Image: Octopi Media.

450MX points leader Dylan Ferrandis came into the weekend at Unadilla knowing title rival Ken Roczen would be strong, and in the early laps of the first moto shifted focus to make sure he could ‘minimize the damage’ on the day.

The 2021 Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship has been practically dominated by the rookie sensation aboard his Monster Energy Star Racing Yamaha. The Frenchman has yet to miss a podium so far this season and is emerging as the clear favorite for the championship.

He’s been steadfast in his approach so far, showing visible frustration at points in the season when he felt he should have won a moto and expressing that his sole purpose for showing up at the races is to win races.

However, as the series headed to Unadilla for round eight, Ferrandis showed a different approach, knowing his title rival Roczen would be fast. Instead of charging for a win, he opted to ‘minimize the damage’ and take the best result he could at what was one of the more technical tracks so far this season.

“Yeah when I show up to the gate it’s always to win, but obviously today Ken and mostly the Honda boys were really on it,” Ferrandis explained. “We kind of expected it, I know from the past, every year Ken is really strong at Unadilla.

“So yeah, I was expecting it, and yeah just being second overall is a good day for me. For sure I wanted to win but I see after a couple of laps in the first moto that it would be not possible today for me to win. So I just tried to minimize the damage and do the best I can, and yeah, second overall is still a really good result.”

When asked following the race if he’s beginning to focus on the championship as he heads to the final four rounds with a 39-point advantage, Ferrandis explained that while it’s always about winning, the ultimate goal is to bring home the championship.

“It’s always about winning, but you can’t win every race,” he continued. “So yeah, my goal is to win [as many] moto’s as I can, but if I don’t, the championship is still the number one goal. So we’re just going to do the best we can and take it race by race. It’s hard to have a plan right now, we’re just going to go moto by moto, do the best I can and we’ll see at the end.”

The series now heads to Budds Creek for round nine of the season, one of few stops on the circuit that Ferrandis has yet to notch a moto or overall podium in his career.