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A pulp mx network production. A cerebral and experienced look into the racing action from the week that was this is Industry Seating with Jason Thomas. Presented by Guts Racing Works Connection Racerattos.com unmatched supplements, firepower parts, Grandstone Boots and fly racing. Welcome to the Industry Seating podcast. And I'm just going to start off by apologizing for not having done this in a couple of weeks. I know I do that pretty often, but not on purpose. Just. Yeah, hasn't worked out. Timing and life has gotten in the way. But we are back and we're going to talk about what we saw in Cleveland, Ohio and what we might see in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, rounds 14 and 15. And I simply cannot believe that this championship is almost over. I say that every year and I know, but it's probably a shared feeling by everybody, right? Like you so excited coming out of the holidays and headed towards Anaheim. 1 and it's like this new season, everybody's wondering what's going to happen and all of a sudden you wake up and it's the middle of April and there's three rounds to go and now, you know, my thoughts are headed towards the pro motocross and before long we'll be wrapping up pro motocross and I'll be thinking about the playoffs and then we'll be right back in the holidays again. And I just swear, just time is spent speeding up and you know, I've heard it from my elders for years that the older you get, the faster time goes and you hear. I don't know if you guys hear it or not. I hear it a lot from Ricky Carmichael just speaking with him. He always says that time is a thief and it steals, you know, all the things that you hold dear and your, your memories and all those things. Yeah, time. He just says that quite a bit. Time is a thief. And I could not agree more. But anyway, thank you to the sponsors of this podcast, Guts Racing, Works Connection. Works Connection swept both podiums with the Pro on start device this weekend. That is simply incredible. So great job To Works Connection, race-rentals.com unmatched supplements and their brand new website. It's going to be a peptide specific company which is Nova Prime Labs that they are launching. Their delivery starts a week from from today. It's April 27th. That's Nova Prime Labs, Grandstone Boots, Firepower Parts and Fly Racing. Thank you to all of them for being on board. I'll have some more details about those companies a little bit later. But we had another 250East round which There is one more specific and unique 250East round, and they also have their showdown in Salt Lake City. There was an opportunity here for Cole Davies. If he had won the race, he could have clinched the championship this coming weekend in Philadelphia. It was not meant to be. He did not win the race, and really rightfully so. His first two races weren't great. And I say that based off of what we know he's capable of. He has. He set a really high bar. We've been talking about it on the openings of the shows how historically Good his first 16 races now, I guess 17 have been. And even with a third on the weekend, he came in with a 3.1 average finish through 16 races, which was second best ever. And he got third. So it's even better, you know. So the crazy part of that is he didn't have the weekend he won and he still improved upon that historic start to a career. So I don't know really how you want to look at it from Cole Davies. I'm sure he was disappointed. I know he was somewhat okay with how he wrote in the last one, but the other two were not anything to. To really write home about. So, yeah, kind of an up and down day. But really, at this point of the season, I think you just have to be kind of satisfied. If you're Cole Davies, you have a 21 point lead. If everything just kind of stays the status quo, you're going to win this championship. And that is really the point. He has four wins. You have to assume he, he. I don't want to assume anything. Maybe he gets another one in Philly. I do believe he's the best rider, so usually the best riders win the races. So he could get five wins. We'll see what Salt Lake brings. You know, Deegs will be back, but if he walked out of here with five wins and a championship like that's a hell of a sophomore season is really the point. We do want to talk about Nate Thrasher, though, because Thrasher does not have a contract that I know about for 2026 or, excuse me, for 2027. And that could change in a moment's notice. And we've tried to talk about that. You heard Ricky kind of saying, mentioning the free agent thing. And he's around those guys quite a bit. He's at, you know, that they ride at his former facility. You know, Brad Hoffman, the co. I guess principal of the team is what his name is, Team principal. He bought the facility, which was the goat farm. So Ricky's out There quite a bit. If you watched him do or just heard about him doing that holeshot who whole shot King. Well, he, when he goes to practice starts, that's where he goes to his old facility. And he's close with those guys. So he doesn't always share insight. Sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn't. I think he tries to protect their privacy, but when he has something good to share or wants to kind of share some of the difficulties that they're going through behind the scenes that maybe they don't share because they don't want to seem like they're making excuses, Ricky has an opportunity to do that for them. And he was talking about Nate Thrasher being a free agent and how important these races are for Nate and how winning a race right, right there might shore up a spot for him on that team. And I was talking to Steve and Weege on our review show earlier. We record on Sunday and we're both, we're all. I guess we were all were kind of like, well, if Starr didn't keep him, I can't imagine