Australia’s biggest supercross race of the year saw Jett Lawrence clinch his first-ever AUSX Open victory in Melbourne at the 2025 edition, while in SX2, Penrite Racing Empire Kawasaki guest Cole Thompson stood tall with a commanding win of his own. MotoOnline caught up with both riders after the races for this Debrief interview.

SX1

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Jett Lawrence, AUSX Open winner… Tell us the feeling.

Yeah, it’s awesome being able to finally get it. It took some time, but we’re stoked. Now, we’re going to be happy for today and tomorrow, but then once we fly back to America, it’s back to the same old business of weekly training and getting ready for A1.

What was the highlight for you tonight? Superpole was cool, and both races were pretty smooth. What stood out?

I think the fans are always here. I think that’s probably one of the favorite things of coming to the AUSX Open is the fans. It’s unreal, so I think that’s probably my favorite part.

And the opening ceremony, the MXoN celebration, that was kind of amplified this weekend, I felt like, with Kyle [Webster] in there as well.

For sure, it was awesome. Like I said, the crowd here is always a great crowd. So yeah, it’s so hard to beat the feeling of the Aussie crowd, really, of coming, coming home.

Is there anything you could take out of tonight, obviously not your regular bike, but any real takeaways that can help you in 2026?

A few things, more so like handling and stuff like that, learning with how some of the characteristics stick out, with certain textures of the dirt, of bumps and things like that. So more, more stuff like that. I would say a little more detailed things with handling and stuff like that.

What is it about this stadium, this track, this layout, the dirt, kind of makes things tight. I know you guys aren’t racing at 100 percent, but at the same time it bunches up and level playing field.

I feel like it’s mostly the dirt when it is like, I feel it’s pretty, it’s pretty level, honestly, with the American Supercross tracks. A few little things are different, little mellower in the rhythm, stuff like that. But actual size wise of the track layout, I would say, it’s not as tight as you think, you know, but I think the dirt has a lot of, a lot to play with, because I think if we had a lot more traction, it would be a lot in and out, but it wouldn’t look that tight because we’re carrying a lot more speed. But this weekend we didn’t have a lot of traction for our front and rear end.

What were your thoughts on the track in general? Like it, didn’t like it, anything in particular?

I liked the layout, honestly. It flowed nice for me and a lot of fun rhythms, a few quads, so I’m always happy when you can get a few quads in.

Final one, do we see you return next year? Is that decided yet? Is that something you would like to do? And how high is this event on the priority list for you?

Yeah, we’ll see. As of right now, I don’t think we have it in plan, [we need] to just give ourselves a break and not burn ourselves out. You know, the past five years of being a professional athlete, we’ve had two weeks off max. This year we’ve only had a week and a half off. So obviously that’s in our control. You know, we don’t have to do these, we decided to do them because we have a lot of fun at them and stuff like that, but I think next year we most likely might just relax and take some time off and just kind of re-coop again.

SX2

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The winner here tonight, Cole Thompson, standing on top step of the podium in SX2. It wasn’t pretty, but you got it done.

Yeah, somehow, someway we found it tonight. I think it started with a good heat race. I was able to put in some good laps in practice. Just all day, I really felt good with the bike, good with the track. I think when you have one of those days, no matter what the start or whatever, you’re just calm, you’re collected, and we finally got a win, man. It’s been so long. It’s been since 2022, since I won in Australia. Last year, I was banging my head against the wall almost every week and getting beat by Shane [McElrath], so to get one up on him, and even he said it after the race, he finally got one up on me. So, yeah, it’s good. It’s been a long time coming. A lot of good riders here in Australia, a lot of good riders in general.

I think that was actually the first SX2 Kawasaki win since Mitch Hoad in 2007.

That’s a stat that I’ll take. I’ll proudly take that. Yeah, I knew it. Even going to Bud Kawasaki this year, one of the biggest questions when I told people was, can that bike do it? Coming here, I always believed in this team and I believed that even the first day I rode the bike, that we were capable of this. So, yeah, I think like any team, there’s things that can be better and there’s things that you can improve on. But for the most part, I jumped on that bike that I raced tonight is identical, besides bar bend, to what Rhys [Budd] has been racing on. And I think it’s a great bike. I just think that, you know, he was able to set it up really well and I was able to benefit from him setting it up and just go.

I’m hearing you didn’t even have your suspension this weekend.

No, again, thanks to a good teammate and a good team. That was Rhys’ suspension. So again, it’s kind of like one of those things where someone else did all the hard work and I more or less took advantage of just having a good bike.

Put yourself in good positions, good starts, really important for you. I feel like that’s something where you get up the front, you can set that pace and go with it. That was a lot easier for you tonight.

Yeah, the second one I got kind of just held up, not held up, I shouldn’t say that word, more or less just kind of got stuck in a rut with the pace of the guy ahead of me and just kind of followed a little bit too long. But at the same time, I knew where I needed to be and knew that there wasn’t an urgency there. I knew Shane took off early and I just more or less needed to be second or third and we would get it done. So yeah, for the most part, just calm, cool, collected and that’s what it took tonight.

I’m feeling like the reason the team sort of brought you on here was to get results. They really needed to have a strong presence in that class. Not saying that’s something that Rhys wasn’t doing, but having that extra person there, you definitely delivered on that.

Yeah, no, I think when I got the call, it was more or less come over, can you win and we want you to win. I more or less said, yeah, I can definitely podium and definitely get a win. First weekend was a bit of a bummer, the way it went for me, tangled right off the first main event. It just felt like I never got a chance at it. Tonight was the goal, was get a good start, put myself in a good position and we did that. Like I said, the team believed in me, I believed in the team and that’s what comes of it.

You’ve done a heap of races here in Australia. The past few years, you’ve been a regular, almost. Actually, no, I’m going to call you a regular on the championship, a win tonight and then on to World Supercross next weekend here in Australia. Is it almost like you feel like it’s racing at your second home?

Yeah. I tell people now Australia is my second home. I don’t race in Canada very often now, so it’s between America and Australia. To be honest with you, I always feel like coming over here helps me for America. So again, like being able to race these races in the off season and have the competition like it’s been, it’s really, really benefited me in going back stateside.

Little segue at the moment. Arenacross for you next year?

Arenacross and then the plan, if I can get through 12 more rounds of Arenacross, go straight into East Coast Supercross for the start of that.

We like to see it. Good job. Congratulations on getting that win for Cole Thompson. Good luck next weekend. We’ll see you there.

Sounds good. See you there.