This Week in Monster Truck Racing - September 25-28, 2025

=== This Week in Monster Truck Racing ===

* Coty Saucier wins 2025 Open Championship!

** Jimmy Creten reached milestone 40-win season

*** Preston Collins joins Top 50 with win in Wildwood

CURRENT STANDINGS and WEEKEND RESULTS (PDF): https://tinyurl.com/mtroc251001

BLOG POST RECAP: https://www.mtroc.com/blog

===== WEEKEND RECAP FOR SEPTEMBER 25^th – 28^th, 2025 =====

Coty Saucier wins the 2025 Monster Truck Racing Open Championship by a mere 60 points!

The unofficial standings are now posted although we will still be accepting late results until next Wednesday before finalizing everything. It does not appear that there are any late results that could change the top of the rankings (I think lol), but late results COULD shift some positions further down in the rankings, so please understand that things could still change a big between now and the official final standings posted next week.

What a crazy finish to this season! The racing in Lakeport, California this weekend settled the championship as Bill Payne secured enough points to pass Tyler Menninga in Total Points, which shuffled around the Top 3 and put Coty Saucier back in the #1 rankings. But check this out: Donald Epidendio’s 2 wins gave him an Average Points score of 207.60 which is just behind Saucier’s 208.54. If Coty had scored just 60 fewer points this season, then Epidendio’s two wins this weekend would have knocked Coty back down to 2^nd place based on Average Points. To put that in perspective, the average round of racing in the sport was worth 71 points this season. It doesn’t get much closer than that!

This was the final weekend for the 2025 Open Championship The 2026 Open Championship starts RIGHT NOW because we have no off season. We won’t be posting new rankings until January, but we ARE still collecting results every week like usual.

Other big news from this weekend: Jimmy Creten becomes only the 3^rd driver in Open Championship history to win 40 races in a single season. The Hot Wheels Tour went racing again with Darron Schell taking the win. And the Renegade Tour had 3 different winners from their 8 truck field in Wildwood, New Jersey, including Preston Collins who raced his way into the Top 50.

We’ll be posting more 2025 stats and information in the upcoming weeks. We expect to have the full and official final standings posted late next week. If you have any results from ANY missing event this season, we are still able to accept it until about Wednesday of next week.

Thank you to everyone who has helped us with reporting events this week: Preston Perez, J.r. Rouse, Nick Jones, Daniel Clark, John Brown, Chris Yuhas, Stanley Hernandez, Steve Parry, Kory Kinal, Brandi Schmidt, Nick Migues, Tim Manchester, Kirk Nagy, Phil Vicinanza, and everyone who posted videos and photos online!

