2026 Supercross Round 10 Birmingham SMX Next Main

Brad

Transcript

00:00So SMX Next, these are young riders with the A and B amateur ranks, as mentioned, three winners in three

00:05races.

00:05They will also compete in Philadelphia for Supercross, and then two motocross races at Redbud and in Indiana.

00:15And what's cool is you've got an international component, five different countries represented here.

00:19As a lot of people from around the world are realizing this is the program to get into, including, I

00:24talked to Cole Davies yesterday.

00:25He tried to get into this years ago when he was 14 and originally got rejected.

00:28Had to send some videos to show, I'm from New Zealand, I can do Supercross.

00:32The rest is history.

00:33Here it is, folks.

00:34SMX Next, Birmingham.

00:35Rebs are up.

00:37Gates down.

00:43Vincent Way on the inside.

00:44A Kiefer on the outside battling.

00:48And Way able to take the lead.

00:49Both star racing teammates got into it off that star right there.

00:53We've got to watch that as it goes on.

00:55But good to see Vincent Way out front.

00:56We've got to take another look at that.

00:58There you go.

00:59Oh, you said it.

01:00Are they both?

01:01Yeah, both star racing Yamahas.

01:04Gordon and Minear.

01:06And that is Minear, I think, walking around.

01:10Where even is Gordon?

01:11Man, that is a disaster for the teammates.

01:15As Vincent Way on the monster team.

01:18Green Kawasaki gets away.

01:20You've got Gavin Betts' second.

01:21Kiefer had that good start.

01:22Made a mistake in the first rhythm.

01:24It's gone back to eighth.

01:26There's Betts.

01:27And Jeremy Fapani on the number two, the KTM third.

01:30Yeah, Fapani looked pretty good earlier.

01:31He had a result qualifying top pole for a while.

01:35Then he slipped down.

01:36But nonetheless, he's had some speed all day long.

01:39This guy's going to be a little nervous.

01:40It's been a little bit since they've been out here.

01:42We talked about how difficult this racetrack is

01:44and how much has changed.

01:45Well, it's changed for these guys as well.

01:47And shout out to Denno, who is ninth,

01:49the winner of the race at Daytona.

01:51Had a big case of a jump earlier on the 199.

01:53He's back in it.

01:54Here's that first turn with the teammates.

01:56Yeah, it looks like 373 gets into Gordon.

02:00And then now he gets into his teammate.

02:03Oh, yeah, that is Gordon getting run over

02:08and running off the track.

02:09That's why we didn't see him.

02:10He went to the wall there.

02:12Yeah, anytime you see those goggles off,

02:14that's pretty much it at that point.

02:16Wow.

02:16Glad to see him get up, though, and walk off.

02:18Absolutely, yeah.

02:19At first, we didn't know what had happened.

02:20Fapani has taken the measure of Betts

02:23to get the KTM up to second.

02:26You got Landon Gibson on that white Rockstar Husky.

02:28Now he's making moves from fourth.

02:30And Ryder Malinowski back in action.

02:33Had a huge crash at Anaheim, the first SMX next race.

02:36We didn't think we'd see him back maybe all year.

02:38There he is in the number nine, running fifth.

02:42Yeah, he's in fifth.

02:43I mean, the podium is right in front of him.

02:46So this race is on for these guys.

02:48It's like you got missed that triple.

02:51Gibson gets up to inside.

02:52Now you're going to see these guys start jumping through the Wolves.

02:54You'll see both options, jumping and skimming,

02:57just more comfortable for these,

02:58whoever you feel more comfortable.

03:02Gibson made the move on Betts.

03:05Betts trying to do it with Malinowski.

03:07Here comes Kate Johnson on the 177.

03:10Yeah, Kate was able to make that pass.

03:13Malinowski right before the mechanics here.

03:15Now he makes another pass here, or close to it.

03:18He didn't get over that on-off section.

