What Really Happened in San Diego?
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WRH is back! And it’s in the hands of Arich Knaub. You may have seen his Twitter or his work with LitPro; it’s great stuff.
For a full and proper introduction, check out our post on Instagram. Lets get to it…
Eli Tomac was 0.13 seconds faster per lap than Jett Lawrence in San Diego. Yup: the difference between 1st and 2nd place was +0.13 seconds per lap!
We’ll remember this as Eli’s first win of the 2025 season (53rd of his career), with the around-the-outside pass he made on Jett but I’m here to tell you how Eli Tomac beat Jett Lawrence in an epic mano-vs-mano battle we won’t soon forget.

On television, it looked like they rode nearly identical races. They both moved through the field together and passed Cooper Webb in the same corner. But it was +0.13 seconds that earned Eli Tomac the victory.
Eli Tomac Won in Only Two Segments
Tomac’s advantage came entirely from segments 5 and 6 (see photo below). Lawrence had the advantage in the other 5 segments.
- Segment 5: Rhythm 2
- Segment 6: The whoops

- J. Lawrence bested Tomac by +0.13 seconds in segments 1-4 and segment 7.
- Tomac was +0.11 faster in segment 5 even though it looked like they were taking the same line.
- Eli was also +0.15 faster in segment 6, the whoops. The difference? Lawrence rode down the middle of the whoops, where it was safer but more chewed up, while Tomac blitzed down the right side for nearly the entire main event.
J. Lawrence actually commented after the race “Then they [the whoops] got blown out, and I was too stubborn to change”. That stubbornness likely cost him the victory last Saturday evening.
Then they got blown out, and I was too stubborn to change.
–Jett Lawrence on the San Diego whoops
Looking at overall lap times also tells an interesting story. Out of the 24 laps (including the first half-lap after the start), each rider split their head-to-head times evenly, 12 laps apiece.
Every single one of their laps was under a second apart, no matter who had the advantage. In fact, 75% of their laps were separated by less than half a second. But likely most important, Tomac had the lap time advantage in 3 of the last 4 laps as show in the bar chart below.
Tomac vs. Lawrence: San Diego SX, Lap by Lap

Notably, out of the 23 timed laps, Lawrence and Tomac set the fastest lap on 19 occasions. However, it was Jett who had more, with 10 fastest laps vs Tomac’s 9. It’s safe to say that if the roles were reversed, Jett could have been just as likely to win in San Diego.
Ultimately what matters is Tomac won because of an advantage in just two segments.

Cole Davies Off to a Better Start than Jett Lawrence
In his first two professional supercross races, Cole Davies has put the moto world on notice. While an 8th and a 4th may not sound impressive, it’s how he earned those results that stands out.
At Anaheim 1, Davies clawed his way back from 20th place. At San Diego, the youngest rider in the field (he’s only 17), led the first 7 laps before briefly going off track and dropping to 5th. Despite this, he didn’t let his confidence waver.

In fact, it seemed to grow. He climbed back up to 4th place and set the fastest lap time in 3 of the final 4 laps of the race. He also set an additional fast lap while in the lead, bringing his race total to 4. To put that in perspective, race winner Julien Beaumer and title rival Haiden Deegan also set 4 fast laps out of the 18-lap main event.
Cole Davies vs. Jett Lawrence
What may be even more impressive is that statistically, Davies is off to a better start than Jett Lawrence’s rookie year (Jett was 16 years 5 months in his first SX races)
In Jett’s first two races (Jan. 2002) he finished 9th and 5th. Davies managed to finish one position better in both of his first two races.
Additionally, in Lawrence’s first two races, he was on average 1.82 seconds per lap slower than the leader. Through Davies’ first two races, he has been on average only 1.01 seconds slower than the leader.
Lawrence broke his collarbone (while trying to pass for the lead on the final lap) at his third career 250SX race but returned after the pandemic hiatus and got a podium at round 15. In 2021, a 17-year-old Jett Lawrence took his first win. And that is the most recent 17-year-0ld to win a 250SX main event.
But before that? Adam Cianciarulo in 2014, his first-ever supercross race!
What Davies already appears to have – which took time for Jett to develop – is maturity. He has clearly faced adversity in the first two rounds and didn’t break either time.
Quite the opposite; he thrived. Perhaps it’s due to being on the same team as veterans Eli Tomac and Cooper Webb? Star Racing has won 18 championships, and their future looks bright with Davies.
Or maybe it’s the benefit of racing SMX Next (Futures) the past two seasons. Whatever the case, Cole Davies has served notice he’s a future superstar.