With a top-five finish, Ken Rockzen starts his Supermotocross World Championship.

At Playoff 1 at zMAX Dragway, Roczen and Nichols both had strong rides.

A unique Supercross-motocross track was built on top of the zMAX Dragway at Charlotte Motor Speedway for Round 1 of the SuperMotocross World Championship. This was the first race of the second year of post-season racing. The unique championship puts the twenty best riders in combined Supercross and Motocross points at the front of the starting gate. The next twenty riders, ranked 21st to 30th in combined points, are then put into an LCQ at each race. The winner of the $5.5 million purse is decided by a two-moto format with scores based on the Olympics.

Stars of the race:

Advance Auto Insurance ECSTAR Suzuki

Model 450

In both the 450SMX Class races and the overall event scores, Ken Roczen came in first place.

Progressive Insurance put on Twisted Tea Suzuki.

Model 450

Colt Nichols got two top ten finishes in the motos, giving him a top ten total at Charlotte.

On the fast track, Kyle Chisholm was always quick.

Ken Roczen (94), who came in second place at the first SMX World Championship last year, got off to a great start in his 2024 race for the title with fast lap times and good results. In both races, the well-known racer fought near the front of the pack. After all the races were over, Roczen moved his RM-Z up five spots from where it was in the rankings going into the post-season races.

“We had a really good weekend here at Charlotte,” Roczen said. “It’s definitely something that can be built upon.” Through five games, we finished fifth overall. Both bikes were easy for me to push. We made a few small changes to the bike, and racing was a lot of fun. That’s a great place to start building from. I hope we can come back next week and keep improving. If we can be first off the line, I think we can be on the podium.

As he began his first full season with the Twisted Tea Suzuki team, Colt Nichols (45) showed a lot of promise. After the season, Nichols moved up 12 spots in the post-season rider rankings.

Because Colt Nichols (45) missed most of the Motocross season, he was put in the group of riders that didn’t have a seed. Nichols raced his way out of the LCQ to get into the points-paying motos after scoring the highest score in his second qualifying practice. Nichols started late, so he had to deal with tough starting places. But he charged through the pack in both races and finished in the top ten in each moto.

“It was a pretty good round,” Nichols said in conclusion. “The track went very, very fast.” For me, a steady 10-10 is a pretty good start for the SMX series, so I was pretty happy. I need to get out of the gate a little better, though. Just need to get a little better at starting races and be there at the start. In general, though, I had a great weekend; I was excited.

The fast track that was laid out over, across, and outside of the zMAX Dragway at Charlotte Motor Speedway was a good place for Kyle Chisholm (11) to get good times.

“The bike was fine.” “The bike setup worked pretty well, but the circuits make these races tricky,” Chisholm said. “But I wasn’t riding well.” I didn’t have the best starts, which made it hard because there isn’t much between us… We probably don’t need to do much on the bike. All we have to do this week is train well and then go all out in Texas.

Larry Brooks, Team Manager for Twisted Tea, H.E.P. Motorsports, and Suzuki sponsored by Progressive Insurance, said, “It was a good day.” “Ken came in fifth overall.” It was a good day for him to ride. We sort of messed around with the settings and tried to get more power. You never know what you’ll get when you run our Supercross bike on these fast tracks. Anyway, we tried different settings for the mix track and I think we got it pretty close to how he liked it… Overall, he went 5-5 and came in fifth place. Today, Colt Nichols came in ninth. He had a couple of Motocross races with the team before this one, but this one was his first real race with the team. Also, he came in ninth, giving us two riders in the top ten. I thought it was good that Kyle came in 21st. This is something Kyle can use to get better. Next week is SuperMotocross’s second round at Texas Motor Speedway, and we’re ready to go.

The SuperMotocross World Championships’ second race will take place in the west at Texas Motor Speedway on September 14. The title points will be doubled in the second playoff round, which will also be a day race. Finally, in 2024, the riders will compete one last time at the Final to name the 2024 SuperMotocross World Champion. Las Vegas Motor Speedway’s “The Strip” will host the Final at night. All 5.5 million dollars will be given to the racers, and a winner will be announced.