The 16th round of the 2023 Monster Energy Supercross Championship took place in Denver, Colorado on Saturday as Team Honda HRC’s Chase Sexton grabbed the win and the points lead in a dramatic 450SX main event. In 250SX West, Jett Lawrence secured the title with a third-place finish in the final. Both riders were available to the media following the races for this Debrief feature.

450SX

Image: Octopi Media.

Chase, we have to start by asking, mathematically and if Eli Tomac doesn’t show up next week, which is looking likely, you’ll be supercross champion. With what went down, how does that feel?

Yeah, it’s definitely tough to comprehend. I honestly didn’t know what was going on, I didn’t know if his bike was broken, or if he broke a wheel. I found out after the race that he hurt his ankle, obviously, there’s a lot of speculation on what actually happened as far as muscle damage wise. But, for me, I just wanted to capitalise when I saw that he was going backwards, obviously, that’s not the way we want to see someone go out, especially someone like Eli, he’s so gnarly, he’s been super, super gnarly these last couple of years and he’s a great competitor, I love racing him. So, tough way to see him go out and I definitely wish him the best. For me, my game plan stays the same, that’s what I’m looking at right now.

Let’s go back to the heat race. You caught and passed Eli, then it seemed like he caught back up and it looked like he was able to match your pace. Were you concerned at all?

Yeah, the heat race with Eli was fun, him being out front I kind of had the opportunity to look at lines and just sit back a little bit and take my time. Once I kind of got by, he just got behind me and followed my lines and was able to stick with me. Then, I got into a few lappers, it was just an interesting race. I love racing Eli, he’s super clean and he’s a bulldog man. He won’t give up. It was a good heat race, obviously, if I’m in a race I want to win and having Eli in a heat race, not that points matter, but, it is nice to go out there and get in front of the guy you have to beat. So, that was positive. But yeah, it’s never over until it’s over, and that’s something I’ve said for the last three or four races. Obviously, we have another round and we’ll see what goes on.

It’s announced that Eli suffered a ruptured Achilles and he’s out for the final round, making you the champion elect. Has that sunk in yet?

Yeah, it hasn’t really sunk in yet. I don’t know, like I said you don’t really know until you get to the last race. I haven’t heard anything obviously. But, I’ve been saying it’s never over until it’s over, and it’s 17 races. It’s tough to see Eli go out like that as I said, and yeah, it’s definitely a little bit weird coming in being so far down and just hoping I could go out there put my best foot forward and win these last few races and see what happened and yeah, I guess the mindset stays the same. But, we’ll see in the coming week what goes on, I don’t really know what to say at this point.

A lot has been said and you’ve acknowledged the mistakes that you made in the middle part of the season. Last three races, you’ve been flawless. Can you talk about the mental toughness it took to reverse that?

Yeah, it definitely was not easy at all. I’ve said before, it was tough when that was going on to even go on my phone, between people texting me trying to help, or everyone having their own opinions on what the problem was. Then, going on Instagram, social media and just seeing the comments, it was tough, honestly. It kind of took its toll on me and I got a little bit negative in the middle of the season and some of those crashes, I think, were caused by being negative and not having confidence in myself and knowing that I can win these races. I think having that break after Seattle gave me some time to just clear my head. I didn’t ride really at all that week, I didn’t train, I just told myself I need a break. I went and hung out in Santa Barbara where my trainer is and I just kind of reset and came back and did some testing and from there on out, it’s been super solid. Those race wins definitely helped my confidence. But yeah, you just have to push through.

With [Cooper] Webb’s issue last week and Tomac’s issue this week, it doesn’t take away from the fact that you have been so strong. Is that emotional whiplash?

Yeah, I mean, all the training that I do during the off-season is to be durable, to be able to try and last 17 races and for me, that’s the biggest thing. I’ve had some big crashes in the last few years, and I don’t think without my training program I’d be able to get up from those and keep racing. So, you have to be durable and that’s why I do the hard work and go to the gym. People say I’m too big, but it’s what I do, I do my hard work and 17 races you need that.

