Eli Tomac
Beast Mode bows out as Eli Tomac sets retirement date
Eli Tomac will retire from professional Supercross and motocross competition at the conclusion of the 2026 SuperMotocross World Championship post-season, closing one of the longest and most decorated careers of the modern era.
The 33-year-old Red Bull KTM Factory Racing rider has three events left: the SMX Playoffs in Columbus, Ohio, on September 12 and Los Angeles, California, on September 19, followed by the SMX World Championship Final at Ridgedale, Missouri, on September 26.
Tomac’s final chequered flag will fall 16 years and four months after he made history at Hangtown in May 2010. A 17-year-old Tomac went 3-1 on a GEICO Honda CRF250R to become the first rider to win an AMA Pro Motocross overall on his professional debut.
Eli Tomac
“I will be stepping away from Supercross and motocross racing at the end of September, following the final three SMX rounds. This has been the hardest decision I’ve ever made in my professional career, but I know in my heart that the time is now and that the time is right.
“I’ve won races and championships beyond my imagination. Racing has been the only thing I’ve woken up to and known the last 25 years, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”
The raw numbers place Tomac among the sport’s giants. His 57 premier-class Supercross victories rank second only to Jeremy McGrath’s 72, while 32 450MX overall wins put him fourth behind Ricky Carmichael, Ryan Dungey and Rick Johnson. He also owns a record eight Daytona Supercross victories and leads the SMX League record book with 240 career podium finishes.
There are eight AMA championships: the 2012 250SX West crown, 2013 250MX title, four 450MX championships and two 450SX titles. Add the 2024 FIM World Supercross SX1 crown and Tomac won major professional championships on Honda, Kawasaki and Yamaha machinery before completing his career with KTM.
Honda | The prodigy becomes Beast Mode
Tomac’s association with Honda began before he turned professional. He won the 2009 FIM 125 cc Junior Motocross World Championship at Taupo, New Zealand, then entered the professional ranks with the Factory Connection-operated GEICO Honda squad in 2010.
The Hangtown debut made the promise obvious, but his first full Supercross campaign in 2011 showed he could sustain it. Tomac finished runner-up in 250SX West, then won five Main Events on the way to the 2012 regional championship. He narrowly missed a successful defence in 2013, losing the West title to Ken Roczen by two points, before taking command outdoors and winning the 250MX championship.
Tomac stepped into the 450 ranks full-time in 2014. Injury interrupted his Supercross season and kept him out of the first four outdoor rounds, yet he still won both motos at Spring Creek for his maiden 450MX overall and finished fifth in the championship.
The following season provided the first clear view of what peak Tomac could look like. He won three 450SX Main Events and finished runner-up to Ryan Dungey, then opened the outdoor campaign with dominant 1-1 sweeps at Hangtown and Glen Helen. His second-moto victory at Hangtown came by more than 90 seconds.
Tomac won the opening moto at his home-state Thunder Valley round as well, making it five moto victories from five starts. It was the run that prompted Racer X’s Davey Coombs to coin the “Beast Mode” description. It also ended violently in the second moto when Tomac crashed and badly injured both shoulders, bringing an abrupt end to a campaign he had been dominating.
The Honda years delivered his two small-bore championships and established the speed that would define him. They also ended with unfinished business in the premier class. After six seasons with the same program, Tomac changed both team and manufacturer for 2016.
Kawasaki | The championship years
Monster Energy Kawasaki signed Tomac while he was still rebuilding from the double shoulder injury. His first season in green was therefore as much a rehabilitation project as a title bid. He finished fourth in 450SX with one victory, his first at Daytona, and runner-up to Ken Roczen outdoors. He also won both American rounds of the FIM Motocross World Championship and took the 2016 Monster Energy Cup.
By 2017, Tomac and the KX450F were a formidable combination. Nine Supercross wins carried him from 29 points behind Ryan Dungey into the championship lead with two rounds remaining, only for mistakes at East Rutherford to swing the title back to Dungey. Tomac ultimately fell five points short.
He answered outdoors. Four overall wins and seven podiums delivered his first 450MX crown, which he sealed at the 2017 Ironman finale.
Tomac defended the motocross championship in 2018 after winning eight of the 12 rounds and 15 of the 24 motos. He also won eight Supercross Main Events that year, although an opening-round crash and the resulting missed race left him third in the title. His season closed with a 1-1-1 sweep of the Monster Energy Cup and its million-dollar prize.
A six-win 2019 Supercross campaign again ended with Tomac second, this time behind Cooper Webb, but nobody could dislodge him outdoors. A sweep at Budds Creek secured a third consecutive 450MX championship, making Tomac only the fourth rider to complete a premier-class outdoor three-peat.
The missing piece arrived in the strangest season of all. Tomac had won five of the opening ten rounds of the 2020 Supercross Championship when the pandemic stopped the series. Racing resumed 85 days later with seven events packed into three weeks at an empty Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City. Tomac met that pressure with two more wins and finally secured his first 450SX championship, 25 points clear of Webb.
His last Kawasaki season yielded three Supercross wins and third in the 2021 standings, followed by two outdoor overalls and runner-up in 450MX. After six years, four premier-class championships, two Monster Energy Cup victories and five of his eventual eight Daytona wins, the Kawasaki chapter had become the foundation of Tomac’s legacy.
