In a repeat of last year’s inaugural MMX Racing Marysville Grand Prix, FMF KTM Factory Off-road Racing Team’s Dante Oliveira managed to keep Liqui Moly Beta rider Dare DeMartile at bay for basically all of the 90-minute feature race serving as round six of the Rocky Mountain ATV/MC AMA National Grand Prix Championship (NGPC) Series, Presented by FMF.
Photos by Mark Kariya
Oliveira’s six-second cushion at the finish was greater than the two seconds he’d enjoyed at round five last month and enables the future father to carry a comfortable points cushion into the summer break with 168 points. Runner-up for the third round in a row, DeMartile now has 133.
But the five-time series champ confided the opening few laps weren’t his best as he tried to find his flow around the course aboard his Red Bull/Dunlop/Alpinestars 450 XC-F, allowing DeMartile to stay within a second—or three—for the first half of the race: “I kind of figured out where I was better and where I wasn’t so much better, so where I was better I’d really charge and get a nice little gap. Where I wasn’t better and they were capitalizing a little bit, I would just relax and just ride it smooth and consistent.”
With Marysville practically being a home track for DeMartile from nearby Lincoln, he was very comfortable hounding Oliveira in the first hour. It was in the latter part of the race that he saw the orange bike open up a gap on him and his FMF/Bridgestone/FXR-backed 480 RR.
“The unfortunate thing is when Dante would get around some lappers, I don’t think the lappers knew how close I was [behind him] so they kind of closed the door [on me] after Dante got around them. It kind of made me struggle a little bit to get around some lappers, but also on my part I made a couple mistakes the last three laps,” he admitted. “I went off the track once and stuck my leg and almost tipped over, so that was my fault.
“I got up next to him a couple times—I just wish I had some more.”
But the weekend certainly wasn’t a total loss for the Beta star. While waiting for the Saturday afternoon AA race, he, Giacomo Redondi and a few other NGPC racers cruised over to the E Street MX track next door for the Battle Borne Racing five-lap Dash for Cash. DeMartile won to take home the $3000 prize, with Redondi pocketing $750 for second.
Oliveira’s younger brother and teammate, Mateo, ran third all afternoon on his Motorex/Motion Pro/100% 450 XC-F. The early going found him eating DeMartile’s roost, but he gradually lost touch and ended up 57 seconds back at the finish.
“I honestly felt like I had the pace on them,” he declared. “I was trying everything—inside, outside—trying to get Dare where I was better. They’re just strong. I definitely dropped the anchor those last four laps, but I was trying hard in the beginning! Just to be in there for that long and pushing the pace and genuinely feeling like I was the faster guy even though on paper I was in third the whole race, I felt so strong in the beginning and my bike felt awesome, so progress is there and I’m taking a lot of confidence from this.”
A fairly solitary fifth in the first half, Pro Circuit/Precision Coatings/Team Green rider Giacomo Redondi secured fourth over the last half, comfortably ahead of FMF/RPM Racing KTM’s Mason Semmens, the Pro II winner for the fifth-straight round on his AEO Powersports/Precision Concepts/Moose Racing 250 XC-F.
After grabbing the Pro II holeshot, he was never headed and said, “Never had any moments or little drops or anything. About halfway, I did start to feel a little bit sick in the stomach, to be honest. I think it’s the heat got to me a little bit—I don’t know.
“One step closer to the championship and that’s the main focus.”
Second Pro II and sixth overall belonged to Cole Zeller and his Gainslinger Human Performance/Lake Elsinore Casino/O’Neal Racing Husqvarna after a big crash in Saturday’s AA race. Two seconds behind him and third in class was 3Bros/Hatch Racing Husqvarna’s Sam Pretscherer.
Slam Life Racing (SLR) Honda’s Tyler Lynn finished fifth Open Pro and eighth overall ahead of FMF/RPM Racing KTM rider Noah Gordon (his best result this season) and Hatch Racing/McCarthy Electric Kawasaki rider Colton Aeck. (After a bike issue on Saturday, the Pro Circuit/Precision Coatings team loaned him Redondi’s practice KX450 and he gladly accepted to get laps in, as he is out of the running in Pro II points.)
SLR Honda’s Mikayla Nielsen brought her recent WMX experience to Marysville—except for starting last. But that recent speed training quickly saw her take her Monster Energy/Lava Propane/Alpinestars CRF250RX to the front of the pack for a sixth consecutive triumph this season over 395 Motorsports/Racer Decal/Troy Lee Designs GasGas rider Ava Silvestri. Holeshot winner Ty Woolslayer finished third on her Woolslayer Racing YZ250FX.
“The intensity of the shorter motos are harder for me than doing these [GPs], but once I got back [to GP training] I was wondering how I would do in [these] longer motos,” Nielsen pondered. “I had a really good first half and then at the end, I just kind of felt like mellow, I guess you could say.”CN
2025 NGPC Round 6 Results
OVERALL (Top 10)
- Dante Oliveira (KTM)
- Dare DeMartile (Bet)
- Mateo Oliveira (KTM)
- Giacomo Redondi (Kaw)
- Mason Semmens (KTM)
- Cole Zeller (Hus)
- Samuel Pretscherer (Hus)
- Tyler Lynn (Hon)
- Noah Gordon (KTM)
- Colton Aeck (Kaw)
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