===== UNOFFICIAL FINAL STANDINGS =====

RANK : DRIVER : PTS/AVG : SCORE : RACES/WINS

-----------------------------------------------------------

1 ) Coty Saucier - 13138/208.54 : 2+5=7 : 63/29

2 ) Tristan England - 10318/234.5 : 6+2=8 : 44/13

3 ) Tyler Menninga - 10545/234.33 : 5+3=8 : 45/15

4 ) Weston Anderson - 13615/174.55 : 1+11=12 : 78/25

5 ) Ryan Anderson - 8110/261.61 : 13+1=14 : 31/12

-----------------------------------------------------------

6 ) Jon Zimmer Jr - 11631/157.18 : 3+12=15 : 74/21

7 ) Dalton Widner - 9287/193.48 : 8+8=16 : 48/14

8 ) Triton Robbins - 10199/178.93 : 7+9=16 : 57/24

9 ) Bill Payne - 10769/149.57 : 4+13=17 : 72/31

10) Bari Musawwir - 8269/201.68 : 11+7=18 : 41/8

-----------------------------------------------------------

11) Camden Murphy - 7692/174.82 : 14+10=24 : 44/6

12) Jimmy Creten - 8414/137.93 : 10+19=29 : 61/40

13) Bryce Kenny - 5200/226.09 : 26+4=30 : 23/3

14) Blake Granger - 7128/148.5 : 16+14=30 : 48/18

15) Donald Epidendio - 5190/207.6 : 27+6=33 : 25/18

-----------------------------------------------------------

16) Armando Castro - 6852/142.75 : 17+16=33 : 48/3

17) Zack Garner - 6367/135.47 : 20+21=41 : 47/8

18) Colt Stephens - 5265/142.3 : 25+18=43 : 37/3

19) Rob Poutre - 5006/143.03 : 29+15=44 : 35/25

20) Daron Basl - 5864/127.48 : 22+22=44 : 46/14

===== BIGGEST IMPROVEMENTS =====

+6 – RJ Turner (War Wizard) – 64^th

+5 – Marvin Anderson (Identity Theft) – 42^nd

+5 – Preston Collins (Jurassic Attack) – 46^th 

+3 – Steven Thompson (Hurricane Force) – 77^th

+2 – Coty Saucier (Dragon) – 1^st 

===== NEWLY RANKED =====

91^st – Zach Winchenbach (Lumberjack)

98^th – Jason Court (Roughneck)

104^th – Ryan Como (Rat Nasty)

===== ABU DHABI, UAE =====

This Hot Wheels Live event did not include side-by-side racing and so points were not awarded. What it did have was a unique line-up for a Hot Wheels Tour. Only 5 trucks in competition (no Mega Wrex or Tiger Shark). Dillon Fenley was the driver with the most consistent schedule recently, as Shane Phreed, Miranda Riley, Vern House, and AJ Straatmann only run events here and there. Certainly an interesting line-up, but this was the 4^th separate tour going on this weekend for the Hot Wheels Live crew which is why they needed the additional drivers.

===== BENTON, MO =====

9/27 Sat Aft: MARK ANDREW [Wicked Sickness] defeated Corree Labbee [Public Nuisance]

9/27 Sat Ngt: CORREE LABBEE [Public Nuisance] defeated Brandi Schmidt [Monster Patrol]

Corree Labbee and Mark Andrew each took a win on the Nitro Tour in Benton running on a wide Chicago-style track.

===== COLORADO SPRINGS, CO =====

9/27 Sat Aft: STANLEY HERNANDEZ [Lone Wolf] defeated Brian Leach [USA-1]

9/27 Sat Ngt: JERROD COMPTON [Anubis] defeated Stanley Hernandez [Lone Wolf]

Stanley Hernandez ends the 2025 Open Season tied for 2^nd in Most Finals on the Monster Truck Nitro Tour. Rob Poutre was in the finals 29 times which was the most. Hernandez and Byron Cadigan both made the finals 25 times on tour. Hernandez added two more appearances here in this final weekend in Colorado Springs and brought his win total to 7 this season.

===== COOKSHIRE, QC =====

The All Out Tour once again used timed runs to determine the finalists so points were not awarded. Pat Paquet won in the finals both events driving Outfoxed. A unique note from Cookshire: due to the narrow track width, the holeshot racing was done nose-to-tail instead of side-by-side. The trucks each had their own set of cars to run over, but with one truck beginning at one end of the track and the other beginning in the middle. The raced in the same direction over their set of cars, but had different starting and finishing lines due to the odd arrangement. Bless the poor official who had to watch two finish lines simultaneously to determine the winners!

===== CULLMAN, AL =====

We do not have results from the Monster Truck Wars races in Cullman, Alabama. If you have any information on the racing results from these events, we can still include them in the standings if you can get them to us before next Wednesday.

===== DENTON, TX =====

9/27 Sat Aft: DEVIN JONES [T-Rex] defeated Mason Rife [Outlaw]

9/27 Sat Ngt: We do not have results from this event

9/28 Sun Aft: We do not have results from this event

9/28 Sun Ngt: MASON RIFE [Outlaw] defeated Kaley Engstrom [Shark Attack]

Monster Truck Wars has gone into some new venues over the past few weeks and with great results. The demand for tickets in Denton was so strong that they added two additional Sunday events! Unfortunately for us, we were only able to find results for 2 of the 4 this weekend.

Devin Jones’ win on Saturday afternoon brought him up to 24 wins on the Monster Truck Tours (for the events we have reported) which was the most wins of any driver on tour. Mason Rife was second with 18, Kaley Engstrom in third with 15, and Aaron Basl in fourth with 13. We also had 25 unreported events from the tour this year. Here’s hoping that next season we’ll be able to get them all!

