On Friday, we heard from seven different 250SX East riders who all previewed Saturday’s Tampa Supercross opener during the pre-race press conference. Both 2025 250SX Champions, Tom Vialle (East) and RJ Hampshire (West), and a handful of other factory riders gave insight on their thoughts entering the weekend. However, missing from that group was Nate Thrasher.
Even though the Tennessee native enters today in a tie second in active 250SX race wins, he was not in the pre-race press conference. Did it bother the Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing rider not being up there on the microphone?
“I take everything as motivation and definitely that'll motivate me a little bit,” he said on not being there. “But yeah, been [wrote off] a lot, so I just keep putting in it.”
“Definitely underrated,” he said. “I feel like I've got pretty much probably the second most wins on this gate going into this race. So yeah, I feel like we're a little bit underdog, but I like being there and I feel like we're in a good spot.”
Active 250SX Wins In 2025 Supercross
| Rider | Total 250SX Wins | Wins in 2025 |
| Austin Forkner | 13 | - |
| Nate Thrasher | 5 | - |
| RJ Hampshire | 5 | - |
| Jordon Smith | 5 | 1 |
| Levi Kitchen | 4 | - |
| Cameron McAdoo | 3 | - |
| Jo Shimoda | 3 | 1 |
| Haiden Deegan | 3 | 1 |
| Tom Vialle | 2 | - |
| Max Anstie | 2 | - |
| Garrett Marchbanks | 1 | - |
| Seth Hammaker | 1 | - |
| Michael Mosiman | 1 | - |
| Julien Beaumer | 1 | 1 |
Note: stats as of February 8, 2025.
We saw Thrasher at the SMX media days at Angel Stadium in early December, but he is rather quiet on social media. How has his training gone since then?
“Just been putting in work back at the [GOAT] Farm and, yeah, just trying to get ready for the season” he said. “I feel like we're in a good spot and ready to go battle. A lot of tough guys on this coast and, yeah, I think we're gonna be right in the mix. [It’s] just gonna come down to a lot of good starts this year.”
Training with the 250SX West riders has been a solid litmus test for the #41.
“For sure, I trained with them all off-season pretty much and, yeah, I feel like we're right there,” Thrasher said. “And then just, yeah, I feel like how good they did every round they did, the speed that they showed is, it's definitely makes us feel a little bit better going into this and knows that our speeds just right up there with the winning speed.”
Thrasher got married over the off-season, which he said was “awesome” and he was “super grateful for.”
“Yeah, I ended up getting married this off-season, which was great,” Thrasher said. “Definitely was a great time and I went on my honeymoon [to Puerto Rico] and stuff. It was awesome, so yeah, super grateful for. That and yeah it was a great time and that was probably the biggest thing I had this off-season. … I went to Puerto Rico, yeah, it was sick. We had a great time.”
In 2024, Thrasher was competitive for race wins before finishing fifth in the 250SX West Championship. He picked up a win at the San Diego SX (round three) but started the season 21st and 18th at the Anaheim 1 SX and San Francisco SX rounds, putting himself at an early deficit. A better start to the season could see him fighting for the red plate.
“And then yeah I just felt like, just one year older, just take another step, right?” he continued. “I've been doing it's been my fifth year now, so I just feel like I just got to stay healthy, and just get a little bit more consistent. The speed's always been there, just gotta eliminate the bad races and we'll be right in the hunt.”
“I've actually raced West Coast more, but I feel like my best year that I've had was on the East Coast, so I feel like this, these tracks suit me a little bit better,” he said. “So, yeah, I feel like definitely this is the better coast for me.”
“Just ready to go and, yeah, we'll see how we do tomorrow night.”
He was really good here at Raymond James Stadium in February 2023, too. In a stacked 250SX East division, don’t forget about Nate Thrasher.
Main image by Mitch Kendra
