Flying somewhat under the radar so far in 2025, Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing’s Justin Cooper has been solid in his sophomore season in the premier class of Monster Energy Supercross. Consistently close to the podium, he finally broke through with a second-place result in Indianapolis, delivering upon a 1-2 for the team in the process. In our latest Conversation feature, Cooper reflects on the result and what it means for his season to come.

Image: Octopi Media.

Justin, we know that you’ve been building and building, you’ve been in the top four over the last few rounds. How does the second place feel, especially on a track that was as technical as this? The last couple of weeks you caught heat for jumping through the whoops, but that was the must-do line tonight…

The whoops were, I wouldn’t even say jumpers tonight – it was more about balance, I think. They were definitely rutted and yeah, you just had to keep the bike straight all the way through. I think that the key tonight was the mistakes, you had to limit those. I stuck to the big lines and that was pretty key, I felt like I was making up a lot of time on the guys in front of me and just being consistent with that. I could kind of flow with the track better and set up my passes. So yeah, overall it was a tricky track and a lot of laps tonight, so I definitely had to keep the focus and yeah, lock in for the end of the race. It was getting pretty gnarly.

You had to fight your way up to that position for the runner-up result, a good one for the team as well. What can you take away from this sort of result at the mid-point of the season?

Well first of all, I feel like it’s been right there the whole time and I feel like I had really good speed last week in Daytona. I came from about 10th and almost got on the podium there, so everything’s been going, I think, in the right direction and my speed’s been there and my fitness is there, I know that. The heat race was terrible and I had a really bad gate pick for the main. I think it was like 13th or 14th, so I went to the inside and was able to come out in the top five. From there, I stalked Justin [Barcia] for a little bit, I was just doing the big rhythms and I knew he was struggling in the whoops, so he missed the rhythm before the whoops, I got underneath him and then was able to get a gap on him from there on out and just click off my laps. Chase [Sexton] ended up going down in the sand, so I just focused on myself and hitting the lines I was hitting and I felt like I was not doing anything special out there, just hitting my marks and that’s what was important tonight on a track like this.

Image: Octopi Media.

Were there any specific adjustments that made a difference for you tonight?

I was struggling right from the get-go today. I felt like I didn’t really have a good flow of the track. I had to go with the team, and they made a big bike set-up change for me, and it definitely felt a lot more comfortable in the rough conditions, and that’s where it really mattered. So I give it up to the team, for sure, for helping me out today.

I know you got a podium in the 450 class last year. How does this one compare to that? Especially after stalking arguably one of the toughest riders to pass in Justin Barcia.

Compared to last year, I think all around, I’ve made progress, and it’s good to see. Going into year two, riding better this year, and I think I’ve been way closer to the podium spot a lot more frequently. [The podium] came at the last round last year, so I’ve been in the podium fight at a lot of these races this year. I feel like I should have had one by now, but it’s definitely better now than never. I think just going into year two, I have more experience riding with these guys, but yeah, Justin was definitely a hard guy to pass and get away from without some retaliation. So I made sure I set up my pass, and once I did that, I was able to focus forward and just focus on the track really, because it was deteriorating pretty fast and I just had to be focused out there.