You’ve had four wins in the last seven races. Is it important for you at this stage of your career, to go through those repeats of getting to the checkered flag first and building up that experience?

Definitely, in the middle of the season when I was making those mistakes I was thinking ‘can I even win a race? I know I can go fast enough to win, but can I put it together?’ It was tough, like I said it was a lot of hard times with myself at night being negative, but I think I turned it around after Phoenix, I won Atlanta and that was a huge race for me, just being solid the whole main event. It’s kind of just bled over into these wins. It’s never easy and winning races in this class is super tough, and man like I said, I’m really happy with how I’ve been riding, I just feel complete as a rider at this point, at least more complete than I have been. I want to get better and seeing all those stats with Eli having 50 wins, that’s super motivating. He’s had a long road ahead of me and that’s something I want to chase… Try and get as many race wins as I can.

250SX

Image: Octopi Media.

Jett, you were on a mission. You had the fall in the heat race, the bad gate pick. But, then coming from 10th place, can you describe what was going through your head as you were slicing through the pack?

Yeah, it did not go as planned for that heat race. One guy kind of went left, so I went left, it wasn’t ideal, but hey we ended up getting through even though I think that was my worst qualifying of the year in eighth. In the main the gates were wrecked, the ruts out of the gate were chewed up and there were only a few good ones. I found an okay one on the inside, there weren’t too many holes but they had some loose stuff on top. I had a good jump but, I just spun out on the dirt. I kind of just took my time, I knew I had to get 10th or better, so I just chugged along. I ended up getting into third about halfway I think. The boys were pretty far out front at that point and it wasn’t really the kind of track to try and send it on. So, I’m happy with third, we didn’t quite equal Hunter on his championship, but we still got the number one plate at the end which is nice.

I think you and Hunter are tied in career wins and there’s one race to go. I know you both have titles wrapped up, does that mean something now, that you’re tied on career wins and there’s one race to go between you?

I don’t know, I’ve kind of already done my job this year, but we’ll go into Salt Lake City and we’ll see how we go there, we’ll see how the track is. If I’m feeling it, okay, but if not, I’m not going to try and push it. My focus now is outdoors on the 450 and that’s what I was going to say next. It was a bummer to see [Tomac] go down tonight, I was really looking forward to racing one of the legends of the sport, I mean, 51 wins in just supercross and there’s plenty more outdoors. I was really looking forward to that. It sucks, I hope he can come back next year or something and I get to race him, cause that would be an awesome experience to race such a legend like Tomac.

You’ve now won four titles, but this is the first one where you’re moving up to the 450. Was it tough to balance that knowing that you’ll be on a 450 in a couple of weeks?

I kind of only rode 10 minutes on the 250 on supercross on Wednesday because we’ve just been so focused on outdoors. We realised the more time I had on the 450 the faster I would get. After nations, we did six weeks on the 450 and I got even faster from there, so we’ve just been focusing on the 450 cause I got that good points lead after New Jersey.

How does this championship rank compared to the past titles that you’ve won? And does it make it that little bit more special considering you were celebrating your brother’s titles last week?

I wouldn’t say it was as good as Hunters, I feel like we were a lot more pumped up for his because that’s been a long time coming and he really deserved it. Any championship you’re pumped for, but I wouldn’t say I was the most pumped for this one. I had other ones where I had to come back through. I’ve been told that the second title’s always hard to win. Either way, you have to be happy, this year’s been pretty good, so I’m definitely happy about that.

Describe to us how the Lawrence family celebrates the two championships in one household.

People that know Daz know that he’ll celebrate tonight, but we’ll go back and it’ll be back to the chalkboard. I said earlier, my focus now is on the 450, it’s a big task coming up. I’ve got a lot to learn with those guys, they have a lot of knowledge and stuff. Same with Hunter, he’s now focused on outdoors and trying to win that title. So, hopefully, he has a good run at that. And for me, it’s a little bit easier you could say, I’m not going in expecting to win straight away, so I’ll just go and feel where I’m at on the 450 and have fun with it. The 450 is going to be a new chapter and I’m excited for it.