03:20Okay, so yeah, getting that on-off section,

03:22what is the difference in these riders,

03:24maybe the lack of experience, skill, whatever you want to call it,

03:26and why that's more difficult for them?

03:28Well, I think it's more difficult because, one, they're less on power.

03:31And then, obviously, with them going in the corner, racing each other,

03:34they're more focused on stopping each other rather than getting on that on and off.

03:37And that's already difficult.

03:38So when they miss it, they lose a lot of time.

03:41But luckily for all of them, all of them missed it.

03:44Kade Johnson fights back, tripling through the middle of that rhythm.

03:48They're battling hard, JT.

03:50Yeah, they're going for it here.

03:51And Kade Johnson, he spends most of his time down at the Dog Pound,

03:55where Hunter Lawrence trains.

03:57He gets so much perspective from those guys.

03:59And it's such a unique story.

04:01There's a sponsor, a family that lives in Luizia,

04:04and I came to Kade Johnson and said,

04:06hey, we just want to help.

04:07What would be the best way to go about that?

04:09As you see, the red cross flag there, they can't jump the finish line jump.

04:12But they basically said to Kade, how can we help?

04:14What would be the most beneficial?

04:15And he said, you know what?

04:16I need better places to ride.

04:18I need better places to practice.

04:19And they said, if we could get you into the Dog Pound in Florida,

04:22how would that work?

04:23And he said, yeah, I think that might do it.

04:25So just a very unique story that has seen Kade Johnson

04:27ride to the front of this class.

04:29Riding well, JT and another Kawasaki rider out front, Vincent Way.

04:33Send it to Will.

04:35Thanks, Jason.

04:36Down here with his dad and mechanic, Nick Way.

04:38Nick, we've had a podium out of your son,

04:41and now it's looking like you could take this win.

04:42If you could talk to him right now, what would your words be?

04:45Oh, he knows what I would tell him.

04:46I'd tell him that he needs to be focused on what he's doing.

04:50Well, you get back to that, too.

04:51Thanks, guys.

04:52Nick Way, one of the greats, is a racer in his own right.

04:55You've spent a lot of time racing him.

04:57Yeah, no, I have watched him kind of grow up.

05:00It's a little bit older than me, but then, yeah,

05:01we had a chance to race, and he would tell his son exactly he knows what to do.

05:05I talked to Nick and Vincent a lot this morning, and Nick said one of the toughest parts about this

05:10is

05:11you're adjusting to a rider who's getting faster and growing in height and weight and speed all at once.

05:17So the bike keeps changing.

05:18The skills keep changing.

05:19The lines keep changing, and then every other rider on the track is advancing on that steep curve as well.

05:26So every couple of weeks when these guys meet up, everybody's significantly better than they were the last time.

05:32As Johnson makes the move on Paponte, that's going to make it a Kawasaki 1-2.

05:36Yeah, nice move by Cade up here, getting up to these guys.

05:40But, yeah, he's absolutely right.

05:42Everything's changing.

05:42As you said, everybody's evolving.

05:44These guys look 90-day difference than they did at their first race.

05:47We saw them this year.

05:48So it's going to be hard, and you've got to keep your kid grounded to understand that success might take

05:54a while in this field,

05:55but that doesn't mean you're not growing yourself, you know?

05:58Well, how about this?

05:59Malinowski, I mentioned briefly at the top of this, had that huge crash early in Anaheim 2.

06:04It actually brought in a red flag and a restart.

06:06He broke his back.

06:08Definitely the thought was that would be the end, at least for his Supercross season.

06:12He has somehow gotten back here at the midway point of the year.

06:16Shout out to Dr. McGinley, who works closely with that Club of X Yamaha team.

06:20He kept telling us every week he was trying to hold him back, hold him back.

06:23His rider wanted to get back to training and then riding.

06:26And he is back, and he is in a podium position.

06:29That is an unbelievable comeback.

06:32He's like, what's my first name?

06:33Ryder.

