Alan Ampudia bolstered his lead in the SCORE Trophy Truck standings by winning the Baja 500, beginning his title defense two for two after the San Felipe 250 in April. It wasn’t as simple as it sounds, however, as he had to fight down to the last second to earn it.

Despite not coming anywhere near the desert floor, the Baja 500 was one of survival for Trophy Trucks. Christopher Polvoorde, the fastest qualifier on Thursday, saw his 2025 SCORE debut end barely a few minutes after entering the timing loop when he hit a “little ledge” that knocked the right front wheel off his truck.

“It must have just been the perfect mechanical storm,” he commented. “We weren’t going super fast. It was like a rain rut and it just peeled the whole right front off, broke the portal, broke the upper A-arm, broke everything. Everything flew off and it was kind of it. It wasn’t a hard hit, like didn’t hurt. It was unfortunate. I messed up on my part. Very, very big bummer.”

Many trucks encountered tire issues as early as the rocky 74th mile like Kevin Thompson and Mike Marsal, while Shawn Runyon suffered a stuck throttle at RM 141. As the race progressed, victims from the TT side included Justin Lofton at RM 210 with a flat and Robby Gordon’s #5. The latter’s truck ran fairly smoothly during his stint, but things fell apart once his son Max took over as it lost power steering followed by a serpentine belt and ultimately four-wheel drive. The #5 was towed off to make repairs and eventually reached the finish eighth in TT and 54th overall.

Even Ampudia wasn’t safe as he lost front-wheel drive and dealt with brake issues before coming into the first pit.

Polvoorde’s retirement shuffled the lead to Luke McMillin, only to hit a rock and break a a portal hub that forced him to stop at RM 202.5. This in turn gave the #46 of Toby Price and Paul Weel the lead with Ampudia right behind. The Australians lost some time to a flat tire at RM 405, but retook the lead from Ampudia once they got going again.

The two trucks were as close as five seconds as the race entered the final stretch, where Ampudia found his second wind. Whether the #46’s flat or simply having the momentum on his side, Ampudia narrowly took the victory by just 36 seconds.

“We fell just a fraction short,” Price said. “My section was good. We had a really good run and I got by everybody and started pushing out front and tried to open a bit of a gap for Paul to have a little bit of a buffer. We climbed out and unfortunately, just wasn’t quite enough.”

Tavo Vildósola initially finished third but was disqualified because he went backward on the course after he missed a checkpoint. Ironically, the penalty promoted his father and TT Legends winner Gus Vildósola onto the overall podium while Dan McMillin took third for TT.

Cameron Steele and Dave Mason Jr., the latter moving up from Class 1, joined forces to win Trophy Truck 2WD. Ethan Ebert impressed with a second in class in the first SCORE race for his Honda Baja Passport which had topped its class in qualifying.

Ultra4 stars and RTR Vehicles Off-Road teammates Loren Healy and Vaughn Gittin Jr. had a mixed day in their Baja 500 debuts. Gittin’s Ford Bronco suffered terminal damage in an accident, while Healy impressed with a fourth in Trophy Truck and 13th overall.

Attrition took its toll on the UTVs as well. Ampudia’s brother Rodrigo was taken out when a Spec truck t-boned his Can-Am Maverick, while the Polarises of Justin Smith and Donovan White respectively rolled over and got hit from behind. Juan Pablo “Juanpa” Zurita, one of the biggest Mexican influencers with over 33.7 million Instagram followers, rolled his UTV and eventually bowed out in his first SCORE race. Herman Johnson received a disqualification for the same reason as Vildósola.

Conversely, the 500 was a masterclass for RZR Factory Racing as they swept both the Open and outright UTV podiums. Brock Heger’s off-road win streak is now at seven with Cayden MacCachren and Justin Morgan right behind. While Max Eddy Jr. finished ninth, his teammates’ performance lived up to his words at the 2024 preseason press conference when he proclaimed, “How do you top sweeping the races last year? You follow it up by sweeping the podium 1–2–3.”

“Days like today feel completely surreal,” commented Polaris racing director Alex Scheuerell. “I’m constantly in awe of what this team and these drivers are capable of, continuously raising the bar for themselves and the competition. To not only come away with another dominant win, but to sweep the UTV overall podium for the first time is just incredible.

“This finishing order is a powerful proof point of the RZR Pro R Factory platform and its unmatched power, strength, and control. A huge thank you to the entire RZR engineering team and everyone at SCi who work tirelessly to build these machines and make results like this possible.”

