The jockeying for position in the first four weeks is over and Eli Tomac has emerged at the top of the Monster Energy Supercross Rankings following the first Triple Crown weekend in Round 5 at Glendale, Arizona.
Three feature races meant there were three chances for riders to make mistakes. Tomac has struggled with starts during his career, but set the tone early by earning the holeshot in the first two races in route to feature wins. In the final race at Glendale, he started and finished third. In his last eight heats and features, Tomac has not finished off the podium, and that will make him difficult to catch in the rankings for a while.
Mistakes kept Chase Sexton from making a bigger charge on Tomac. He fell twice in the first feature at Glendale before remounting to finish 11th. Once he found his balance, Sexton swept the podium in his last two races and was scored third overall for the weekend. That was enough to retain second in the Supercross Rankings after Round 5.
MORE: Eli Tomac wins back-to-back Supercross races to solidify his advantage
.@Predator_34 achieves his career best finish in Glendale with a P2 overall 🥈 Congrats Malcolm! 👏#SupercrossLIVE pic.twitter.com/vzWRyJVgpK
— Supercross LIVE! (@SupercrossLIVE) February 6, 2022
Malcolm Stewart was the biggest mover among this week’s top 10, jumping three positions in the rankings with a consistently strong weekend in Arizona. He did not win one of the features, but had a worst result of fourth in the three races. In the second race, he finished runner-up to Tomac, which contributed to his best career Supercross finish of second.
Jason Anderson had an unforced error in Race 2 of the Triple Crown. After finishing runner-up to Tomac in his first feature, Anderson was comfortably in second when he jumped wide and got hung up on a Tuff Blox. Without that mistake, he likely would have finished the night with a 2-2-2, which have left him one point behind Tomac for the overall win.
Consistency does not always equal strength. Justin Barcia finished 6-7-6 in last week’s three features, which equated to sixth overall. Those relatively modest results allowed Stewart and Anderson to leapfrog him and push Barcia to fifth in the rankings.
Still, Barcia did not fall quite as hard as Cooper Webb, who slipped from a tie for fourth to seventh in the Supercross Rankings after Round 5 with an 8-8-5 in the features and eighth overall.
450 Rankings
1. Eli Tomac (last week: 1); [2 feature wins, 4 heat and wins]
2. Chase Sexton (2); [1 feature win, 4 heat wins]
3. Malcolm Stewart (6)
4. Jason Anderson (4); [1 feature win; 1 heat win]
5. Justin Barcia (3)
6. Ken Roczen (7); [1 feature, 1 heat win]
7. Cooper Webb (4); [1 heat win]
8. Marvin Musquin (9)
9. Dylan Ferrandis (8)
10. Aaron Plessinger (10)
11. Dean Wilson (12)
12. Shane McElrath (12)
13. Joey Savatgy (15)
14. Justin Brayton (11)
15. Mitchell Oldenburg (16)
16. Max Anstie (14)
17. Brandon Hartranft (17)
18. Kyle Chisholm (19)
19. Josh Hill (21)
20. Justin Bogle (22)
.@HunterLawrencee takes the 250SX Triple Crown win and celebrates Aussie style 🏆 🇦🇺 #SupercrossLIVE pic.twitter.com/PGpndMy0bd
— Supercross LIVE! (@SupercrossLIVE) February 6, 2022
By the time the dust settled, and the steam evaporated from Christian Craig ears, he found himself the winner of two of the three Glendale races, but second in the overall standings. The middle race was critical as he was cleaned out by Vince Friese in the sand section of the track, which dropped him from the lead and a potential perfect sweep of the weekend to the back of the pack.
Craig remounted and charged to fourth at the end of that race, but it opened the door for Hunter Lawrence to win his first feature of the season. With such an incredibly strong start to the season, Craig maintained the lead.
But it was also a solid night for Lawrence, who finally made slight inroads into Craig’s 250 West points’ lead. Eight is a much easier number to manage than 14, which is where the gap would have stood without Craig’s misfortune.
Three was the operative number for Jo Shimoda. He finished third in two of the three races and climbed to third in the standings. The series returns to Anaheim for a third time this week and Shimoda struggled in the first two outings with seventh-place finishes.
Michael Mosiman suffered the most in Arizona. He crashed on Lap 1 of Race 1. Once he remounted, he lost his momentum and barely cracked the top 10 in that race. He rebounded to finish second in Race 2, but sustained another crash in the final event and finished 15th. All of those numbers combined to drop him from second in the Supercross Rankings to fourth at the end of Round 5.
Friese also remounted his bike after the Race 2 contact with Craig, but he only climbed to 10th at the checkers. That, along with a fifth-place overall finish, was enough to allow him to retain fifth in the rankings.
250 Rankings
1. Christian Craig (1); [3 feature wins, 6 heat wins]
2. Hunter Lawrence (3); [1 feature win, 2 heat wins]
3. Jo Shimoda (4)
4. Michael Mosiman (2); [1 feature win, 3 heat wins]
5. Vince Friese (5)
6. Nate Thrasher (6)
7. Jalek Swoll (8)
8. Carson Brown (11)
9. Garrett Marchbanks (13)
10. Robbie Wageman (12)
11. Carson Mumford (7)
12. Chris Blose (9)
13. Cole Thompson (9)
14. Ryan Surratt (14)
15. Dylan Walsh (17)
16. Dominique Thury (15)
17. Derek Kelley (19)
18. Logan Karnow (16)
19. Mitchell Harrison (21)
20. Dilan Schwartz (18)
Triple Crown wins included with Heat wins
POWER RANKINGS AFTER ROUND 1 AT ANAHEIM: Ken Roczen, Christian Craig have a perfect weekend
POWER RANKINGS AFTER ROUND 2 AT OAKLAND: Justin Barcia climbs to the top spot
POWER RANKINGS AFTER ROUND 3 AT SAN DIEGO: Consistency pays off for Eli Tomac
POWER RANKINGS AFTER ROUND 4 AT ANAHEIM: Eli Tomac remains on top as competition levels