Preston Campbell had a March to remember. He began the month by winning the Mint 400 Motorcycle Race for the second year in a row. Two weeks later, he went down to Mexico and won the Sonora Rally in his first rally raid.

Reigning Sonora bike winner Brendan Crow claimed the first stage, but received 11 minutes of penalties after he misinterpreted the size of the speed zone waypoints. He noted the widths listed in the roadbook were different from their actual dimensions and he went wider as a result, technically causing him to miss the waypoints.

His race worsened when he hurt his knee in Stage #2, adding injury to an already insulting day plagued by electrical issues. He ran the final few days with a heavy heart after his grandfather’s passing, after which he duct taped the phrase “The pleasure was mine” onto his navigation tower. With his grandfather riding alongside him, Crow bounced back by winning the final two stages to finish fourth.

“These simple words reference the last time we spoke, during our goodbyes, in what are his last words to me,” wrote Crow. “He was always an extremely cheerful, happy go lucky person, even in pain and/or sickness. He started and ended with a smile, and that’s the meaning I’m choosing to take from this quote. You’ll only get whatever happiness you allow life to give you. While I can’t deny having an emotional rollercoaster of a week, that was just the kick in the ass I needed to continue to smile everything else away.”

Campbell inherited the Stage #1 win due to the penalty (coincidentally, he also won the Mint because of the leaders getting penalized) and proved it wasn’t a fluke by never letting go of the overall lead the rest of the way on his Honda CRF450RX Rally. Even his bike is new, essentially a rally replica version of the CRF450 Rally used by Honda’s W2RC team.

“I had a great time and fun week at my first rally competition, learning a new style of racing with new landscapes and navigation,” said Campbell. “My favorite parts were all the sandy two-tracks and huge dunes we had to climb. The CRF450RX Rally equipped with Pirelli/Metzler Rally tires worked great and was fun to ride all week.

“Rally racing is so fun, I loved hanging out in the bivouac after the stage and talking to all the other riders.”

After the 2024 race was shortened to three days, it returned to its usual five-stage format for 2025. While a longer event typically means having to race smarter, even doing that doesn’t always work out. If anything, it gave more opportunities for the Sonoran desert to claim some victims.

For example, Dan Bartolucci and Dawson Stanley both crashed on the first stage with the former breaking his collarbone while the latter suffered a concussion. Stanley was able to reach the stage finish before withdrawing. Brothers and Dakar veterans David and Jim Pearson both retired with damage to their rear suspension and exhaust system, respectively.

Mike Johnson, the biggest challenger to Campbell and Crow, did not finish the last stage after his bike broke down. Even after successfully completing the final timed section, Maciek Obryk still got bitten by Sonora one last time as he ran out of gas on the liaison.

On the four-wheel side, George LaMonte’s race ended after four stages when his Infiniti FX45 went over a “medium-sized dune” and the front end slammed into the ground, tearing up the radiator. Despite the setback, he was pleased with how the Infiniti fared in the desert.

“The car was pretty impressive though. That beast of a vehicle right there is honestly, with the right driver the fucking thing could go anywhere,” he commented after his retirement. “The radiator just needs to be in the back and I need some taller springs. It’s actually a good little platform.”

LAP Motorsports’ triumvirate of LAP VXs was fast but their race ended in disappointment. Luis Perocarpi topped the first stage for 4WD but crashed into a dune two days later; the team repaired it in time for Stage #4 only for the car to lose power steering before breaking down for good just 25 kilometers from the finish. His teammates Bruce Myrehn and Andrew Sellers respectively bowed out with transmission and rear differential pinion failures after two and three legs.

Bill Conger won the first stage for the four-wheelers but was unable to start Stage #2 due to mechanical failures on his car. Brock Harper seized the opportunity by running the table the rest of the way to win the Road to Dakar.

Although the Sonora Rally is no longer on the W2RC calendar, it is part of the Road to Dakar program that awards free Dakar Rally registration to the best driver with no prior experience there. Harper’s win thus waives his signup fee for the 2026 or 2027 Dakars.

Similarly, rookie rally raider Brandon Krause finished fifth overall for bikes to win the new Dakar Dreams challege, for which the Sonora Rally will pay off $10,000 of his Dakar entry fee. He also earns points to bolster his credentials and improve his chances of being accepted by the ASO for Dakar.