somebody wouldn't sign him really, really quickly. That just seems impossible for a guy who is a podium threat all the time, especially when he's healthy and can win races, as he just proved this past weekend in Cleveland. So I can't imagine he would be without a factory bike in 2027, but I think he'd like to stay where he is. You know, that team is really successful. They've dominated this 2026 campaign and I don't think he has any real motivation or desire to go elsewhere. Why would you that? That bike is incredible. So kudos to Nate Thrasher. It's a rider that I've talked to more and more. I haven't really spent any time with him before this season, but just by happenstance, I got to speak with him on media sessions and yeah, I like his approach to things. He's a really down to earth guy, you know, Tennessee native, not a lot of ego there. So, yeah, I was, I was happy to see him find some success because it's been a really frustrating 2026 for him. No question about that. He was dealing with this kind of nerve thing in his shoulder. He had really no feeling in his hand at all. So, you know, for him to go out and win races in that condition is asking a lot. And now that he's healthy again, I don't know what fixed it. I know he was undergoing a lot of treatment, but he's healthy again and you're seeing the Big difference there. So good job to Nate Thrasher. Landon Gordon. I'm watching the highlights as I'm doing this podcast. By the way, Landon Gordon was phenomenal. This is a kid that really wasn't slated to race this 250 East. He was slated to race SMX next. All year long and through injuries, most notably. Who started off the injury? I can't think of it now. Someone got hurt, which then brought up. They were going to put Caden Minear in there. And then they were going, that turned into Landon Gordon, or, excuse me, that turned into Kaden Dudney because Maniere crashed in Houston. And then Kaden Dudney just wasn't really executing the way that that team wanted him to. And they. There's two sides of that coin because they truly believe that Kaden Dundee can be a threat to win races outdoors. He's that good at motocross, so they wanted to give him a head start since it wasn't going so well in Supercross, which also then freed up a spot for Landon Gordon to get a shot as well. And this kid's delivered. You know, I know Nashville main event wasn't what he wanted, but the heat race was really good. And then his second overall with a Triple Crown and his second ever race, that is. Yeah, that just doesn't happen all that often. And I don't want to get carried away and say, like, here it comes, here's Colt. I don't. I don't think it's that. You know, I think Landon Gordon is solid. I think he has a lot of potential, but I don't see the going to go on a run of winning races. Superstar guy that we saw with Cole Davies last year at Anaheim. One. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Landy Gordon. You know, I've been wrong before. I've been wrong about Hunter Lawrence for a couple of several years now. So maybe this could just be another one. But in any case, Landon Gordon overperforming, because I thought he'd be fine. I thought he'd be a top 10 guy, but not second. Not second place. Not keeping Cole Davies honest in race three. So great job, kid. Really nice kid. You know, his older brother races as well. His older brother's, you know, not quite as good as Landon is. That's okay. That happens. But, yeah, I thought it was just incredibly impressive. And the important part of this story with a kid like Lana Gordon or Kaden Dudney or Caden Minear, that there's no real security at that team. If you get on the team Kudos. But you better perform and perform quickly. There is just not a lot of patience for lackadaisical results. And I would kind of say zero patience. Look at Dudney. They already, you know, like, there was this kind of back and forth about the word benching. I'm not using it. I'm just. I saw multiple people say it, but when you get pulled in the middle of a series, it's not good. You know, there's no way you can say it is a positive. So that's a. That's a challenge for Kaden Dudney to now overcome when they go to pro motocross. And I think he will. Motocross is his strength, and he showed speed in supercross. He just really couldn't stay off the ground, and he couldn't turn those into results that I think he and the team felt like he needed to turn in. So we shall see. The story of Kaden Dudney is far from over. I'm not. I'm not really concerned at all. It's really just wow. From Landon Gordon like that. That's really it. It's. It's very rare that you see a kid perform this well, this fast. And really, he didn't have much fanfare, to be honest. He's. He has some holes in his game that he is finding ways to shore up. The whoops have been problematic for him, even in smx. Next, you could see that he wasn't as good in the whoops as some of some of the other guys. You know, this track was good for him in that respect because he didn't really have to blitz big whoops. They were kind of jumpers, and you hop, skip, and just basically survive through them, which was a good setup for him. And again, I'm not trying to take anything away from him. I'm just more trying to give reasons for how this result was possible. If we get to a race where the whoops are brutal blitzers, I think you'll see it be a liability for him. And I've watched him enough to know that that's kind of what his strengths and weaknesses are. Great starter, really solid. You know, he can just put in solid laps. But the whoops are not his friend. So just keep that in mind, you know, keep that in mind as we go down the stretch. I don't know what Philly's going to bring. I don't know what Salt Lake's going to bring, but if the whoops are tough blitzers, you will see that is a. It's Still a challenge for him. It is not what he excels at. Anyway, great job. Forget all that for now, but just keep it in the back of your mind. Cole Davies, I kind of touched on. It's fine. He didn't have his best day. Still increase the points lead, and if you can have an off day with crashes involved and still increase your points lead, take it, move on. Don't, you know, don't. