2026 Birmingham Supercross Photo Gallery

2026 Birmingham Supercross Recap

A rather exciting showdown but a bit of a boring premier class highlighted the start of the second half of the 2026 Monster Energy Supercross season on Saturday at Protective Stadium in Birmingham, AL.

Everyone returned to racing after the lone weekend off in the series for Round 10 featuring the first 250 East / West Showdown which indeed turned into a thrilling dual as championship contenders in each lass met each other for the first time. Since the other race was a runaway, let's start with the 250 class.

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Levi Kitchen came out strong grabbing the Holeshot. He rolled side by side with Cole Davies for about a second who took the lead on the next turn. Seth Hammaker hung back in third while the most talked about 250 rider from the West started 10th.

Kitchen took the lead back a minute into the race and built a gap over Davies. Meanwhile, Hammaker and Jo Shimoda duked it out for third place supremacy. Meanwhile, the 250 West points leader needed little more than six minutes to work his way into fifth and about the same time Davies found his way around Kitchen and took off.

Now with about six and a half minutes on the clock, Shimoda passes Hammaker for third, a minute after that, Hammaker succumbs to the 250 West points leader and rides fifth. Kitchen, however, continues his descent and drops out of podium contention with less than five minutes left.

Davies now upfront, Shimoda closing in and the rider once in 10th place reeling in the leaders.

Shimoda takes the lead! Oh wait he didn't. If you watched on TV you'd think by the extra giddy commentator, Shimoda took the lead. He did not. (Forwarding clip to @awfulannouncing.) Though he was riding close, Davies held firm until Shimoda almost did grab the lead in a turn less than a minute later and before he could yell at lappers to get out of the way, he dropped to third!

The 250 West guy popped in front of Shimoda to take second as riders bunched up in a corner and wouldn't you know, 10th place was suddenly first with two minutes remaining. Once passed, Davies had nothing for the leader and the battle for second ensued.

Last lap heroics proved futile as Shimoda passed Davies when he got caught in a mosh, just kidding, in a rutted up corner but Davies quickly took the lead back and finished second. Behind him, Hammaker closed in on third and when Shimoda slid out on the second to last corner before the finish line, Hammaker took advantage.

"Looking at the positives I made points tonight," Davies said who leads the 250 East. "I kind of rode terrible, I was overriding. I'm not happy with that. We still made points. I'm happy with that not happy with my riding."

HOLD ON!

The 250 West rider who crossed the checkers first violated a rule by cutting inside on the split section rather than staying on the outside. As a result, he was docked a position giving the win to Davies. The infraction ends a five-race win streak for the 250 West points leader.

Elsewhere, Pierce Brown, third in the East class entering Birmingham just two points from first crashed and posted a DNF.

450 class

Jorge Prado, who made waves last year with his sudden departure from Kawasaki back to KTM on which he rode to success in MXGP, grabbed the Holeshot. But that lead evaporated quicker than his time on green when Hunter Lawrence and his slippery fast Honda took the lead and checked out. That was it. A fast-forward race if there ever was one.

"It feels good, I'm just taking it one race at a time," said Lawrence, who has won three of four and holds a nine-point lead over Eli Tomac. "I'm just trying to stay focused in the moment."

Ken Roczen was the only one in this field to put up a fight. A bad start dropped him mid-pack but he worked his way up front passing Tomac for second near the 14 minute mark. A few brief charges looked hopeful for the veteran rider but he didn't have enough gas to mount much of a fight for the lead and easily held on for second.

"I'm ecstatic honestly. I rode really well but you can't start 15th and expect to win a race," Roczen said.

Tomac was far behind in third and perhaps a trip to the LCQ used up some energy stores. An aggressive pass on Justin Cooper in their Heat race married their two bikes leaving Tomac's KTM with an unfortunate injury. He did win the LCQ handedly.

Elsewhere, Justin Bogle returned after a near four-year absence and made the Main. He finished 18th and an impressive sixth in his Heat race to qualify. He turns 32 today!