2026 Monster Truck Racing Open Championship Season Review

Jon Zimmer Jr is the 2026 Monster Truck Racing Open Champion! This is the first time that an independent driver has won the Open Championship. After last year’s nailbiting finish, this year was a more placid ending as Zimmer outpaced second place Tyler Menninga by nearly 700 points. Zimmer led the sport in total points, scoring 14774 points which was the 3^rd highest in Open history. His 30 wins were the 2^nd most of all drivers this year.

The year started with Donald Epidendio in the #1 spot after a strong autumn season with the Malicious Tour, but he quickly surrendered that to then-reigning Open Champion Coty Saucier. Tyler Menninga held the #1 rank the longest at 20 weeks and had a banner year by winning the Monster Jam World Finals Racing Championship for the first time. Jon Zimmer Jr stayed close to the top all season thanks to massive points earned while winning his 2^nd consecutive Monster Jam Arena Series championship, and he added some big wins during the summer months, including Fowlerville and Miami, to take over the top spot in late July.

===== FINAL STANDINGS =====

Click here to see the FULL STANDINGS of all drivers for the 2026 racing season:

https://tinyurl.com/mtroc2026final

===== RECAP =====

We had a very successful year of events archiving with over 94% of all known events recorded! A huge thank you to all the promoters, drivers, crew, and fans who reported results and posted phots and videos online.

We had 1917 total events on the books, with 1807 reports and 1152 events scored for points just this season. That brings our 8-year total to 12442 archived events with 11543 reports and 8054 events scored for points!

We finished the year with 127 drivers ranked (20-race minimum) and 253 active drivers with at least 1 racing event.

===== HIGHLIGHTS =====

• We had 4 drivers ranked #1 at some point this season:

  • Donald Epidendio (January 5th = 1 week)

  • Coty Saucier (January 14^th thru 27^th and May 27^th thru June 19^th = 7 weeks)

  • Tyler Menninga (February 3^rd thru May 20^th and June 25^th thru July 15^th = 20 weeks

  • Jon Zimmer Jr (July 22^nd thru September 30^th = 11 weeks)

• Jon Zimmer Jr finished with the most Total Points (14774)

• Tyler Menninga finished with the highest Average Points (290.55)

• Tim Hall Jr competed in the most racing brackets (99)

• Bill Payne and Dillon Fenley tied for the most wins (31)

• Bryce Kenny and Cory Rummell tied for the toughest schedule (1.216)

• Donald Epidendio had the highest Driver Performance Rating (99.24)

• Camden Murphy competed in the largest average field size (12.9 trucks)

• Bill Payne competed in the most final rounds (52)

• Kaley Engstrom was the highest-ranked woman driver (31^st) and had the most wins (26), most points (5212) and highest average (104.30) of the 18 ranked women

• Alex Bardin as the most improved in the rankings (+58)

We’ll be posting more statistics in the coming weeks. In the meantime, the 2027 Open Championship has already begun! If you attend ANY monster truck event around the world this year, we hope that you’ll remember us and help us with our goal of record every monster truck race ever. Just jot down the racing brackets and send them in to our Facebook page or by email to staff@mtroc.com and help us make Every Race Count!