Silly Season

By: Jeffrey Keeble

It’s the end of the 2024 Champ offroad season and some drivers have decided to move up and some drivers have decided to hang up the steering wheel.

We’ll start with the obvious. Trey Gibbs has moved up to Pro-2 class and debuting it at the last round of champ offroad race held in Crandon, Wisconsin. The newly built Mamer chassis proved that it can withstand the carnage and bumping but with some testing and time on the track, Gibbs looks to challenge for the championship in 2025.

Ryan Beat is still looking for a Pro-2 championship and doesn’t want to move out of the class until he does. Word on the street is that he bought the late Rick Huseman Pro 4 truck and plans to race select rounds in 2025. Beat will still compete in the Pro-2 class full time as his goal is the Pro-2 championship and plans to debut the Pro-4 at the Mint 400 offroad race held at the Primm Valley Short Course Track, March 7th and 8th, 2025.

Mickey Thomas, the Silent Assassin, won the 2024 Pro-2 Championship and like any normal driver he wants to improve his racing program. The only way to do that is to move up a class and that’s the highly stacked Pro-4 class. We don’t know if he’s building a new one from scratch, which would require a lot of testing and learning, or you buy used and proven equipment. There’s a hand full of Pro-4’s laying around like the late Kyle Leducs, Doug Mittag, Jimmy Henderson and maybe even a long lost Doug Fortin truck. The list is endless but can’t wait to see what Thomas has planned for 2025.

Avery Hemmer, debuted her Pro Spec at Fall Crandon and proved that she belongs in the class with 2 podiums. Moving up from Mod Karts, she had no problem adapting to the truck and the competition in that class. Let’s just hope it wasn’t a one race deal and we see Hemmer piloting the number 15 Pro Spec in 2025.

Stay tuned as more speculations occur.