Ken Roczen wins second race of 2026 in Detroit, Hunter Lawrence crashes and loses points lead

DETROIT, Michigan: Ken Roczen won the second race of the 2026 season at Ford Field in Detroit, Michigan, as Hunter Lawrence and Eli Tomac struggled. With this victory, Roczen is firmly in championship contention with a 14-point gap to the leader.

Chase Sexton secured second in his first race back after suffering an injury in a practice crash prior to Daytona. Sexton continued to get stronger during each session as he climbed his way through the ranks.

Malcolm Stewart secured his first podium of the season one week after getting his first top-five in Birmingham.

Justin Cooper stole a point from Tomac in the closing laps, but Tomac’s fifth-place finish along with Lawrence’s problems gave him the championship lead by four.

Tomac had to fight hard to stay in the top five as Cooper Webb challenged on the white flag lap. Webb crossed under the checkered flag in sixth.

450 Feature Results

In-Race Notes

Jorge Prado has been hot on the gate drop and he earned another holeshot in Detroit.

Meanwhile, Lawrence and Tomac both got poor starts and had to come through the field together.

Roczen stole the lead from Prado on Lap 2, bringing Webb with him.

Webb crashed with Prado and handed second to Sexton.

Incredibly, Lawrence was up to third on Lap 3; Tomac was fifth and gradually losing contact with the points leader. Tomac cannot afford to lose any more ground to Lawrence.

Stewart was the man in the middle of the two points challengers.

Webb settled into eighth. Prado fell to 14th.

Tomac was five seconds behind Lawrence at the halfway mark.

Dylan Ferrandis was in seventh on Lap 7. He was also returning from injury along with Sexton this week.

Lawrence crashed on Lap 10, hurting his bike in the crash. Lawrence had a 12-point lead at the time. Lawrence had not finished worse than fourth all year and was second or better in all but two races.

With the incident, Tomac moved up to fourth in the running. Lawrence was 19th at the time. This would give Tomac the points lead.

Lawrence had to pull into the mechanics area to replace his front wheel.

Roczen was in command of the race on Lap 15.

Tomac didn’t have the pace to fully take advantage of Lawrence’s crash and lost fourth to Cooper on Lap 18.

Roczen finished 7.8 seconds ahead of Sexton.