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth. Just, you know, count your blessings and keep on rolling. The last 250 rider I wanted to make a note on was Seth Hammaker. Yeah, it's just one of those days where small mistakes add up. And that's really been somewhat of the story for Seth Hammaker in his career. And if you look at last year and the first half of this Supercross season, he had found ways to minimize those. And it seemed like as soon as he said, well, I got to take chances now because I don't have a choice. I've got to go try to win. You know, I spent a lot of time talking about introducing risk back into the equation for Hammaker and what that would look like and what literally the risks are of upping the risk ratio in your racing profile. And I think we're just seeing it. You're seeing more mistakes, you're seeing more crashes, you're seeing the consistency kind of go away. You're seeing the predictability go away. Well, that's the prototypical downside of trying to go faster, trying to get out of your comfort zone and ride faster than you think you can sustain. Yeah, that's what happens. So I'm not saying that I got this right or anything like that. I'm just saying that if you were wondering, like, what. What's that going to look like if he tries to take more chances? Well, this is what it looks like. Inconsistent results, crashes, mistakes. Sometimes you save it, sometimes you don't. Sometimes are good races, sometimes they're not. That's what it looks like. And you could also make the argument, well, he was going to lose the championship anyway. Fair enough. I wouldn't argue that. I have no pushback for that at all. The only real downside, I would say, is if an injury stems from this or. Or if Davies has a huge crash at the next two, one of the next two, and the door swings wide open, like, say he gives 15 points back and had Hammaker backed it down, you know, gotten a second last week without the crash and then the subsequent track cutting that push him in fifth. And then had a more solid day in Cleveland and got like a second or third instead of a fourth. Maybe the points lead to something like 14. And then you have this huge mishap from Davies which puts you right in the championship fight at the finale. It's all ifs and buts. I'm just saying, the what ifs of how could this be punitive? Because it feels like it's not going to matter right now. With two races to go, it feels like it's not going to matter. We'll just see if that remains how it goes. So all I'm saying is if, if it stays like this and Davies wins A championship by 20 points and it's kind of like, who cares? You were going to lose anyway. Might as well go for it. You might as well go down, you know, swinging than just staring at the pitch. And I'm using a baseball reference there, but I'm sure you can figure it out. So I don't know. Time will tell. But I certainly think that we've seen a little bit less consistent Seth Haymaker than. Yeah, than maybe what we were expecting. So this is. This is what the downside looks like in a nutshell. Sponsors of this podcast, Guts Racing. They are the preeminent name in seats graphics for all sorts of motorcycles. They have custom seats for E bikes. The Surrons. They are the name. They're the. What am I trying to say? They are the foremost name in the game. Yeah, that works. But anyway, Guts Racing. Great team over there. Andy, Greg, stand up human being. And if you need anything in that space, I could not recommend this company enough. Gutsracing.com and guts racing on Instagram Works connection. As I mentioned, they swept both podiums with the Pro on start device. That is truly incredible. Great job to the team over there. And one thing they wanted me to mention, they've been really pushing. What? I don't say pushing. That's kind of a negative connotation. They have been reminding people that they have the reinforcement straps for the fork guard. So what happens basically, in the world of greats and modern four strokes, people are running their. Their start devices really, really low. Like if you watch the pro guys, they're pulling their bikes all the way down almost to where the front fender is sitting on the front tire. That's to keep the. The bike from wheeling because these grates have so much positive traction. Well, what happens when you do that? You are putting an insane amount of stress and strain on the fork guard to hold that down. The fork guard is the Only thing that connecting those two, it's, it's taking all of that pressure and I don't even know the right word for it, but it's not inertia, but it's, it's doing all of the work. Like it's holding those forks compressed is basically what's happening. Like you push it down, it locks into place. Well, guess what holds it. The fork guard is sustaining all of that energy from the forks. The forks want to decompress so badly because they're so stiff. If you don't have anything there to reinforce that fork guard, basically the fork guard is just going to rip out of the fork lug. And I've done it a million times. And if you don't run the reinforcement straps, maybe you get away with it. Two or three starts. It's not going to last though. Like that is a guarantee that if you are using any sort of aggressive height on your fork on your prolaunch start device, it's going to break your fork guard. It's just going to rip right out of the bolts. And most of you probably know what I'm talking about, but I'm trying to explain it for those who don't. This is a really common thing. So don't forget if you get the Pro on