A fighting victory at Daytona’s 10th round of the Monster Energy AMA Supercross series has served as a massive injection of confidence for James Stewart.

The Toyota/Yamaha/JGRMX rider is now certain he can continue to challenge up front for the series remainder, making the most of treacherous conditions last weekend in Daytona.

“It was a tough and gnarly race,” said Stewart, who now has 44 victories in the class and has tied with Jeremy McGrath in second place on the all-time SX/MX win list with 89.

“Practice went really well, we set a good lap, won the heat race and got a good start. It was amazing and special to win Daytona for the second time.”

Stewart said it was a special moment for the entire JGR team to take a 1-2 finish as teammate Davi Millsaps trailed him across the finish in Daytona.

“It means a lot for us to get a win and to go 1-2 as a race team,” he added. “We had a lot of, I wouldn’t say bad luck, but we had some struggles with starts – at least I have – and then some weird things happening.

“I’ve been saying if I got a start I felt like I could win one of these things. So tonight it was definitely good enough for me. So, I’m stoked.”

With the absence of Ryan Dungey through a collarbone injury, Stewart is now just 15 points from second place in the standings and 44 behind leader Ryan Villopoto.