Image: Octopi Media.

A controlled ride from Max Anstie saw the Fire Power Honda rider land his second-consecutive 250SX East podium, positioning himself as the main threat to red plate-holder Hunter Lawrence in the early stages of the series.

After a supercross world tour of sorts at the end of last year, Anstie was initially slated to race 250SX West following a strong US off-season that saw him second in the SX2 World Supercross Championship (WSX), also taking the Australian title in the category.

Making a last-minute switch to 250SX East due to back issues, Anstie came out of the gates firing at Houston to qualify fastest and finish second on the night to Lawrence (Team Honda HRC). Admittedly, third place on Saturday at Raymond James Stadium didn’t come as easy for Anstie, working through some teething issues and managing his bike temperature in the main.

“I don’t know what I can say, but I think the old girl underneath me was getting a bit hot,” Anstie explained. “Just with the air temperature, there were a few things with my team manager Martin Davalos, we were a little concerned with the weather – we definitely went the wrong way in the heat race.

“We thought that it was going to be very, very wet, and we didn’t want to risk getting water in the engine or not finishing. So we played it safe, and in the main event, there are some things we have to go back to the drawing board on. My bike is amazing, my start was great and it was solid for a little while there, but the humidity here… this is the thing, my team is pretty small and it is hard to have the knowledge and experience of these top teams.

“There were a few little teething issues, but nothing I couldn’t ride around. They’ve got a few things to iron out these next few weeks, but the next round is an indoor stadium, so that will be a bit easier, then get it sorted out for Daytona and we will be on for a good one there. It wasn’t necessarily strategy, I just knew I had to save myself in the sand and I couldn’t use the clutch – I knew I had a big gap behind so I was just bringing it home.”

In the build-up to the Tampa round, speculation spread about Anstie potentially being protested for running a big-bore motor, which appeared to stem from a written warning provided to both himself and Lawrence for failure to report directly to impound in Houston.

“We had to take the 280 out for the heat race and, jeez I was struggling then so we put it back in for the main [laughs],” joked Anstie. “Again I’m old enough… I don’t even know how you find half of this stuff on the internet, people are sending me this and I don’t where it is – random TikTok stuff – I don’t know. It doesn’t bother me, I’m not too bothered. Again, just to back it up is kind of cool.”

No penalty or further action was recorded at Tampa, with Anstie able to progress through the night and ultimately add 21 points to his 2023 tally, now eight from Lawrence with eight races remaining. Importantly for the number 63, he feels he has been able to score each podium in unique conditions, effectively placing him in a position of strength to maintain his front-running charge.

“When I walked this track, this track for me felt like a real American Supercross track, real tight,” he continued. “The track last weekend… it was weird in Houston, it kind of felt like when I was racing in Australia, it felt like everything went pretty smoothly and the track wasn’t super tight, whereas here, it definitely was.

“It was nice that the bike worked well, and I was still fast, fast in practice which was cool because that is not really my thing. Very happy with it, I’m done now, I’ve got two results and I can go home now, I don’t need to do any more…[laughs].”