06:34That's exactly what I want to be out there.

06:36Ryder out there.

06:36So far, he's looking good, and he's starting to close back in on Tate Johnson for that second position.

06:40So coming off that injury back here, what can you say about these kids?

06:46Absolutely wild.

06:47Yeah, he's going for second with Johnson.

06:50And he's only been back on the bike about 10 days.

06:53I talked to him briefly yesterday.

06:55I don't know.

06:56Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

06:57I'm not sure what these young guys, they even know what to be worried about.

07:00And he shrugged it all off.

07:01He's like, 10 days, I'm good.

07:0310 days, that's nine.

07:04Nine more, and I need it.

07:05There we go.

07:07He's here today.

07:08So well done by Malinowski, who was relatively late to racing dirt bikes.

07:14He's only started riding during COVID, when there weren't any other sports to do.

07:19So he's only been riding for about five and a half years.

07:23And here he is going for a podium.

07:25Yeah, that's insane.

07:27Really, to be able to do that.

07:29To be on this level, these kids have been riding a whole life.

07:32I mean, I started when I was two years old to get to this level.

07:35So it shows you how much talent all these kids got, special rider.

07:40So he's third, Fapani to fourth.

07:42Dedo, who I mentioned the last race winner, though, but he had a big case of a jump.

07:47Thought he might have hurt himself in qualifying.

07:49At least he's able to get back on the track, running in fifth right now.

07:55And Vincent Way, pouring it on out front.

07:57There's Dedo in the black and the high-vis green.

08:02It's a good recovery for him.

08:04Yeah, it looks like he got around Gibson or close to it.

08:08But, yeah, nice recovery after practice.

08:10We thought he was not even going to race.

08:13So good for him.

08:14All these kids want to get out here, hurt or not, but good to see him out here.

08:19So Ivan Tedesco is the team manager for that squad.

08:21And he said one of the ways they track the progress of these riders is

08:25when they first start getting on a Supercross bike, you can talk to this.

08:28The suspension is way too stiff, what these kids are used to.

08:31But Dedo's getting closer and closer to the pro-level setup.

08:34Yeah, and basically what happens is that your speed comes up.

08:38And then what Ivan's talking about is just now they start slamming into things.

08:42And now, hey, the kid starts saying, no, it's too soft.

08:45It's too soft.

08:45That's when you know that he's starting to elevate.

08:47Because when they first get on there, the Supercross stuff is way too stiff.

08:51So good to hear that.

08:53Nice move by Ivan.

08:56Up ahead, Nick Way.

08:59Got to be happy about this.

09:00His son, Vincent, looking to make it happen.

09:03Had the podium earlier in the year.

09:05This would be four winners in four rounds of SMX Next.

09:10Vincent Way.

09:11It was dad's old Michigan Mafia member.

09:13But Vincent, born and raised in California because Nick was out there to pursue his racing career.

09:20And it's all paying off right now for Vincent Way.

09:24It's a proud moment.

09:25Very proud.

09:27Good to him for being out in front, not making any mistakes.

09:30It's a hard position to be in as well.

09:32Congratulations to the Way family.

09:34Here it is.

09:35Second generation win coming up.

09:38Vincent Way is the SMX Next winner in Birmingham.

09:41And there's dad.

09:44Looks more relieved and stressed than happy.

09:48I know in my household, they'd be like, Nick who?

09:51Nick who?

09:51It's here.

09:53It's a star now.

09:54I'm the star.

09:56Kate Johnson is going to hold off Malinowski.

09:59But what a comeback for Malinowski to even get to the race, let alone to get on the podium.

10:03And now the congratulations come.

10:05There's Malinowski.

10:06There's Johnson.

10:08And the Kawasaki folks are pumped.

10:10You've got the team green manager, Ryan Holiday, here.

10:12They go 1-2 for their amateur program.

10:14They go 1-2 for their amateur program.

10:17They go 1-2 for their amateur program.

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