Australia and New Zealand have already figured out how to produce world-class motorcycle racers. Now SuperMotocross wants to make the route from there to the world's biggest stage considerably clearer.
The SMX League is partnering with the Australian-based AUSX Supercross Championship to launch SMX Next Australia, the first regional expansion of the official development program feeding the Monster Energy SuperMotocross World Championship.
The program will debut during the 2026 AUSX Supercross Championship beginning Oct. 3 in Townsville, Queensland, and will feature top young prospects at every stop on the five-round Australian and New Zealand schedule.
The incentive goes beyond another junior championship. Finalists will earn invitations to compete in the 2027 SMX Next World All-Stars, held during the 2027 SuperMotocross World Championship Playoffs. In other words, there's now an official bridge. And SuperMotocross didn't exactly choose Australia by accident.
Look at the Riders Already Coming From Down Under. Jett Lawrence. Hunter Lawrence. Cole Davies.
Go back a generation and add Chad Reed and Ben Townley.
Australia and New Zealand have been exporting elite motorcycle racers for decades. What's changed is just how prominent those riders have become at the top of American racing. Jett Lawrence won three consecutive SMX World Championships from 2023 through 2025. Older brother Hunter just claimed his first premier-class Pro Motocross championship at Ironman and enters this year's SMX postseason as the championship's top seed.
Then there's New Zealand's Cole Davies.The Waitoki native is the newly crowned 250 Pro Motocross champion, was named the 2025 Monster Energy Supercross 250 Rookie of the Year and added the 2026 Eastern Divisional 250SMX championship to his rapidly expanding résumé. That's an extraordinary amount of current American championship hardware coming from one relatively small corner of the world.
SMX Next Australia is essentially an acknowledgment of what's already happening. The talent pipeline exists. Now the infrastructure is catching up.
What Exactly Is SMX Next?
SuperMotocross launched the current SMX Next structure in 2024 as a season-long development platform intended to give elite amateur prospects a clearer route toward professional competition. It combines SMX Next Supercross, the SMX Next Scouting Moto Combine and SMX Next World All-Stars under one development system. The concept isn't simply to find somebody who's fast. Young riders get opportunities to race in environments connected to the professional championship, develop their skills and put themselves in front of teams and decision-makers who may eventually determine whether they get a professional opportunity. There are already examples of the system working.
Two-time SMX World Champion Haiden Deegan and Davies are both products of SMX Next, while the Lawrence brothers participated in its predecessor, Supercross Futures. Australian teenager Kayden Minear offers another recent example. Minear competed in SMX Next, won its Anaheim opener this year and has since progressed to an AMA Supercross opportunity with Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing. That's what makes the Australian expansion more interesting than simply adding another youth racing class.
It's connecting that development system directly to a market already producing professional-level talent.
Five Rounds, One Bigger Opportunity
SMX Next Australia will operate alongside all five rounds of the 2026 AUSX Supercross Championship.
The schedule begins Oct. 3 in Townsville, followed by:
- Auckland, New Zealand — Oct. 31
- Geelong, Victoria — Nov. 7
- Perth, Western Australia — Nov. 14
- Newcastle, New South Wales — Nov. 28
Top prospects will compete throughout the championship, with finalists advancing to the 2027 SMX Next World All-Stars during next year's SuperMotocross playoffs. That final step is important. For a young Australian or New Zealand racer, making the jump to American Supercross has traditionally required considerably more than speed. There's travel. Money. Team connections. Relocation. Different tracks. Different racing environments. And the simple challenge of getting noticed from the other side of the Pacific. SMX Next Australia doesn't eliminate those barriers. But it potentially moves the first major evaluation closer to home. Young riders can now enter a system connected directly to SuperMotocross without first needing to establish themselves in the United States.
That's a meaningful change.
Align Media
Jett Lawrence
The Next Lawrence Brothers?
It's the obvious comparison. It's also probably the wrong way to measure whether this works. Jett and Hunter Lawrence are exceptional cases. Building a development program with the expectation of finding another family capable of collecting American championships at their rate would be setting the bar somewhere around the moon. The larger objective is volume. More riders identified. More meaningful competition. More opportunities to be evaluated.
And ultimately, more athletes capable of making the transition from regional racing into professional Supercross and motocross.
"Australia and New Zealand have long produced some of the greatest talent in the world," SMX League Senior Director of Supercross Mike Muye said in announcing the program. He pointed specifically to Townley, Reed, the Lawrence brothers and Davies while describing SMX Next Australia as a pathway for riders pursuing elite-level careers. AUSX President Adam Bailey sees the benefit extending in both directions. The program isn't only designed to send riders overseas. Bailey said creating additional opportunities should also strengthen racing within Australia and New Zealand by increasing participation, fan interest and investment in future generations.
That's an important distinction.
A healthy development pipeline can't simply remove the best talent from a domestic championship. Ideally, the pathway makes that championship more valuable because young riders know performing there can lead somewhere.
SuperMotocross Is Getting More International
There's another part of this announcement worth watching. Australia is first. SMX Next Australia isn't described simply as another SMX Next event. It's specifically the first regional extension of the development platform. That wording matters. The Monster Energy SuperMotocross World Championship is American-based, but the rider pool increasingly isn't. Since the championship was created, more than 80 athletes representing over 20 countries have competed in SMX, according to the league.
The United States remains the center of the championship. But the search for riders doesn't have to stop at its borders. SMX Next Australia gives the league a way to connect its development structure directly to another established championship without attempting to build an entire Australian series from scratch. AUSX already has the races, tracks, audience and regional infrastructure. SMX brings the development ladder and connection to its world championship. That's a fairly logical partnership. And if it works, there's an obvious question:
Where does SMX Next go next?
The league hasn't announced another regional program, so anything beyond Australia and New Zealand remains speculation. But France, Germany, Japan and other countries already contribute riders to the broader SMX field. An international development model that works in Australia could potentially become a template rather than a one-off. That's the part worth watching. Building the Road Before the Next Star Needs It. For years, talented Australian and New Zealand riders have found their way to American racing anyway. Chad Reed did it. The Lawrence brothers did it. Cole Davies is doing it now. SMX Next Australia isn't creating that ambition. It's organizing the road.
Beginning in October, promising riders across Australia and New Zealand will have an official development platform operating inside their own regional championship, with the best earning an opportunity to put themselves directly in front of the SuperMotocross world.
Some will make it.
Most won't.
That's development racing.
But the next young Australian or New Zealander dreaming about racing Supercross in America now has something previous generations didn't always have: A clearly marked first step. And considering where some of the world's best riders are coming from right now, SuperMotocross has plenty of reason to start looking.