After crashing on the final stage of his most recent Sonora Rally in 2022, Willem Avenant rebounded with a seventh. Avenant, who made his Dakar debut in January, had a fairly clean rally save for some fuel issues and hitting a cactus in Stage #3.

Ramsey Carr finished 13th; at just 16 years of age, he is the youngest rider to complete the race. Six spots back was Ben Howard, who raced the 2023 Sonora Rally on a Yamaha Ténéré 700 but opted for a KTM 500 EXC for 2025.

Despite rolling down a dune on the final stage, Bruno Pinillos’ 1978 Datsun 280Z won the 2WD class after Conger’s exit. Pinillos had been restoring the Datsun to potentially compete at the Dakar Classic someday, and has also raced it in NORRA.

“The dunes were huge,” said Pinillos after Stage #4. “Reminded me of my country of origin, Peru. They have big dunes like that too. I love that I got to do that for the first time, put the Datsun in such big dunes. Tire pressure was so low that I was so scared of debeading, but just enough to like make it through all the soft sections. I had a blast.”

Stage winners

Stage	Moto	Total Time	Auto	Total Time
Stage #1	Preston Campbell	3:52:59	Bill Conger	4:55:43
Stage #2	Preston Campbell	4:08:58	Brock Harper	4:50:48
Stage #3	Preston Campbell	4:54:40	Brock Harper	6:04:49
Stage #4	Brendan Crow	3:26:28	Brock Harper	2:46:51
Stage #5	Brendan Crow	2:06:15	Brock Harper	4:53:19

National Moto results

Finish	Number	Rider	Class	Total Time	Margin
1	5	Preston Campbell	Pro	18:33:44	Leader
2	16	Jordan Huibregtse	Pro	20:08:09	+ 1:34:25
3	4	Kyle McCoy	Pro	20:41:24	+ 2:07:40
4	1	Brendan Crow	Pro	21:04:16	+ 2:30:32
5	15	Brandon Krause	Pro	21:31:53	+ 2:30:09
6	37	Julián Sánchez Dabin	Enduro	22:33:45	+ 4:00:01
7	3	Willem Avenant	Pro	23:29:59	+ 4:56:15
8	6	Matthew Ransom	Pro	24:20:56	+ 5:47:12
9	21	José Daniel Miranda Fumero	Enduro	24:46:14	+ 6:12:30
10	36	Gareth Jones	Enduro	24:58:03	+ 6:24:19
11	17	Justin Jumet	Pro	26:43:25	+ 8:09:41
12	13	Adolfo Alonso	Pro	27:11:37	+ 8:37:53
13	35	Ramsey Carr	Enduro	27:53:09	+ 9:19:25
14	14	Armando Morales	Pro	28:36:29	+ 10:02:45
15	28	Ofol Sundstrom	Enduro	30:22:16	+ 11:48:32
16	27	Maciej Obryk	Enduro	30:29:37	+ 11:55:53
17	33	Larry Engwall	Enduro	31:32:20	+ 12:58:36
18	8	Matthew Glade	Pro	32:10:37	+ 13:36:53
19	29	Ben Howard	Enduro	35:45:09	+ 17:11:25
20	26	Ryan Nariño	Enduro	49:21:30	+ 30:47:46
21	2	Wes Carr	Enduro	56:33:05	+ 37:59:21
DNF	7	Mike Johnson	Pro	DNF	N/A
DNF	9	Jim Pearson	Pro	DNF	N/A
DNF	10	Dan Bartolucci	Enduro	DNF	N/A
DNF	11	Mike Shirley	Pro	DNF	N/A
DNF	12	Vladimir Malyarevich	Pro	DNF	N/A
DNF	20	Alexander Kachaev	Pro	DNF	N/A
DNF	24	Bryan Predersen	Enduro	DNF	N/A
DNF	30	Dawson Stanley	Enduro	DNF	N/A
DNF	31	Ladislao Hendández Artesi	Enduro	DNF	N/A
DNF	32	Ben Lauderdale	Enduro	DNF	N/A
DNF	34	C.J. King	Enduro	DNF	N/A
DNF	38	David Pearson	Pro	DNF	N/A

Featured image credit: Jamie Campbell