===== DURHAM, CT =====

9/28 Sun Aft: MICHAEL VATERS II [Overkill Evolution] defeated Preston Pérez [Suberfoot]

The tempest in a teapot event up in Durham always draws a strong crowd and this year the trucks added to that wild whirlpool with Chicago-style racing. Michael Vaters II took the win over Preston Perez who made his first appearance driving Suberfoot. Perez was this year’s All Star Monster Truck tour champion and looks to be finishing the year in the Top 25 barring any late results that come in.

===== GREENSBORO, NC =====

This Hot Wheels Live event did not include side-by-side racing and so points were not awarded

===== HOGANSBURG, NY =====

9/26 Fri Aft: MICHAEL VATERS I [Black Stallion] defeated Joe Foley [Brutus]

9/27 Sat Aft: NO POINTS; The bracket could not be scored

The brackets in Hogansburg got a little wacky this weekend and so it was a stretch to score them. On Friday, Mikey Vaters was given a bye directly to the finals which against our rules which require bracketing, so even though he beat father Mike in the announced finals, for points purposes this one counts as a four-truck bracket with Mike Sr taking the win. On Saturday, Mike Sr won the finals again, which would have been great except that he had not competed at all in the previous rounds and we’re not sure how he got to the finals. This one also included breakage and a fast loser and other situations that just made it too hard to score. We have the heats recorded in the history books, but unfortunately we could not award points for it.

===== JAMESTOWN, NY =====

9/27 Sat Aft: GREG WINCHENBACH [Crushstation] defeated Brandon Derrow [Bad News Travels Fast]

9/27 Sat Ngt: GREG WINCHENBACH [Crushstation] defeated Brandon Derrow [Bad News Travels Fast]

The Versus Monster Truck tour is in the midst of a short series of autumn events and Greg Winchenbach swept the series in Jamestown with two wins over Brandon Derrow. Greg ends the season with 9 wins in 15 races but is short of the 20 events needed to make the rankings. His son Zach just barely reached the 20 race threshold in Jamestown and joins the rankings in the final week of the season in 91^st with 3 wins. Brandon Derrow also finishes in the rankings with a solid 40^th place finish with 13 wins in 25 events.

===== LAKEPORT, CA =====

9/26 Fri Ngt: DONALD EPIDENDIO [Titan] defeated Bill Payne [Rock Star]

9/27 Sat Ngt: DONALD EPIDENDIO [Titan] defeated Bill Payne [Rock Star]

The most important event this weekend was the Malicious Tour in Lakeport. If Bill Payne failed to score any points, then Tristan England would be the Open Champion. If he scored up to 237 points, then Tyler Menninga would be the Open Champion. And if he scored 238 or more points, then Coty Saucier—who had held the lead nearly all year long and was facing an tough onslaught in the final weeks of the season—would get bumped back into the #1 ranking.

The news for us began earlier in the week when thanks to our great fans we were able to get a couple backlogged results from Bill Payne. The Black Creek Speedway event was one where Payne lost in the first round and scored no points, but the Penticton event from February was a racing win for Bill Payne and added 183 points to his total that he had been due for nearly 8 months. That meant that Tristan England was officially out of the running heading into Friday’s event in Lakeport.

The story at the track was Donald Epidendio sweeping another weekend. He won 18 of 25 events this season (plus 4 runner-ups!) to finish ranked 15^th in the world with a 64-7 heat record and a 26-5 record against Bill Payne head-to-head. It was Payne he faced in both final rounds and despite eliminating the Rock Star, those runner-up finishes were enough to not only push Payne up into 19^th place with an industry-best 58 final round appearances this year, but it was also more than enough to bypass Tyler Menninga in Total Points and give the 2025 Open Championship to Coty Saucier! Bill Payne finishes the year with 10769 points which is the 4^th most of all drivers this season and also the most that he scored in his Open career.

