Monday Morning Coffee

Grab another cup for this week’s Monday Morning Coffee opinion column where we cover some of what happened this weekend in Motocross and more…

By Billy Rainford

Supercross is done. We finished the 2026 season of the Monster Energy AMA Supercross series at Rice-Eccles Stadium on the campus of the University of Utah (Go, Utes!) in Salt Lake City, Utah. While I like the city and actually lived there through the fall, winter, and spring of 1994-1995, I still think we had a more spectacular show when it finished in Las Vegas.

I’m not even a fan of Las Vegas but the excitement of the finale in that city wasn’t lost on me. I went a few times and had a great time. I can go to Vegas and not spend a dime gambling. I enjoy the people watching and just wandering around in all the nonsense. Sure, I’ve got a few wild and crazy stories from my times there, but I won’t be spinning any of those yarns here in print.

As we headed into Round 17 this past Saturday, there were really only a couple things that could have happened to make this an exciting show, and we got both of them!

In the 250 class, it was the Dave Coombs Sr. East/West Showdown, but both coasts were already decided, so we didn’t have that draw to pay attention to. Cole Davies won the East and Haiden Deegan won the West. Hmm, how could we make this exciting…

You got it! What if Cole were able to get some payback for Denver last year? Well, you didn’t have to hold your breath long because that is exactly what happened!

If revenge is a dish best served cold, Cole played this situation to a T. Once Haiden got out front, I didn’t think there was a chance of anything exciting happening for the rest of the Main, but I was wrong.

I haven’t looked yet, but are there arguments being made that Deegan slowed dow to have some fun with Davies? Either way, I looked at the lap times in the Main and I think that would be a pretty difficult stance to take. Davies was the only rider to dip under the 50-second lap time.

I don’t think that, as a racer, you open yourself up to a stuff pass no matter how much of a show you were trying to put on for the crowd. Also, Deegan was trying to pad his record book numbers, so I don’t think that theory holds water….until Davies was on him.

Cole took a couple looks inside and then went for it in a left-hander and punted Deegan quite effectively. Haiden was able to catch back up and went for some payback, but he was the one that ended up going down, allowing Davies to squirt away and take the win.

I was actually expecting the crowd to turn on Davies for this but it sounded like it was just the opposite and he now has a whole slew of new or stranger fans.

Cole took the flag first and Haiden ended up crossing the line in 4th. At this point, I was wondering how Deegan would react and he did the only thing he could have done to save face – he acted like he enjoyed it. He had to.

Had he acted upset or stormed back to the pits immediately, it would have been a very bad look. He laughed about it and said it was a great show for the crowd. Perfectly handled, I’d say.

Keep in mind, the kid from New Zealand is 2 years younger than Deegan. He’s got time to continue to collect Regional titles and records of his own before heading up to the 450 class where the rivalry will rekindle.

Here’s a look at the results:

It was great that they had the 2 of them together for some post-race thoughts. Check that out here:

In the 450 class, it all came down to this final round between Ken Roczen and Hunter Lawrence by just 1 point. I’m pretty sure you’re all aware of this as we headed into the 450 Main.

Beforehand, I thought the dry conditions would favour Hunter but also that the tight track may favour Kenny. I was hedging my bets and sitting balanced nicely on the fence.

Hunter grabbed the holeshot but Kenny went for a solid inside pass immediately in the next corner.

Hunter seemed to be able to close in if he wanted and I think that had us all thinking it was likely just a matter of time before he made a move of his own and took the lead and the title. But that didn’t happen.

Hunter pushed the front end and went down. As he rushed to get up and going again, he cost himself a little more time and dropped back, handing the title to Kenny. But wait…

In the post-race interviews, Kenny said he had some excruciating pain in his stomach and was letting riders go by him on the way to the flag. He only had Justin Hill between himself and Hunter in the end, so it had a slight feeling that anything could happen right to the end. It was a fantastic way to end this season.

Ken put in the best laps time of the race with Hunter just behind that in 2nd. It was fitting.

Sort of forgotten in all of it was the actual race podium. Chase Sexton took a much needed win ahead of Justin Cooper and Jorge Prado.

