Pablo Quintanilla is hanging up his helmet. On Tuesday, he announced his retirement from motorcycle racing as he plans to focus on raising his family. However, he has not ruled out switching to four wheels.

After starring in South American motocross throughout the 2000s, Quintanilla made the jump to rally raids at the turn of the decade. The Chilean debuted at the Dakar Rally in 2013 and had been a regular since, recording 13 total starts with seven stage wins, three podiums, and a best finish of second in 2020 and 2022.

Quintanilla also won the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge in 2018, the Rallye du Maroc in 2021, and the FIM Cross-Country Rallies World Championship (predecessor to the current World Rally-Raid Championship) twice in 2016 and 2017. He finished sixth in the 2024 W2RC RallyGP standings.

His last race, the Dakar Rally in January, ended with a crash in Stage 8 that resulted in a concussion. The Monster Energy Honda factory rider did not enter the W2RC’s next two rounds in Abu Dhabi or South Africa, the former due to his injury and the latter—which took place last week—for what he described as “personal reasons”.

Those reasons were confirmed Tuesday as fatherhood. Since doing rallies on a bike is obviously dangerous, he does not want to risk further injury during such a crucial part of his life.

Having said that, Quintanilla is not opposed to trying out driving should he get the itch to return to rally raid. It is not uncommon for motorcycle riders to switch to cars or side-by-sides; notable examples from his native Chile include his close friends and Dakar winners Ignacio Casale and Francisco López Contardo.

Featured image credit: Charly Lopez / ASO