Andrea's Angle: Anaheim II
February 01, 2024
Welcome back to Andrea's Angle, a column showcasing my perspective as a newbie to Supercross. Coming to you a little late this week, already in chilly Detroit, with my thoughts on last weekend's exciting Anaheim 2 race!
Pre-Races
First triple crown of the season!
The entire evening was one big ad for the new Ghostbusters movie, but I will say the marketing people did a great job with Barcia’s intro. He drove right onto the track in the Ghostbusters station wagon, and it was genuinely fun to see a unique entrance.
Then, there was Jett... I was already feeling anxious about his "boxing" intro after the whole helmet-grabbing incident last week. The crowd was NOT into it - he faced a pretty resounding booing. Not fun to hear!
They also watered the track before the night show - the first time we’ve seen water being intentionally added to the dirt in a while! If the track is too dry, it loses traction and gets slippery. This is because the soil hardens up as it loses moisture, which makes it harder for the tires to dig in.
Triple Crowns
I just found out that Triple Crowns were only introduced to Supercross about 5 years ago! That's when I first started following the sport, and I had assumed it was a longstanding tradition.
For me, they are more fast paced and generate more excitement than the regular night show. It's three chances for your favorite riders to do well as opposed to a singular shot. If not for the Triple Crown, I wouldn't have had the joy of seeing Tomac and Shimoda both figure things out in their final races of the evening.
However, like Scott mentioned in What We Noticed, I find that the format removes the incentive to fight for positions in the final race if you've already secured the overall win. Hence why we saw Levi Kitchen riding around in 2nd place instead of trying to battle Thrasher in the final Main Event. I also find it a bit boring to have someone win the night without winning a single race (Cooper Webb).
Biggest SMH (shaking my head) moment of the night was Jett's massive blunder in the last lap of the third and final main event. He was in 2nd, and trying to catch up / pass Tomac wouldn't have affected the overall results. Perhaps he wasn't aware of that or just wanted to win the race, so he pushed hard and lost control in the whoops section. That error lost him a spot on the podium, dropping him all the way from 2nd place to 6th place overall. Jett may have demonstrated great speed and skill, but some of these emotional and rash decisions highlight the fact that he's still a rookie, and has room to mature and grow as an athlete.
Overall, there's still no clear frontrunner in the 450 class coming out of Anaheim 2. It's super exciting to have such a stacked field, and I cannot wait for more exciting races to come. We're also saying hello to the 250 East class, who are racing in Detroit this weekend! In case you don't know, the 250 class (mostly younger riders on bikes with smaller engines) is broken up into the East and West Regions, each crowning a champion. We'll see the 250 West riders again next weekend when we head back west to Glendale, Arizona.
See you next week,
Andrea