Yamaha | Reinvention, triumph and two major comebacks
Tomac’s switch to Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing for 2022 brought an immediate return. He won seven Main Events and clinched the 450SX championship in front of his home-state Colorado crowd. It was Yamaha’s first premier Supercross title since James Stewart in 2009.
Outdoors became a season-long contest with Chase Sexton. Tomac arrived at the Fox Raceway finale one point ahead, then produced a 1-1 sweep to take his fourth 450MX championship by seven points. The Supercross and motocross double made 2022 the finest season of his career, and earned him the ESPY Award for Best Athlete, Men’s Action Sports.
Tomac then captained Team USA at RedBud, won the combined MXGP/MX2 race and helped end the nation’s 11-year wait for the Chamberlain Trophy. Tomac, Justin Cooper and Chase Sexton won the 2022 Motocross of Nations by a commanding margin.
The next two seasons tested his powers of recovery. Tomac had seven wins and an 18-point championship lead when he ruptured his Achilles tendon while leading the 2023 Denver Main Event. He did not crash, but the injury ended his season and handed the initiative to Sexton.
Tomac returned in 2024, initially looking like a rider still finding his range before breaking through for victory at the St Louis Triple Crown. A Bennett fracture and torn ligaments in his thumb at Denver then forced surgery and kept him out until the final two Pro Motocross rounds. He still finished on the podium at Ironman and then helped Team USA to second at the Motocross of Nations.
His 2024 season finished in CDR Yamaha colours in the FIM World Supercross Championship, bringing an Australian connection to the Tomac story. He dominated both nights of the Perth double-header and sealed the SX1 world title in Abu Dhabi by 43 points.
There was another reminder of his speed in 2025 when Tomac won a memorable San Diego Supercross duel with Jett Lawrence. A broken fibula sustained in qualifying at Tampa ended his indoor campaign, but he recovered in time to race outdoors and finished third in the 450MX championship.
Across four seasons together, Yamaha credited Tomac with 16 premier-class Supercross Main Event victories and 16 Pro Motocross moto wins. More important than the totals was the shape of the stint: the move to blue produced the greatest single season of his career and proved, twice, that major injuries had not extinguished his ability to win.
KTM | A short final chapter, but no farewell tour
Tomac’s move to Red Bull KTM Factory Racing for 2026 was not a ceremonial final contract. He won his competitive debut on the KTM 450 SX-F at the Vancouver round of the 2025 FIM World Supercross Championship, then opened the 2026 AMA season with victory at Anaheim and backed it up in San Diego.
Wins at Seattle and Daytona followed. The Daytona result was the 57th premier Supercross victory of his career and his record eighth at the famous speedway, spread across three manufacturers: five with Kawasaki, two with Yamaha and one with KTM.
Tomac remained in the championship fight until a heavy qualifying crash at Cleveland injured his hip and shoulder. He missed Cleveland and Philadelphia, returned to take third in Denver, and finished fourth in the 450SX standings with four victories.
The outdoor season was again interrupted almost immediately. A collision with Garrett Marchbanks on the opening lap at Fox Raceway left Tomac with a hyperextended ligament and partial muscle tear in his neck. He missed five rounds, returned at Spring Creek in July and gradually worked back towards the front, signing off from AMA Pro Motocross with 7-5 moto scores for fifth overall at Ironman.
Whether or not the orange chapter adds a final title, it has already added something valuable to the record. At 33, on his fourth manufacturer and after multiple major injuries, Tomac could still adapt quickly enough to win four Supercross rounds and fight for a championship.
Ian Harrison – Red Bull KTM Factory Racing Team Manager
“We’ve had the privilege of working with him this year, and it was no different – he was fighting for the title and for wins each and every week. Eli is an amazing rider, and for the team and myself, to see how he operates and to get a better understanding of his sportsmanship and work ethic was a gift after all those years that we competed against him.”
The last three
Tomac has never been the sport’s loudest self-promoter. His appeal came from the opposite direction: a reserved public manner, a visibly close family and a riding style that could turn a deficit into a rout when “Beast Mode” arrived. His work with the St Jude Children’s Research Hospital and Love Moto Stop Cancer campaigns also raised six-figure sums through donated race gear and bike graphics, many of which he helped design.
That combination of longevity and competitiveness is unusual. Tomac won the first professional event he entered in 2010 and the opening Supercross round of his final season in 2026. Between those two points sit eight AMA championships, a World Supercross crown, a Motocross of Nations victory, 57 premier Supercross wins, 32 450MX overalls and more Daytona victories than any rider in history.
Fans now have three final opportunities to watch the number three race: Columbus on September 12, Los Angeles on September 19 and the championship decider at Thunder Ridge Nature Arena on September 26.
Only then will one of American motorcycle racing’s longest and most emphatic careers finally be complete.
Eli Tomac career highlights
- 2009 FIM 125 cc Junior Motocross World Champion
- 2012 AMA 250SX West Champion
- 2013 AMA 250MX Champion
- 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2022 AMA 450MX Champion
- 2020 and 2022 AMA 450SX Champion
- 2024 FIM World Supercross SX1 Champion
- 57 career 450SX Main Event wins – second all-time
- 32 career 450MX overall wins – fourth all-time
- Record eight-time Daytona Supercross winner
- 2022 Motocross of Nations winner and Team USA captain
- 2022 ESPY Award – Best Athlete, Men’s Action Sports
- 240 SMX League career podium finishes