Archaeface start device, don't forget to get those reinforcement straps. So basically you don't have to get a whole new fork guard. And if you're sitting on the line, you're like, oh, I got my new starting device, I'm going to use it. Well, you're not going to use it for long because it's going to break your fork guard in half. So anyway, thank you to for works connection you can go to worksconnection.com I believe the pro bone code is JT23, which is crazy that it's been that long, but I believe it's JT23. Unmatched supplements. What a great company. They have a brand new product just came out. It's called the Cognishot and I am waiting for mine to get here. I don't even have mine yet. It just came out. But it's basically to improve focus. So if you have any sort of job that requires a lot of mental focus or strain, a lot of people have high tense jobs and you need to be your best. Maybe you're going to give a presentation, maybe you have a really stressful meeting that you need to bring your A game. Maybe you're a sales guy and you want to like, hey, I Need to knock this out of the park, give Cognishop a try. Because I just, I know where they're going with these products and I've tried similar things from them. I think this thing's going to be a home run. So unmatched supplements is the way to go. And I mentioned the Nova Prime Labs. They are, that's going to be a peptide specific company. If you don't know anything about peptides, I would implore you to do some research. They are basically what's next for fitness and nutrition. And I'm not a chemist, I'm not a scientist, but I am learning a lot about peptides. I do take some myself. They are, and I'm using this phrase, seriously, I'm not trying to be loosey goosey with it, but they are a miracle. I don't even want to say drug, but they're a miracle supplement. Truly they are. What peptides can do are like nothing else that has ever happened in the space of fitness and nutrition and medicine. I firmly believe that it's really early because all these companies like Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk and the big companies are going through stage three trials right now and it's just to protect everybody. But when the big dogs in the pharma space launch their products, you're going to hear about it nonstop because they're going to be advertising it every, everywhere. Right now they're still in research phase, so you have to buy them from lesser known companies. Once the big companies hit the market, I promise you, all the guessing or lack of information that you're feeling right now is going to be solved because they're going to make it their mission in life to inform the average person what these drugs can do. You've all heard of Wegovy, Ozempic, Manjaro. Those are all the big ones for GLP1. So when, when I say GLP1 they are a single and, and I may be getting something wrong, but antagonist, basically it hits one thing. GLP3 is the next stage of that and it's a triple antagonist. So it works on three different things as far as curbing hunger, burning fat, doing all these things. So it's, it's much more effective than what Ozempic and wegovia. And these things are now that's coming, that's in stage three for these companies. And I'm getting way off track here, but I just want you guys to be on the front end of these next level things that are happening in the space because I'm telling you they are life changing breakthroughs. 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Especially if you're listening to this podcast. I want the best for you. Just do some homework on this stuff because I really believe it can improve your life in a serious way. Anyway, I'll get back on topic. Grandstone Boots. I have the best boots in the game. I promise you, if you went in my closet, well, for one, you'd be breaking and entering. But if I invited you to look in my closet, you would see an insane amount of footwear. Just an incredible amount of boots and sneakers and shoes. It's. It's scary. And I wear the same ones over and over is the worst part. I don't even branch out. Sad. But I have so many pairs of shoes. It's awesome, I love it. But it's also a little bit terrifying. But Grandstone takes such good care of me and thank you to them. Firepower Parts. Check them out. Batteries, wheels, ramps, stands, gas jugs. They make everything. Great company. It's WPS owned. So I'm selling, selling for the home team. Don't get me wrong, but Firepower Parts is a company on the rise. I'm just telling you it is. I'm on the inside and I see it and I see the things that are happening. And then fire racing. How could I not mention fly racing? So yeah, I feel like my name sometimes my middle name should be fly racing, but I wouldn't have it any other way. Let's do the power rankings. 450 class and it took me a while because I haven't done this show in a couple of weeks. Sad. Hashtag sad. It took me a while to kind of figure these out, but I looked at my old notes and then I just went with it. And I didn't like, try to overthink it. I just went for my gut and made sure that I could justify it on the back end. And so here we are. Honorable mentions are Dylan Ferrandis, who I feel bad isn't in here. I kind of feel like he should be. He had a good result. I think he went 8, 8, 9. Is that right? Something like that. On the weekend, I'm going from memory something like that. Garrett Marchbanks has been steadily improving. Although I didn't love the. The move on Hunter Lawrence. I don't think it was intentional, but it also wasn't very bright or bright's not fair. It wasn't very wise or the Racecraft wasn't. Wasn't something I would suggest. How about that? I'll try to back out of that as much as I can. Shane McElrath also fifth. I think he got fifth in the last race. So good job from Shane McElrath and he loves these inclement weather conditions that he really shines and yeah, so