===== LONG BEACH, CA =====

This Hot Wheels Live event did not include side-by-side racing and so points were not awarded

===== MARIETTA, GA =====

This Full Throttle Monster Trucks event did not include side-by-side racing and so points were not awarded

===== NORTON, OH =====

9/27 Sat Aft: JIMMY CRETEN [Bounty Hunter] defeated Austin Minton [Shark Bite]

9/27 Sat Ngt: JIMMY CRETEN [Bounty Hunter] defeated Austin Minton [Shark Bite]

Jimmy Creten becomes only the 3^rd driver to win 40 races in a single Open season after sweeping the two-race showdown in Norton, Ohio. In 2022, both Derick Anson (66) and Donny Hebert (40) won that many on the Monster Truckz tour. Creten’s previous best was 30 wins during the 2023 season. He will also finish the season ranked 12^th in the world.

===== ROCK SPRINGS, WY =====

9/27 Sat Ngt: JACOB LADWIG [Rat Attack] defeated Tim Manchester [Hillbilly]

Jacob Ladwig closes out the Insanity Tour’s portion of the 2025 Open Championship with another win on tour. The Insanity Team got creative with their track again in Rock Springs, running a Chicago-style track but where the drivers negotiated the turns in the opposite direction. So they raced counter-clockwise over the cars, but clockwise around the turn poles. For those engineers among us, it sort of resembles a new diverging diamond interchange in a sense. It was certainly insane with 2 points on the track where the trucks crossed paths, but no collisions occurred. The entire event is available for watching on the Monster Truck Insanity Tour YouTube page.

===== TUNICA, MS =====

9/26 Fri Ngt: We do not have results from this event

9/27 Sat Ngt: We do not have results from this event

===== WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND =====

9/27 Sat Aft: DARRON SCHNELL [Gunkster] defeated Rick Steffens [Skelesaurus]

Well well well, the Hot Wheels Tour went racing again in Wellington! Despite not racing very much, it seems like the few times that the Hot Wheelers got racing Darron Schnell finds his way towards the final round. He picked up the win here over Rick Steffens. We’re told that they’ll be racing again in Auckland to end their New Zealand tour and kick-off the 2026 Open Championship season.

===== WILDWOOD, NJ =====

9/26 Fri Ngt: STEVEN THOMPSON [Hurricane Force] defeated Brett Falvey [The Haymaker]

9/27 Sat Aft: CARSON WILLIAMS [Rockwell R.E.D.] defeated Preston Collins [Velociraptor]

9/27 Sat Ngt: PRESTON COLLINS [Velociraptor] defeated Cory Snyder [Toxic]

Last but not least was the Renegade Tour on the sandy beach in Wildwood, New Jersey. This year’s track was a three-jump straight line contest that included a huge gap jump before the finish line. The eight truck field was evenly balanced with only Preston Collins managing to advance to the final round more than once. On his second try Saturday night he picked up the win to close out the 2025 Open Championship season. That was his 12^th win of the season and jumped him up 5 spots inside the Top 50.

===== EVENTS THIS WEEKEND =====

There’s no off-season in the Open Championship! The 2026 season starts this weekend with these and other events. If you’re attending any, please send us the results so we can get our next year off to a great start!

Arlington, TX (Monster Jam)

Asheboro, NC (All Star Monster Truck Tour)

Auckland, New Zealand (Hot Wheels Monster Trucks Live)

Austin, TX (Monster Truck Wars)

Butler, IN (Fall Monster Truck Show)

Davenport, IA (Monster Truck Nitro Tour)

Fonda, NY (Versus Monster Trucks)

Kayenta, AZ (Unhinged Monster Truck Tour)

Hermiston, OR (Monster Truck Insanity Tour)

Lavonia, GA (SC Monster Truck Madness)

Markham, ON (Monster Madness & FMX World Tour)

Melbourne, Australia (Monster Jam)

Mexico City, Mexico (Monster Jam)

Milton, FL (2X Monster Trucks Live)

Palma, Spain (Monsters World Tour)

Quarryville, PA (Renegade Monster Truck Tour)

Red Bluff, CA (West Coast Nationals)

San Angelo, TX (Monster Trucks Maniac)

Stockton, CA (Malicious Monster Truck Tour)

Troy, AL (CFP No Limits Monster Trucks)

Victorville, CA (Monster Truck Thunder)

Washington, MO (Monster Truck Wars)

Worcester, MA (Hot Wheels Monster Trucks Live)