The FIM Hard Enduro World Championship will not take place in 2025, at least not in its current form, after the loss of primary sponsor KTM. Organizer WESS Promotion announced on Friday that with no financial support, the series cannot be conducted.

Despite being one of the most prominent manufacturers in motorcycle racing, KTM has been in rocky waters since 2023. Its parent company Pierer Mobility AG has struggled financially, leaving the futures of its subsidiaries like KTM, GasGas, and Husqvarna in doubt. The troubles forced Pierer to consolidate all three marques’ rally divisions into KTM, who also skipped much of the 2024 World Rally-Raid Championship because the ROI was not there.

Following over a year of restructuring and cutbacks, Pierer was able to secure a restructuring plan for KTM last week with hopes of resuming production by mid-March. It seemed to be a sign of brighter things for the orange brand, especially coming off winning the first two rounds of the 2025 W2RC including the Dakar Rally.

Unfortunately, the happy days were a bit too late on the Hard Enduro side as KTM had already withdrawn its sponsorship in December.

WESS released the following statement:

As the current promoter of the FIM Hard Enduro World Championship, we regret to inform that we will not be able to hold the 2025 Championship.

The pull-out of our main sponsor in December 2024, for reasons that are well known, did not leave us enough time to secure alternative funding. Since most of the potential new partners had already finalized their 2025 budgets at the time of the withdrawal, this significantly limited our options for alternative cooperation.

Despite many promising discussions and successful negotiations, we have now reached our self-imposed deadline without securing the financial backing needed to ensure a professional and high-quality championship. Therefore, we have made the difficult decision to cancel our plans for the 2025 season.

This decision was taken with a strong sense of responsibility towards our potential new sponsors and all the partners who have supported us over the past years. Among them, without singling anyone out, were the FIM, all our event partners, Red Bull Media House, and KTM Group.

On behalf of the entire team, we sincerely thank everyone who has been part of this journey.

The FIM, on the other hand, is not giving up hope and intends to find a way to conduct the series.

“Since we received the news in December, we have been in constant contact with WESS, and we understand the efforts they have made during the start of this year in order that they could continue their good work,” said FIM president Jorge Viegas. “Unfortunately, that is now not the case, and we cannot move forward without thanking them for the incredible job they have done with this series. The FIM Hard Enduro World Championship is a great championship, so we are determined to find a solution that can allow it to continue this year and long into the future.”

The series had an eight-round schedule planned for 2025 along with a five-race calendar for the Junior World Championship. If the season can be saved, the FIM stresses the schedule might vary.

2025 FIM Hard Enduro World Championship provisional schedule at time of cancellation

#	Event	Location	Date
1	Valleys Hard Enduro*	United Kingdom	May 10–11
2	Red Bull Erzbergrodeo*	Austria	May 29 – June 1
3	Xross Hard Enduro Rally*	Serbia	June 18–21
4	Red Bull Romaniacs*	Romania	July 22–26
5	Red Bull Outliers	Canada	September 6–7
6	Abestone*	Italy	September 20–21
7	Sea to Sky	Turkey	Early October
8	24MX GetzenRodeo	Germany	October 24–25

Featured image credit: Sam Strauss / Red Bull Content Pool