good opportunity for him. So good job to all those three. They didn't make the top 10, but it's a tough list right now. Number 10, Justin Hill. And my goodness, Justin Hill. That race three, passing Sexton for third. He passed eight guys, I think, to get to third, which is remarkable. And he is one of the most unique individuals you'll ever meet. And I mean that in all the best ways. He is just his own person. I mean, the guy retired from racing, went to Portland, was a sheriff, then said, nah, I don't want to be a sheriff in Portland because this sucks. We're not allowed to arrest anybody. They're allowed to do drugs right in front of us and they're allowed to do anything. Basically they want to us and we. And we still can't arrest him. So I don't want to do this job anymore. This is him telling me the story. So then he moved to Wyoming and said, I want to go racing again. And now he's getting third in Triple Crowns race three, passing former Supercross champion. So God bless you, Justin Hill, because you are your own. You are just such a unique person. Wildly talented musician. If you've ever watched him play guitar, he's like a jack of all trades. It's incredible. Crazy talented his dad was a BMX freestyle legend. You don't know anything about Monty Hill. Look him up. His dad was. That's where all the talent come from. From Josh Hill. And Justin Hill is from the dad, crazy talented BMXer. And I think he did freestyle. Don't quote me on that, but I know it was the BMX arena. And yeah, he's just a legend on bicycles. So anyway, great job, Justin Hill. Love to see it. Number nine, Joey Savage. And I love the story that Steve told on the review pod about Joey. Just talking about I gotta be better, not very good, this and that. And Steve's like, you got fifth. Like, wait, what? Okay, cool. Well, I mean, but it's so Joey. Joey is. I don't know that I would say I'm just like Joey. But I can be like Joey where I'm. I never super stoked on anything I do personally, I'm always kind of thinking, where did I screw up? Where should I have been better? And I, I think I'm pretty optimistic on life, but maybe a little bit more so than Joey. But I do very much appreciate the net. You're never really getting too high on yourself type of vibe because that is certainly me. But I just, I think Joey's really impressive, man. The guy's a great, great rider. He truly is very, very underrated rider. And so, yeah, good job to Joey Sabachi. And really he's, he's been killing it all season other than the, the toe injury, which I'm sure sucks, but he's, he's been fantastic all year. Number eight, Malcolm Stewart. And I was just watching the highlights as I mentioned, and man, if you want to ever see the look of someone seething under their helmet, it would have been Malcolm with Jorge Prado because Prado really wasn't doing anything necessarily wrong. If you're Malcolm, you're just like, dude, get out of the way. Like, please get out of the way. You're going to go backwards. I'm much faster than you right now. And all you're doing is just slowing us both down. I understand the Prado side where like I'm in third. What do you want me to do? Like, I'm, Yeah, I'm going to try to keep going, but it's just a really tough dynamic for Malcolm because it's delaying the inevitable. And this is where I've argued with people in the past and it's. Neither of us are right or wrong. It's an opinion based thing. But I always feel like, and I did this As a racer, I 100% did this. And I, I'm sure that there would be people and other racers that be like, dude, that's not it. Like, you can't do that. You got to fight more. But I always felt like if I was simply delaying the inevitable of someone passing me, especially someone that, well, I wouldn't, shouldn't say Prado and Malcolm are like that. But like, if someone much better than me, like a Tedesco or Andrew Short or somebody was behind me and I'm like, I'm not going to beat this guy. There's no way. It's lap three, I'm not beating this guy. I didn't feel like there was much upside to like fighting him to the death and like blocking him. That, that to me seemed counterintuitive to the best possible result. Because the way I look at it, okay, at the end of the race, if you ever go look at the results, what's the, you know, and say it's a pro motocross ra. The end result, your final score time is 33 minutes, 12 seconds. Okay? That is really what you need to be worried about more than anything else. Okay? In that race, if you could find a way to make 33.12 down to 32:51, you've shaved, what, 21 seconds off of your total race time, which could be, I don't know, two, three, four positions, whatever. Whatever that number is is what it is. But you would do better in almost every scenario than you had done. So when I look at that and I'm like, okay, me blocking Shorty is going to slow us both down because I'm going to take really defensive lines and I'm going to go inside, all the way inside in the corner. And then if he goes out, I'm going to ride him up in the corner and we're both going to go slower and my lap time is going to be slower. Well, in that math, that 33:12 is now going to be more like something like 33, 22 if you do that for a lap or two, maybe not that drastic, maybe 3317 if you block him for a lap or two. And maybe if you're dealing with a guy like Shorty, he's going to blast you when he gets the chance because he's going to be so angry with you. And now even if you stay up, you're going to lose more time. All of that to the point is slowing down your total race time. It's slowing it down. That's why I say it's pointless to put up such a fight. And that's why I used to get so mad when Vince Freeze would do stupid stuff like that with really good guys because he's not going to beat them. He is not going to beat those guys. And I don't want to talk about Vince Friese, but it's the same point. It's