Travis Pastrana is coming home. The Annapolis native and AMA Motorcycle Hall of Famer will serve as Grand Marshal of the 36th Yamaha Budds Creek National Presented by Carter CAT on Saturday, Aug. 22, the penultimate round of the 2026 Pro Motocross Championship, sanctioned by AMA Pro Racing, and Round 27 of the Monster Energy SMX World Championship regular season at Budds Creek Motocross Park in Mechanicsville.
Pastrana will hold a fan autograph session from 10 to 11:30 a.m. race day, and will take part in additional festivities throughout the National as organizers formally celebrate his accomplishments and contributions to the sport. The following evening, he makes the short drive north to his hometown for Nitro Circus 2.0 at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium in Annapolis, set for 6 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 23, where he’ll be joined by a roster of fellow world-class action sports athletes.
Credit: MX Sports Pro Racing, Inc.
“The sport of motocross, action sports, and motorsports as a whole have never seen an athlete more gifted and dynamic than Travis Pastrana,” said Ezra Beasley, organizer of Budds Creek Motocross Park. “No one transcended into the mainstream quite like this happy-go-lucky young kid from Annapolis, who simply loved going fast and pushing the limits of what’s possible. It’s incredible to think that 26 years after his first ever professional gate drop, Travis remains as popular as ever and continues to break new barriers, be it two wheels or four. We’re honored to have him as our Grand Marshal and know our fans will be thrilled to see him make a return to Budds Creek.”
Few if any athletes in motorsports history have built a résumé as varied as Pastrana’s. He broke through as a teenage freestyle motocross phenom, single-handedly turning the X Games into a mainstream spectacle for action sports. Under the mentorship of Roger DeCoster at Suzuki, he made a seamless jump into championship racing, winning the 2000 AMA Motocross 125cc Championship and the 2001 AMA Supercross East 125cc Championship, and helping lead Team USA to victory at the 2000 FIM Motocross of Nations in France. But his freestyle roots kept calling. He cut his racing career short and stepped away from full-time competition after the 2005 season, remaining an FMX fixture, racking up countless X Games gold medals and landing tricks that once seemed impossible — contributions that earned him induction into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame as a member of the Class of 2023.
His career didn’t stop at two wheels. Pastrana proved a quick study in rally racing, capturing more X Games success and eventually becoming an American Rally Association champion. His icon status grew further with the creation of Nitro Circus, his collective of close friends and fellow action sports athletes willing to push the boundaries of physics — a project that spawned a hugely popular MTV show and grew into the Nitro Circus Tour, which continues to visit stadiums across the globe. Not to be outdone, his one-of-a-kind résumé also includes a stint in NASCAR and a championship-winning run in offshore powerboat racing. He’s responsible for an array of world-record stunts on both two and four wheels, and has become a central figure in the Gymkhana series, carrying on a legacy created by his late mentor and close friend Ken Block. In the 27 years since Pastrana first graced television screens, no one has participated in more disciplines or achieved more success piloting a motorized vehicle.
Pastrana’s homecoming lands amid one of the tightest championship battles in recent Pro Motocross history. Jett Lawrence reclaimed the 450 class points lead at last weekend’s Unadilla round, edging brother Hunter Lawrence 402 points to 392 with just two rounds remaining. The 250 class is even closer, with Levi Kitchen clinging to a one-point lead over Cole Davies. The 11-round championship has crisscrossed 10 states from late May to late August, visiting some of the sport’s most hallowed venues, with legacies spanning upwards of five decades, and featuring a field led by Australian siblings Jett and Hunter Lawrence, second-generation American phenom Haiden Deegan, Spanish world champion Jorge Prado, and more. At season’s end, two athletes will emerge with the distinction of AMA National Champion.
Budds Creek has been a pillar of the Pro Motocross calendar since 1989 and cemented its status in the sport in 2007, becoming just the second racetrack in the United States to host the FIM Motocross of Nations — affectionately known as the “Olympics of Motocross.” The track’s most distinctive feature is its racing surface, a vibrant light brown clay that racers prize for the traction it provides, paired with dramatic elevation changes throughout the layout that challenge competitors while giving spectators some of the sport’s best sight lines. Racing here is close and often unpredictable, particularly in the heat and humidity of late summer, and Budds Creek has produced its share of surprise winners over the years. For three decades, motorsports fans across the greater Washington, D.C. area and the wider DMV region have made the annual trip to Southern Maryland for the event; this year’s National is expected to draw well over 100 racers representing more than a dozen countries, with tens of thousands of fans filling the hillsides.
Race day begins with practice and qualifying at 8 a.m., followed by opening ceremonies at 12:15 p.m. and first motos — 250SMX Class and 450SMX Class — at 1 p.m., with second motos, including WMX, following at 3:30 p.m. NBC will air live network coverage of the second motos beginning at 3:30 p.m. ET, with comprehensive streaming coverage on Peacock starting with Race Day Live at 10 a.m. ET and moto coverage from 1 p.m. ET. Saturday general admission tickets are $69.11 for adults and $38 for children ages 4–11, all-in pricing including taxes and fees; a general admission-plus-pit-pass package runs $100.22 for adults and $63.92 for children.