Prado was solid near the front and even looked like he had decisions to make about getting in the mix between the 2 title contenders. Sexton moved forward to the lead and Cooper moved up the entire race, too.

It could have been one of the most exciting nights of racing we’ve seen, considering it happened in both classes. What a show.

And now we wait for Round 1 of the AMA Pro Motocross Nationals that kick of at Fox Raceway in Pala, California on May 30th. All eyes will be on the 450 class as we await the return of Jett Lawrence and the entry of Haiden Deegan. As Motocross fans, it really doesn’t get any better than this!

Canadian Results

We had 3 Canadians on the line in SLC this past weekend. Here’s how they did:

250 Class:

214 Preston Masciangelo
Brantford, ON

Qualifying: 32nd
West Heat: 16th
LCQ: 18th

450 Class:

214 Tyler Gibbs
Abbotsford, BC

Qualifying: 44th

66 Cole Thompson
Brigden, ON

Qualifying: 24th
Heat 1: 10th (he was up in 6th for a couple laps)
LCQ: 4th
Main: 20th

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Cole Thompson (@colethompson16)

2026 Pulp MX LCQ Challenge

Race 1:

1. Freddie Noren
2. Cade Clason
3. Grant Harlan
4. Kevin Moranz
5. Cole Thompson
6. Scott Meshey
7. Luke Neese
8. Justin Rodbell
9. Justin Starling
10. Cheyenne Harmon

Race 2:

1. John Short
2. Tristan Lane
3. Kevin Moranz
4. Cade Clason
5. Justin Rodbell
6. Cole Thompson
7. Crockett Myers
8. Freddie Noren
9. Scott Meshey
10. Brandon Ray

Overall:

1. Cade Clason (2-4)
2. Kevin Moranz (4-3)
3. Freddie Noren (1-8)
4. Cole Thompson (5-6)
5. Justin Rodbell (8-5)
6. Scott Meshey (6-9)
7. John Short (15-1)
8. Grant Harlan (3-14)
9. Crockett Myers (12-7)
10. Tristan Lane (22-2)
11. Justin Starling (9-15)
12. Luke Neese (7-17)
13. Brandon Ray (16-10)
14. Preston Masciangelo (14-13) 
15. Josh Cartwright (18-11)
16. Logan Leitzel (17-12)
17. Cory Carsten (13-16)
18. Zack Williams (11-18)
19. Cheyenne Harmon (10-19)
20. Josh Greco (20-20)
21. Bobby Piazza (19-21)
22. Anthony Rodriguez (21-22)

Tyler Medaglia 4th at J Day in Virginia

#905 Tyler Medaglia (or “Tea and Eggs” as your talk to text may type it if you say “T-Dags”) was back in action in the hybrid MX/Off-Road J Day series, this week at Gary Bailey‘s Lake Sugar Tree in Axton, Virginia. If the latter part of that sentence gave you very strong emotional feelings, you may be as old as I am.

There was a pretty stacked number of fast Pro riders who would give Tyler a good challenge. And there was also a section on the track that was discovered by Jiggs Fustini where he went straight and jumped a creek instead of going to the right and up an awkward bank. It saved a ton of time and some other riders picked up on it late in Moto 2.

You can scroll through their live feed if you like:

4:22 Moto 1
8:23 Moto 2

Thanks for having us out to your place again for the Supercross finale, Dean Martin. Sorry I missed the bike ride this year. Fortunately, I have the weather forecast on my phone…

I did something new to the Direct Motocross SmugMug page which is where all the photos are stored. You now have the option to purchase photos. I haven’t got it all sorted out quite yet, but it should be a mice feature, moving forward. Considering that already this month alone there have been over 139K photo views, I figured it was time, so watch for that to get rolled out in the next few days.

If there’s a photo you see on there that you like but it’s not in the quality you’d like, please let me know and I can edit it and get it to you. There are some classic older photo in there!

Have a great week, everyone. I’ll be over at Gopher Dunes for their Team Intro on Tuesday, so watch for that.