptionally well,
11:06considering the circumstances. And there he is. He's just been getting good starts and plugging away.
11:11That injury that Ricky was talking about was a broken neck and surgery, did his recovery time,
11:17rehab, came back strong. He was on the set with Ouija and myself at A1. Yeah. Like he was still
11:22in
11:22recovery mode that recently. So this has been very impressive. Well, like JT was talking about,
11:29and Cole Davies coming up on lappers, it's going to be difficult for some of these lappers to just
11:33move around. And the reason it's going to be difficult is because how ruddy it is. So they
11:38just basically have to stay married to their line. They can't go from one side of the track to the
11:43other
11:43because of that. Man, look at this guy. He is really pretty to watch, right? That's for sure.
11:49Now he's got himself back to where he says he should be. This is more like the Cole Davies we
11:55expected to see at the beginning of this East Division Championship. Last run through the whoops.
12:02Yeah, his form is just very neutral on the bike and a very nice riding style.
12:09Been very purposeful today. I watched him in qualifying first time out. He waited for the whole field to go
12:14by.
12:15He had his own track space. Race win for Cole Davies. That's his fourth individual race win in triple
12:22crown format for his teammate from Monster Energy Star Yamaha. Pierce Brown had to work his way through
12:29the field trying to get as many positions as he can. This is all about the cumulative points on the
12:36night.
12:36You've got to try and finish as low as possible. Let's see if he goes for it. Oh, Jaleek isn't
12:42able
12:42to triple that section. They're going to play cat and mouse. He's not going to be able to get the
12:47position.
12:48How about that? He got back into the top ten. So well done to Cole Davies. We'll hear from him
12:53in a moment.
12:53Good stuff. His teammate had to work hard.
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