the same. And I don't want to say it about Prados as much because Prado is a fight far superior rider than I was or Vince Freezi is. But it's still kind of, kind of a thing. Like, if you. And I don't think that Prado is there mentally, he's not like, well, I can't beat Malcolm. I don't think he's thinking that way. So I'm, I'm trying to tiptoe around the fact. But I've seen Prado do it. I've seen Prado, like, block people to the death when I'm like, he's gonna get you, man, like you were. Especially last year, especially in 2025. It hasn't been as bad this year, to his point. And it certainly won't be a thing in motocross, I don't think. But it is a thing with a lot of riders. And I, I understand why Malcolm would be frustrated is where I'm trying to circle back to, because Malcolm's like, dude, I am going to pass you come hell or high water. All you're doing is screwing up our race. That's all you're doing is screwing up both of our races right now. And whatever our total time is, is going to be worse than it was, which means we have no chance to catch the guys in front of us. That's why he's really angry. That's why those guys get so frustrated. And when I was racing, I tried to think ahead and be like, this does me no good. And I would get yelled at. Like, Forrest Butler was like my team manager and he'd be like, you, what are you letting those guys buy for? And I'm like, dude, I'm not going to beat them, so why don't I just tuck in behind them and try to turn the best lap time possible and maybe learn something from them instead of blowing myself out trying to block them and maybe them knocking me down, like, that's not smart. And it was just agree to disagree. But, you know, it's. It comes down to race strategy and racecraft and mental aspects of it. I just knew that if, like, no matter what I'm Going to get, you know, 10th in the Moto. Like, fighting for fourth ain't going to do me a damn bit of good. I'm still going to get 10th because that's over the course of 33 minutes. That's where I'm going to end up. I'm not good enough. Those guys are going to be 30 seconds ahead of me. Truly, like. Like, they're going to end up 30 seconds ahead of me. There's no way for me to cut 30 seconds off my race time at all. Like, no matter what I do, I'm not doing that. So, anyway, I've gone way too long on that subject. But that's why Malcolm was so frustrated with Prado is because he felt like you're. All you're doing is delaying the inevitable and cutting all. Like, swerving all over the racetrack to slow us both down. Um, and that. That is a real thing. That's why guys get really angry. Number seven was Prado. I talked about him. Number six, Chase Sexton. And Sexton has been better, but I don't think he deserves to be ahead of any of the other guys. Like, I don't. I don't know how you could make that argument. So sixth is where he is. Even though he was, you know, he's been a little better. You know, he got second in Detroit. St. Louis was not good at all, but Nashville was better. He rode his way back up to fourth this weekend. I don't know what he got overall, that's. But I know he was fourth in the last race. And, yeah, it's been okay. But he still, again, he should not be ahead of any of the next five. So that's where you land is sixth. Number five is Justin Cooper. And J. Coop is pretty legit, man. He wins race two again, and he's. He's in a contract year, too. Like, I don't know where he's going to end up. I know he's been flirting with some other teams, maybe testing some other motorcycles. I don't know. You know, I can't say that for sure, but I know he is putting the feelers out there to see what's available because I don't think he has any guarantees to stay where he's at. I think he'd like to, but he'd also like to get paid. I don't think he's really been paid a ton of money ever. At Star, he's always kind of been like the. The redheaded stepchild. I know that's a terrible reference, and I don't think it's offensive to anybody. If it is, I'm sorry, I'm not trying to offend anybody. But you know what I'm trying to say, like, he's always kind of been the writer that they're not pursuing. They just sign because he's there type thing. Ruben Fernandez and mxgp, if you watch those races, exactly the same thing. They're not spending a bunch of budget on him. They're like, hey, we want to keep you around, but we don't have, really have a lot of money for you. That's, that's the dynamic that is Justin Cooper. He doesn't want to be there. He wants to be a guy that's getting like 800 grand or more. You know, he. And he's riding in a fashion that I can't really argue it. You don't go out and win races in triple crowns and get podiums consistently. Well, I say consistently, but get podiums in Supercross and never get paid. Like that's, that's not a thing. So I don't blame Justin Cooper for wanting to test the waters, wanting to see what's out there. I don't think he's going to upgrade as far as team or bike. I don't think that's a thing. But he probably wants to get like, you know, he probably wants to hit seven figures in a year for pay and maybe he already has, I don't know. I don't know his income, but I bet he's not seven figures in salary right now. And I bet he'd like to be seven figures in salary, you know, like if I had to guess and this is all conjecture, I don't know. But if I had to guess what he makes salary right now, it's probably something like 600 total all in. Maybe 500. I'm going to ask, I just want, I'm not going to say for sure, but now I want to see how wrong I am. But I want, I'm going to guess something like 600 all in. Maybe again, I'm going to say the same thing. Maybe it could be like 500, maybe it could be 700, but I don't think it's more than that. But he would want to be like a million dollar guy, a 1.2 guy. And not everybody can get paid like that, but I'm sure that's what he's aiming