{"id":131934,"date":"2026-01-13T18:41:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T18:41:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/131934\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T18:41:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T18:41:07","slug":"second-place-doesnt-always-tell-the-truth-ken-roczens-2026-anaheim-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/131934\/","title":{"rendered":"Second Place Doesn\u2019t Always Tell the Truth | Ken Roczen’s 2026 Anaheim 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Photos: Octopi Media<\/p>\n

Second place doesn\u2019t always tell the truth. Sometimes it means you faded and sometimes it means you survived. And sometimes \u2014 like Anaheim 1 \u2014 it means you spent 20 minutes sitting right on the edge of stealing a win.<\/p>\n

Ken Roczen started the 2026 Monster Energy SMX World Championship off perfectly, IMO, finishing only 1.470 second off of Eli Tomac, well ahead of the third place of Jorge Prado. It showed insane speed, the equal amount of stamina, and that two of the most experienced racers in the class still got what it takes to gap the field.<\/p>\n

\"\"Roczen averaged a 1:06.92 pace<\/p>\n

The Annoying Kind of Close (Literally One Second)<\/p>\n

Roczen said it himself \u2014 and the stopwatch agrees.<\/p>\n

\u201cEli and I, we were the entire Main Event\u2026 bouncing between one second,\u201d Roczen said. \u201cI would gain him a little bit and then he would make it back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Roczen averaged a 1:06.92 pace. For reference, Tomac averaged 1:06.97.<\/p>\n

From laps 2 through 10, Roczen repeatedly matched or bettered Tomac\u2019s lap times:<\/p>\n

Roczen ran multiple 1:05.3\u20131:05.8 laps<\/p>\n

Tomac answered with low-1:06s<\/p>\n

The gap never ballooned because Roczen\u2019s sector timing stayed extremely stable, especially:<\/p>\n

S2 (consistently ~5.05\u20135.15)<\/p>\n

S4 (hovering around ~6.05\u20136.20)<\/p>\n

\u201cI would gain him a little bit and then he would make it back.\u201d Yep, checks out.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Closing Laps: Yes \u2014 This Is When He Was Closest<\/p>\n

Roczen claimed the end of the race was his strongest moment:<\/p>\n

\u201cTowards the end, that was the closest that I\u2019ve been the entire main event.\u201d<\/p>\n

That checks out.<\/p>\n

From laps 15\u201318, Roczen locked into a narrow band from 1:07.17-1:07.37 lap times while Tomac, over those same laps, 1:07.29-1:07.47. Roczen was actually slightly more consistent, and faster late in the race. Add in Roczen\u2019s body english, and it visually looked like he was closing the gap hard. But not quite enough.<\/p>\n

\"\"Kenny admitted that the whoops were, ironically, his week spot at Anaheim 1<\/p>\n

Where the Race Was Lost<\/p>\n

\u201cI kind of struggled on the whoops,\u201d Kenny stated.<\/p>\n

That shows up clearly in the data:<\/p>\n

Roczen\u2019s S6 times fluctuate more than Tomac\u2019s<\/p>\n

When Roczen missed the triple out, Tomac gained tenths every lap<\/p>\n

When Roczen nailed it, the gap stabilized immediately<\/p>\n

Tomac\u2019s S6 and S7 were repeatable and Roczen\u2019s were fast or costly \u2014 nothing in between.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the race.<\/p>\n

\"\"Kenny\u2019s full-race standard deviation was only \u00b10.69 seconds<\/p>\n

No Need to Panic<\/p>\n

The most important stat isn\u2019t lap time \u2014 it\u2019s restraint. It\u2019s only Anaheim 1 after all. His full-race standard deviation was only \u00b10.69 seconds<\/p>\n

\u201cYou couldn\u2019t override the track,\u201d Roczen said. \u201cThere\u2019s a very fine line.\u201d<\/p>\n

He stayed on the right side of it. Again\u2026 only A1. <\/p>\n

\"\"The Anaheim 1 Podium ft. Eli Tomac, Ken Roczen, and Jorge Prado.<\/p>\n

Vintage Power<\/p>\n

It\u2019s 2026. Eli Tomac and Ken Roczen are still doing this.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re ancient. Vintage,\u201d Roczen joked.<\/p>\n

Fine. Call it vintage. But when two \u201cvintage\u201d riders are averaging sub-1:07 pace for 20 minutes, with less than a second of deviation, that\u2019s proving an exceptional amount of relevance. Let\u2019s see if these two old dogs can keep it going.<\/p>\n

Eli Tomac won this race with control and Ken Roczen made sure it stayed uncomfortable until the end. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photos: Octopi Media Second place doesn\u2019t always tell the truth. Sometimes it means you faded and sometimes it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":131935,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164],"class_list":["post-131934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131934"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131934\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}