Eli Tomac Vs. Ken Roczen

The Start of the 2020 Supercross season has been full of surprises, and close racing. Needless to say, we have seen two giants start to step forward and outpace the competition. One side we have Ken Roczen with his aggressive starts, lightning-fast passes, and neck-breaking whoop speed. The other side is all full of the green machine we call Eli Tomac. He looks just as good as he did 2015 on his Geico Honda.
This last weekend we finally got to see a glimpse of what we as fans have been dying to see since Ken Roczen had his crash that almost ended his career in 2017, and that would be a Ken Roczen Vs. Eli Tomac battle for the championship. In the first of three main events, we watched as Roczen had his rear wheel full of Tomac for the entire race. That first main event came down to who would make the least amount of mistakes on what would be a very tricky and fast track. So let us break it down what each rider will need to do to beat the other in order to hopefully finish on top and ultimately take the 2020 championship.
We will start with the 2019 Motocross champion Eli Tomac. Some of the biggest issues we have seen thus far this season, and in seasons past, are his starts. When his starts are off his whole night gets thrown off and the results show it. I do not believe it is from a lack of trying after a terrible start, but because of the field of talented riders being so fast, it makes it almost impossible to make quick passes and move forward. We see riders such as Jason Anderson talk about this and struggle just the same.
The next area where Tomac needs to improve is getting out of his own head. Last season we watched it multiple times where an incident would happen, such as Cooper Webb landing on some tough blocks and almost taking him out to make a pass. But after that incident, Eli seemed to ride backward and lost all forward momentum. Now that Eli has found the comfort that he has been desiring on his bike, if he can solve those two issues we may just see him as the newest Supercross Champ.
Next, let’s talk about Ken Roczen and some of his problem areas. The first thing with Roczen is his consistency with being able to ride tracks and not have something catastrophic occur. Every rider believes they can win but sometimes they just need to settle for that second or third, and now that Kenny has some wins under his belt and the points lead, playing the Dungey consistency game will get him the championship. But Roczen has that same tenacity as Ricky Bobby sometimes and “if you’re not first, you’re last.”
Which that same tenacity leads into my next point for Roczen, which would be keeping his emotions in check. In 2018, when he and Cooper Webb got into each other, it was due to high emotions with things that were said on social media. The fact of the matter is that this championship is full of riders that can and will pull stupid moves out of their hat for no apparent reason. As long as Kenny can keep his head clear, and not let what other riders do affect his mind, we may see a 2020 Supercross Championship come to the 94.
All in all, the coming weeks are going to be full of, action-packed racing between these two riders. What we as fans of the sport can hope for is that they are neck and neck every week and stay healthy. One thing is for sure the 2020 Supercross season is not going to disappoint when the finale reaches Salt Lake City Utah and we crown a 450 champion.