for. And he's like, man, I'm winning races, I'm getting podiums in 450 Supercross, like, what more do you Want, it's just there's only so much to go around, so much money to go around. And guys like Malcolm and RJ and ap, they're not getting paid a ton either. They are not. I'm just telling you right now, they're not getting paid a ton. Like they're doing fine, but they're in that same kind of range that I've been telling you about, like that 6 to 700 range. And I don't know for sure, I'm not their agent, but I, I am in this industry and I have a good feeling what kind of going rates are. And when you're winning, you want and you're looking at, see what they're looking at is he's looking at a guy like Hunter who is better, who's doing better. No question he would, he would have to admit that too. But hunter's probably a $2 million guy right now, you know, 1.5 to 2, I would guess. And I. He's probably up. His Honda deal is probably up. So he's going to be a two million dollar guy all day long. At least, at least that. So he's looking at like I'm, you know, and I'm again, I'm making up numbers here that I feel like are close. And he's like, well, I'm getting 600 and Hunter's getting like 2 million. Like, damn, he's not doing that much better than me. He is doing better, but not that much better. Now if he wins a championship, all that goes out the window. And Hunter's won a bunch of races, so you could kind of already like throw that argument out anyway. But going into this season, it wasn't that crazy of an argument to make. I don't think it wasn't that crazy of an argument to make. Now it, now it kind of is. But anyway, the point is, Justin Cooper wants to go make some money. So I think he's out there seeing who's available, seeing what bikes are good and seeing what the market will bear in the end. Cooper Webb is fourth and coupe wants to win some races. You know somebody, I've had some questions from people today, even about like, hey, is there still a chance for the championship? I mean, sure. What's the lead? 21. It's not impossible, but I don't think Koopa's thinking like championship all the way right now. I don't think so. Like, I could be wrong. I think he's like, I want to go try to win these last two, which you know, would net him 300 grand or whatever, maybe more, and whatever, put the pressure on for the championship. These guys blow it, then cool. That would be unbelievable. But I'd at least like to make a couple hundred grand on my way out. If I win. If I could win Philly and then get a podium at Salt Lake. Because he's not the best at Salt Lake. To be fair, Salt Lake is not a great track for him. He. This Cooper Web is driven by money, and he has a lot of it. Don't get me wrong. He gets paid very well, but he. He likes to make money. I do, too. I am very driven financially, like, you want to motivate me, lure money in front of me. That is a driver. It's not a driver for everybody. It's not a driver for Chase Sexton, but it is for some people. Hunter, it is. Myself, I don't. I shouldn't even be in the conversation with them. But Cooper Webb and Hunter, it is like they want to make money. Jet wants to make money, and I don't. It's just a different dynamic for everybody. Some people don't care. I've met lots of people that are like, yeah, whatever, money. So what? You know, like Steve Mathis, he does really well for himself. He's, in my mind, the preeminent SMX media member there is. He does well for himself. He has earned every bit of it. But I can tell you that money doesn't drive every decision he makes. It just doesn't. And we argue. He and I argue about that sometimes because it does drive a lot of decisions I make, and I sacrifice a lot to make more money. Where he's kind of like, eh, I don't think I would do that. And that's okay. It's different strokes for different folks. All that to say, if you're wondering where Coop's motivation is, he wants to go make some damn money. Number three is Eli Tomac. And I don't know if Eli Tomas is going to race this weekend. I was, you know, reading between the lines, talking to people that would know. I heard he's getting an MRI this week to see what the extent of the hip damage is. If he can't go this weekend, he would really like to be back for Denver. It's his home race, kind of, but whatever, it's home race, and he'd like to be out there and he'd like to, you know, finish the season strong and be ready for pro motocross without it, without a hitch. So time will tell. You know, the. The MRI will tell the story, because if the MRI comes back clean, then it's just a pain management thing. And as a racer, that's all you're really ever asking for, is just put it in my hands. Like, wet me be the determining factor of whether I go racing. Not a doctor's report, not an MRI that tells me I need surgery. You know, like, just if you're telling me all I got to worry about is pain, most guys are going to be like, sign me up, because these guys are absolute maniacs with. With pain tolerance. And I. This podcast is not about me, but I raced for a long time, as you know. I dealt with a lot of pain. I raced with torn ACLs. I've raced with separated shoulders. I've raced with broken bones. I've raced with all kinds of stuff. And you just. Yeah, you want to be out there. This is your livelihood. It's all you've ever worked for your whole life. And you're not going to let pain hold you back in the end. Like, pain is not going to be what keeps you sidelined. And Eli Tomac is probably a lot tougher than me, so I can't imagine that pain is going to keep him sidelined either. Number two is Ken Roczen. And pretty damn impressive from Kenny, man, I have to give him a lot of credit. That is. This has been a hell of a run he's been on here. I did not think he would be able to claw his way back into this thing. I really did not. And here he is. Here he is. He is one point out of this