While Polaris was the star of the show, all three major UTV manufacturers enjoyed a class win. Kaden Wells topped the Maverick-dominated Pro UTV Forced Induction, while Corbin Leaverton led a convoy of Hondas in the Normally Aspirated category in his SCORE debut and the first race for Red Bull Honda Talon Factory Racing. Polaris also notched a Pro Stock UTV victory. Conversely, a SPEED UTV in Pro Stock piloted by David Lauer Jr. did not finish.

Eliott Watson enjoyed what he called a “flawless day” to win Class 10. Class 1, on the other hand, was more of a struggle for fellow Alumicraft driver Cody Reid after the converter broke and the team had to pour “roughly 25 gallons of various substances” into it to keep it running; still, he was able to reach the finish in second behind Kyle Quinn.

Like they did at San Felipe, the bike overall was a duel between the #7X of Tyler Lynn and the #1X of Arturo Salas. Also as in the season opener, Lynn won out by ten minutes. Both bikes were so far ahead that they were the only ones to set a time under ten hours; the third-placed #15X of Eric Holt was 54 minutes behind Lynn.

Bhaskar Ramani and his #127X crew won Pro Moto Limited, becoming the first Indian-American class winner in SCORE. He described his crew as being “like an international project management exercise” with “one guy in the UK, there’s two guys from India, one from the US” while he’s an “Indian in the US” (hailing from Marietta, Georgia).

Quinn’s team owner Brad Wilson was one of the notable absences as he opted to stay home and spend time with his newborn daughter. Bryce Menzies also missed the 500 for the first time since 2009 due to a neck injury from San Felipe that led to a stroke. Rolf Helland did not race following his team’s pre-running accident that killed Felipe Aréchiga Ríos; Eréndira residents planned to protest the race by blocking parts of the course, but the demonstrations were called off after Aréchiga’s family and Helland’s team reached a settlement on Friday.

Class winners

4-Wheel

Class	Overall Finish	Number	Driver of Record	Total Time
Class 1	45	138	Kyle Quinn	12:06:43.018*
Class 1/2-1600	80	1600	Daniel Goodrich	14:35:55.593*
Class 5 Unlimited	60	500	Eli Yee	12:55:35.313
Class 7	66	711	Rhys Millen	13:07:22.020
Class 10	24	1033	Eliott Watson	10:43:32.321
Class 11	93	1100	Oliver Flemate	17:02:01.686
Heavy Metal Limited	DNF	N/A	No Finishers	DNF
Pro Stock UTV	39	3959	Antonio Mendez	11:49:26.886
Pro UTV Forced Induction	25	2935	Kaden Wells	10:50:23.574
Pro UTV Normally Aspirated	44	1925	Corbin Leaverton	12:06:41.300*
Pro UTV Open	8	1896	Brock Heger	9:39:23.245*
Sportsman Unlimited Buggy (Class 1500) #	97	1500	Cesar Quirarte	17:57:01.809
Stock Full-Size	DNF	N/A	No Finishers	DNF
Trophy Truck	1	1	Alan Ampudia	8:39:34.422
Trophy Truck 2WD	4	16T	Cameron Steele	9:28:55.116*
Trophy Truck Legends	3	1L	Gus Vildósola	9:19:40.903*
Trophy Truck Spec	5	285	Justin Davis	9:31:00.457
TrophyLite	DNF	N/A	No Finishers	DNF
X Lite Buggy	DNF	N/A	No Finishers	DNF

Moto

Class	Overall Finish	Number	Rider of Record	Total Time
Pro Moto 30	11	308X	Jason Alosi	11:30:17.2276*
Pro Moto 40	6	400X	Shane Esposito	10:59:52.465
Pro Moto 50	16	530X	Gerardo Rojas	12:57:21.415
Pro Moto 60	22	600X	Harold Harris	13:45:33.875*
Pro Moto Ironman	19	715X	Larry Serna	13:04:41.143*
Pro Moto Limited	7	127X	Bhaskar Ramani	11:10:45.150
Pro Moto Unlimited	1	7X	Tyler Lynn	9:18:23.692
Pro Quad	DNF	N/A	No Finishers	DNF
Sportsman Moto #	14	211X	Filiberto Garcia	12:04:07.751*
Sportsman Quad #	4	101A	Jorge Martinez	10:35:07.502