Pro Motocross: Dungey takes overall win, 450MX points lead after Tomac, Roczen crash at Thunder Valley - MotorSportsTalk

In a shocking turn of events at Thunder Valley, the 450 Class championship was dealt a huge shake-up thanks to a crash from Eli Tomac.

Just when it looked like Tomac was minutes away from cruising to his sixth straight moto win, disaster struck. As a result, Ryan Dungey won the race and took over the points lead, and Tomac may now be dealing with a serious injury.

After dominating the first two rounds of the 2015 Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship, the undefeated Eli Tomac carried a 19-point championship lead into today’s races and was considered the heavy favorite. After all, he was on fire, he was the fastest qualifier this morning, he was coming to his home state of Colorado, and he’s one of the only riders used to training in the altitude.

Things were going according to plan through the first moto and a half – Tomac won the day’s first moto, then grabbed the lead and opened up a large gap in the second moto. In a position to just cruise to the checkered flag, the unthinkable happened, and Tomac lost control and crashed hard in Moto 2. He looked to be in serious pain and made no effort to reenter the race, instead heading straight to the medical center to get checked out.

With Tomac out of the running, Ken Roczen – last year’s 450 Class champion – assumed the race lead and was in a position to earn the overall victory as well. At the time, Ryan Dungey, after inheriting second place, had moved into a tie with Tomac for the points lead.

Then fortunes shifted once more, as Roczen also crashed while out in the lead with just two laps to go – something he said was the result of a flat tire – and that allowed Dungey to catch up to him. The former teammates battled for the top spot, with Dungey making the pass and Roczen then going down for a second time.

Dungey was then able to check out with the lead en route to the checkered flag, and his 2-1 moto finishes earned him the overall victory, his first of the season.

“The track is rough. When we’re pushing the envelope that fast, I hate to see [Tomac] go down like that,” Dungey said after the race. “I hope he’s okay, I don’t know the aftermath. He’s going at a good pace right now, and the faster you go, the more that stuff sneaks up on you.”

Roczen’s crash cost him a shot at the overall win, but he still finished second overall with 3-2 moto finishes. Blake Baggett (4-3) rounded out the overall podium – his first career podium finish in the 450 Class.

The Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship will resume next Saturday, June 6th at Muddy Creek Raceway in Tennessee, and the big question will be around the status of Tomac after today’s crash. Will the GEICO Honda rider be healthy enough to return to racing and keep himself in title contention?

INDIANAPOLIS — The first Indy 500 victory for Josef Newgarden also was the richest in race history from a record 2023 purse of just more than $17 million.

The two-time NTT IndyCar Series champion, who continued his celebration Monday morning at Indianapolis Motor Speedway earned $3.666 million for winning the 107th running of the Greatest Spectacle in Racing.

The purse and winner’s share both are the largest in the history of the Indianapolis 500.

It’s the second consecutive year that the Indy 500 purse set a record after the 2022 Indy 500 became the first to crack the $16 million mark (nearly doubling the 2021 purse that offered a purse of $8,854,565 after a crowd limited to 135,000 because of the COVID-19 pandemic).

The average payout for IndyCar drivers was $500,600 (exceeding last year’s average of $485,000).

Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Roger Penske, whose team also fields Newgarden’s No. 2 Dallara-Chevrolet, had made raising purses a priority since buying the track in 2020. But Penske but was unable to post big money purses until the race returned to full capacity grandstands last year.

The largest Indy 500 purse before this year was $14.4 million for the 2008 Indy 500 won by Scott Dixon (whose share was $2,988,065). Ericsson’s haul made him the second Indy 500 winner to top $3 million (2009 winner Helio Castroneves won $3,048,005.

Runner-up Marcus Ericsson won $1.043 million after falling short by 0.0974 seconds in the fourth-closest finish in Indy 500 history.

The 107th Indy 500 drew a crowd of at least 330,000 that was the largest since the sellout for the 100th running in 2016, and the second-largest in more than two decades, according to track officials.

“This is the greatest race in the world, and it was an especially monumental Month of May featuring packed grandstands and intense on-track action,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said in a release. “Now, we have the best end card possible for the 107th Running of the Indianapolis 500: a record-breaking purse for the history books.”

Benjamin Pedersen was named the Indy 500 rookie of the year, earning a $50,000 bonus.

The race’s purse is determined through contingency and special awards from IMS and IndyCar. The awards were presented Monday night in the annual Indy 500 Victory Celebration at the JW Marriott in downtown Indianapolis.

The payouts for the 107th Indy 500:

1. Josef Newgarden, $3,666,000
2. Marcus Ericsson, $1,043,000
3. Santino Ferrucci, $481,800
4. Alex Palou, $801,500
5. Alexander Rossi, $574,000
6. Scott Dixon, $582,000
7. Takuma Sato, $217,300
8. Conor Daly, $512,000
9. Colton Herta, $506,500
10. Rinus VeeKay, $556,500
11. Ryan Hunter‐Reay, $145,500
12. Callum Ilott, $495,500
13. Devlin DeFrancesco, $482,000
14. Scott McLaughlin, $485,000
15. Helio Castroneves, $481,500
16. Tony Kanaan, $105,000
17. Marco Andretti, $102,000
18. Jack Harvey, $472,000
19. Christian Lundgaard, $467,500
20. Ed Carpenter, $102,000
21. Benjamin Pedersen (R), $215,300
22. Graham Rahal, $565,500*
23. Will Power, $488,000
24. Pato O’Ward, $516,500
25. Simon Pagenaud, $465,500
26. Agustín Canapino (R), $156,300
27. Felix Rosenqvist, $278,300
28. Kyle Kirkwood, $465,500
29. David Malukas, $462,000
30. Romain Grosjean, $462,000
31. Sting Ray Robb (R), $463,000
32. RC Enerson (R), $103,000
33. Katherine Legge, $102,000

*–Broken down between two teams, $460,000 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, $105,500 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing/Cusick Motorsports