thing with two rounds to go, and I don't know if he's going to do it. Hell if I know. Why would I know? Hunter is incredibly resilient, so he's going to have his work cut out for him. And I would say, what, three. Three races to go? Sorry. I would say Philly suits Kenny better than Salt Lake does Denver. I kind of give the nod to Hunter, so I think. I think Philly is really important for Ken to win. We're looking at some inclement weather again. We'll see what that looks like when we get closer. But I saw, like, I've seen anywhere from 65 to 85% chance of rain on Saturday. Not great. So we shall see what that means. But I think inclement conditions favor Kenny. Just. That's what I think. Doesn't mean it has to work out. Can. He could fall. Get mud on your gloves and then you're screwed. Like, it can happen that fast. But I Like Kenny's chances if it is raining. But I do like Hunter at the final two rounds. Track conditions, altitude or elevation, and the way those races set up, I think favor Hunter a little bit more. So it's going to be a great show, you know, like, all I hope is we keep it close. Like, I just hope nobody crashes, nobody does anything silly to kind of blow the points out and then we have no suspense. I'm sure I don't want to know. It'd be an interesting question to ask. Like, hey, you have a 50, 50 shot of one of you having a problem and effectively ending your chances this weekend. Would you rather that? Would you rather take a 50, 50 coin flip of it going sideways for one of you and the other guy is going to win the title, or would you rather it stay close all the way to the end and it's 21 minute main event in Salt Lake for all the marbles, what would you rather have? I don't know. It's an interest, but it's a. For me anyway. It's a pretty interesting quandary because I think it would answer how confident these guys are. Like, if you're like, no, man, let's do it. I would race this guy Anytime, anywhere, 21 minutes for the championship. That would, to me would scream confidence. But if you're willing to take a 50, 50 shot at it, maybe you're not so sure. You know, I'm kind of reading the psychology of what that answer would be. It's almost like if two football teams, and if you watch college football, you'll know exactly what I'm saying. Two football teams come down to the end. One team is huge underdog and they found a way to hang in there. And it's like, oh my God, they got to overtime and they score a touchdown and they can win it by going for two right at the end of the game. Doesn't have to be overtime, it could just be the last play they score and it's, you know, they kick the extra point, it's tied. If they go for two, they can win it. Usually you will see that the underdog team that is really overmatched, that found a way they'll go for two and try to win it all in one play. Because the predominant theme, or like the smart money says, the longer you go, the more football you play, the more time you give this equation, the more likely it is for the lesser team to lose. So if you are given one shot to win it all in one play, you take that shot. That Is that is kind of the predominant wisdom in football, and I kind of think it relates here to this, too, is if you're like, I don't know, like, I don't think any. Either of them view it this way, truly, in the end, so it probably doesn't matter. But if you were like, like, just not having a good year and you're like, I'm lucky to be in this spot right now. Like, I'm really lucky to be here. You'd probably take the 50, 50 coin flip, right, that I'm offering. I don't know. None of this is even possible. It's all hypothetical. So I apologize for taking you down this road, but it's. It would be an interesting question to. To pose to them with some true serum, or maybe just three or four shots of their favorite alcohol would probably get it done. Anyway. Number one is Hunter Lawrence. And, yeah, I have again, I've talked about this many times. I've never been so wrong about a rider in my entire life than I have been about Hunter Warrants for the last. Going on five years. Truly remarkable career he's putting together here. It's a person I've really come to like, and I had really no relationship with him, and I've very much tried to build one because I respect the guy so much and what he's done with his career and the just incredible success and improvement he's made along the way. So, yeah, he. He has my respect, and I've tried to show him that. And, yeah, just give him the respect he deserves in whatever way I can. Not that he cares what I think, but if I respect you, I want you to know it. And maybe that's. Maybe that's selfish, maybe that's narcissistic. I don't know. I don't. Whatever, who cares? But I. I always am trying to make up for the fact that I was not a believer. I was not a believer in Hunter Lawrence at all, really. Like 20, 20, 2021. I was like, I mean, he's fine. He's, you know, whatever, top 10, 120, top 10, 250 guy. Maybe he's going to get some podiums, but he's not going to be in line to win a 450 supercross championship. Like, are you nuts? That's what I would have said to you in 2020 and 2021. And here we are. He's done the unthinkable. So he has been right. I have been wrong. Congratulations to Hunter Lawrence. You are the man. And who knows if you win this title or you don't. But there's one thing that's for damn sure is I have been super wrong about his career and his tenacity and resilience. And he deserves every accolade and every dollar that he gets and earns from here on out. So that's it for this week. Thank you, everybody, for listening. I apologize again for making these so far, few and far in between. But I'm going to vow to do a better job. I know I say that a lot, but I really am trying to do a better job. And I appreciate all the sponsors, I appreciate all the listeners, and we will talk to you soon. See you.