FMF KTM Factory Racing Off-road Team’s Dante Oliveira wrapped up the year just as he’d started it: winning. Having clinched his sixth-straight title in the Rocky Mountain ATV/MC AMA National Grand Prix Championship (NGPC) Series, presented by FMF, two weeks ago, the eighth and final round of the series had no bearing on his final standings.
Photos by Mark Kariya
But he saw it as business as usual, coming from behind to win for the seventh time this season, followed by Slam Life Racing (SLR) Honda’s Tyler Lynn and first-time Pro II winner Sam Pretscherer.
Cohosted by the Ventura County Motorcycle Club, Best in the Desert provided the Laughlin Event Center venue it uses for some of its popular four-wheel desert races and had desert legend David Pearson help lay out the approximately 6.5-mile course for the inaugural Laughlin Grand Prix. Befitting the location and Pearson’s extensive desert heritage, it was one of the fastest GPs and possibly the most unrelenting, with unending chatter bumps, whoops and rocks that effectively became buckshot when launched from the back tire of a 450 doing 80 or so miles an hour.
“What a wild difference it is from [the AMA Hare & Hound National Championship finale last week in Lucerne Valley] to Laughlin!” Oliveira said. “This track was insane: fast, on the ragged edge the whole time. It took a couple of Hail Marys to get it done, but we’re leaving safe and healthy.”
An uncharacteristically poor start on his Red Bull/Motorex/Alpinestars 450 XC-F left him last off the line, while new (and repeat) Pro II champ Mason Semmens launched fastest on his new FMF RPM Racing KTM 450 SX-F, flanked by Lynn and the other half of the FMF KTM team, Mateo Oliveira.
Semmens laid to rest how he’d fare on 450s by leading the first half of the 90-minute, $8000 feature race on his Precision Concepts/Dunlop/Moose Racing machine.
However, a technical issue with his throttle ended his dream Open Pro debut after the halfway mark just as Oliveira was closing in, with the champ admitting, “I did not want Mason Semmens beating me, that’s for sure. Not wishing anything bad against him, but he’s just moved up to the 450cc class, so there’s no shot of that happening [beating Oliveira]”
Once in the lead, Oliveira steadily added to it with each mile. Lynn held strong in second aboard his Monster Energy/Lava Propane/Fly Racing CRF450R.
“We made some bike changes over the summer, and I don’t think it paid off quite as well [as we expected], so we went back to 100 percent what we had before summer, and it seemed to pay off today,” Lynn said.
Pulling into third overall after his own rough start, 3Bros/Hatch Racing Husqvarna’s Pretscherer had similarly chased down FMF RPM Racing KTM’s Noah Gordon, who’d led the Pro IIs for nearly an hour in a breakthrough ride. Like Oliveira, Pretscherer was coming off his own victory at the Hare & Hound National the week before and found the two races worlds apart, though still in the desert.
“Bob [Bell] helped me out with the pits—we did a two-pit [strategy], so I was able to get in the lead,” the Precision Concepts/Blud Lubricants/Troy Lee Designs FC 250-mounted Pretscherer said. “I’m pretty worn out, and I’m excited to have a few weeks off and get ready for next year—I’ve got some exciting stuff happening!”
Gordon was a solid second in Pro II and fourth overall, followed by Gainslinger Human Performance Husqvarna rider Cole Zeller, who spent nearly the entire race third among the Pro II competitors and finished there on the day as well as final Pro II points.
Perhaps a reflection of the course’s brutality, 250s shone at Laughlin with Simi Valley Cycles/bLU cRU Yamaha-mounted Cody Simpson fourth in class and sixth overall, followed by Liqui Moly Beta’s Dare DeMartile, who admitted he never gelled with the course’s speeds: “Yeah, I wasn’t comfortable at all [this weekend]. I had to be cautious, and especially with me doing another series and leading the championship in [with one round to go], I really didn’t want to put it on the ground. I’m happy to get through the last round safe and finish second overall in the series behind the champ. I’ll take it!”
Early leader Semmens nursed his 450 to the finish for fourth Open Pro and eighth overall. Zip-Ty Racing GasGas rider Dustyn Davis was fifth Pro II and ninth overall. Purvines Racing/TBT Suspension/Fast House KX450-mounted David “Racer” Fry rounded out the top 10 overall and was first among a wave of Four-stroke A riders.
As she’d done at round seven, 395 Motorsports/Racer Decal/Troy Lee Designs EX 250F rider Ava Silvestri used rival Mikayla Nielsen’s broken hand as the perfect opportunity to add another Pro Women triumph to her résumé, winning decisively for the second round in a row.
“The intensity was pretty high at the beginning,” she said. “I was trying to set as high a pace as I possibly could and [then] see where Mikayla was at. Obviously, I knew she was still injured, so I could hopefully set my own pace and go from there. It’s not worth it to throw myself on the ground at this high rate of speed. I tried as much as possible to stay safe, but it was pretty hard. By the end, every bump that I hit, my hands would just tingle, and I couldn’t feel anything by that point.”
Though unhappy, she was unable to put up her usual fight; Nielsen was satisfied with clinching the Pro Women Championship for the third straight year on her Progressive/Pro Circuit/Scott-backed CRF250RX.
Nielsen said, “We decided against surgery because we only had this race left, and we figured to let it heal naturally because eventually you have to get that plate out [going the surgical route]. Although it kind of sucks to race on, I knew I just had to finish; I just had to tape it as best I could and pray!”
She finished a lap down on Silvestri and 34 seconds ahead of third-placed Ty Woolslayer’s Woolslayer Racing YZ250FX.
2025 NGPC Round 8 Results
OVERALL (Top 10)
- Dante Oliveira (KTM) 1:38:43
- Tyler Lynn (Hon) 1:38:59
- Samuel Pretscherer (Hus) 1:39:17
- Noah Gordon (KTM) 1:40:03
- Cole Zeller (Hus) 1:40:39
- Cody Simpson (Yam) 1:42:28
- Dare DeMartile (Bet) 1:42:55
- Mason Semmens (KTM) 1:44:46
- Dustyn Davis (GG) 1:45:06
- David Fry (Kaw) 1:46:23
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