The 2010 AMA SX series/FIM World Championship came to an end with the seventeenth and final round of the year taking place at the Sam Boyd stadium in Las Vegas last weekend. Kyle Cunningham was the surprise top runner on the Valli Motorsports YZ450F with 4th position but Muscle Milk Joe Gibbs Racing’s Justin Brayton finished 8th and was able to rise into the top five of the season standings.

Texan Cunningham had a career-best race in just his third event in the premier class since taking the vacated seat of the injured Ivan Tedesco. The 21 year old, who had secured 8th place in the East Coast Lites series, had scored 13th and 11th in his two previous outings before coming to Nevada.

"I knew I could ride the 450, I just hadn't put a whole race together,” he said. “Something just kept happening. Plus, the other two races [Seattle and Salt Lake City] were just crazy conditions. But here, with normal conditions, I felt great. I caught a flow about halfway through and I just rode it on in to the finish. I'm pumped."

Kyle Chisholm was 7th ahead of Brayton and Michael Byrne managed 11th. Josh Hill was able to score two points more than his two previous outings with 17th place and end a nightmare-ish second half of the campaign in which a rib injury has affected his race stamina.

Four Yamaha’s finished in the final top ten of the standings with Brayton 5th, Hill 6th, Tedesco in 9th and Kyle Chisholm claiming 10th. 2009 champion James Stewart etched the sole victory for Yamaha at Anaheim 1 but has been out with a broken scaphoid since round four.

The AMA Motocross Nationals will now begin in two weeks with the first event taking place at Hangtown in Sacramento, California.