=== This Week in Monster Truck Racing ===
* Coty Saucier begins 2025 atop the ROC
** Team Jurassic Attack leads way for independents
*** Rob Poutre puts USA-1 into Top 3
CURRENT STANDINGS and WEEKEND RESULTS (PDF): https://tinyurl.com/3e3wphxy
BLOG POST RECAP: https://www.mtroc.com/blog
===== WEEKEND RECAP FOR DECEMBER 6th – 29th, 2024 =====
Welcome race fans! A new season is upon us (our 7th with the MTROC!) and we’re already 3-months into it since our season begins in October. So let’s catch up on where everyone will be starting the new year.
Coty Saucier has been dominate so far with 8 wins in 9 races while competed against the toughest competition, including reigning Open Champion Ryan Anderson. Saucier won 4-of-5 in Mexico and 4-of-4 in Puerto Rico with Monster Jam. He has been national runner-up in the MTROC twice and will have a great opportunity to win his first Open Championship while running a full schedule on the Monster Jam Arena West tour.
Tim Hall Jr has been rising fast in the sport since joining Team Throttle Monster in 2023. He had 5 wins that year but then won 18 times last season, good enough for a 28th ranking overall. He starts 2025 in 2nd place behind Saucier and already has 4 wins to his name. Teammate Dalton Widner is in 7th place, so Jurassic Attack and Grave Digger are the only trucks with teammates inside the Top Ten.
It’s been a long time since fans have seen USA-1 near the top of a national leaderboard, but with Rob Poutre coming over to Triple B Motorsports from a successful stint with 2Xtreme Racing, the original racing champion of the sport now boasts 8 wins in 11 races and a 3rd place ranking to start 2025. Poutre has steadily improved from his 93rd place ranking in 2021, to 50th in 2022, then 31st in 2023 and last year he placed 15th overall with 26 wins. Running on the Monster Truck Nitro Tour should give Poutre more races to compete in (since the Creten usually ran 1 event per weekend) but point values will be a bit lower than he is used to since the 2Xtreme Tour had a stacked line-up. Still, Rob has himself off to a good start and should give USA-1 fans a reason to cheer this season.
The rest of the rankings are all over the place at the moment! The next three months will really shake things up, too, as the first quarter Monster Jam schedule will be adding a lot of points very quickly. As always, we will need YOUR HELP in compiling all these results. If you attend any monster truck event this year, please consider writing down the racing bracket and sending it in so we can score it for points. Remember: EVERY RACE COUNTS. No matter how big or how small. If monster trucks are going side-by-side we want to know about it.
Thank you to everyone who has helped us with reporting events this week: Preston Perez, Sean Green, Clive Featherby, Zacharey McWilliams, Kaley Engstrom, Kirk Nagy, Phil Vicinanza, and everyone who posted videos and photos online!
===== CURRENT STANDINGS =====
RANK : DRIVER : PTS/AVG : SCORE : RACES/WINS
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1 ) Coty Saucier - 2853/317.00 : 1+1=2 : 9/8
2 ) Tim Hall Jr - 1120/186.67 : 7+2=9 : 6/4
3 ) Rob Poutre - 1602/145.64 : 3+6=9 : 11/8
4 ) Matt Cody - 1874/144.15 : 2+7=9 : 13/4
5 ) Jimmy Creten - 1537/139.73 : 4+8=12 : 11/7
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6 ) Jon Zimmer Jr - 1046/174.33 : 10+3=13 : 6/2
7 ) Dalton Widner - 1107/158.14 : 8+5=13 : 7/2
8 ) Tyler Menninga - 1002/167.00 : 12+4=16 : 6/3
9 ) Armando Castro - 1482/134.73 : 6+10=16 : 11/1
10) Colt Stephens - 1536/118.15 : 5+12=17 : 13/2
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11) Bill Payne - 1003/125.38 : 11+11=22 : 8/2
12) Preston Pérez - 952/136.00 : 14+9=23 : 7/4
13) Blake Granger - 801/114.43 : 16+13=29 : 7/3
14) Brandon Arthur - 774/110.57 : 17+14=31 : 7/1
15) Ryan Anderson - 916/101.78 : 15+16=31 : 9/0
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16) Preston Collins - 753/94.13 : 18+18=36 : 8/3
17) Kory Kinal - 998/83.17 : 13+26=39 : 12/3
18) Byron Cadigan - 1105/69.06 : 9+30=39 : 16/3
19) Bari Musawwir - 723/90.38 : 19+21=40 : 8/0
20) Mikeal Christensen - 653/93.29 : 23+19=42 : 7/0
===== BATESVILLE, MS =====
12/14 Sat Aft: COLTON KISER [American Scout] defeated Daniel Aimes [Crime Time]
Preston Perez made his debut with the Culture Shock team in Batesville with the SC Monster Truck Madness tour. Despite winning his first round heat, Perez was put out of racing due to breakage. Colton Kiser picked up his 2nd win of the season over Perez’s teammate Daniel Aimes.
===== BLYTHE, CA =====
12/14 Sat Aft: ROB POUTRE [USA-1] defeated Byron Cadigan [Bear Foot]
12/14 Sat Ngt: PAUL CRAIGHEAD [MAGA Monster] defeated Byron Cadigan [Bear Foot]
The Nitro Tour has a tough Chicago style track in Blythe with 3 hits on rampless cars. The bracket was reduced both nights due to breakage. Rob Poutre won both of his heats in the afternoon to get his 8th win of the season, which is tied for the most with Coty Saucier. In the night, MAGA and Bear Foot were the last two trucks standing and raced in a best-of-3 final round with Paul Craighead taking the win.
===== LIWA OASIS, UAE =====
12/27 Fri Aft: BRANDON ARTHUR [The Amazing Spider-Man] defeated Bari Musawwir [Black Panther]
12/27 Fri Ngt: BLAKE GRANGER [El Toro Loco] defeated Matt Cody [Grave Digger]
12/28 Sat Aft: CHARLIE PAUKEN [Megalodon] defeated Matt Cody [Grave Digger]
12/28 Sat Ngt: MATT CODY [Grave Digger] defeated Charlie Pauken [Megalodon]
Monster Jam was back in the United Arab Emirates for some late-night racing. The two-day doubleheaders had start times of 6pm and 11pm, but the drivers were still running hard even past their bedtimes. Matt Cody reached the 6-truck final 3 times and beat out Charlie Pauken on Saturday night for his 4th win of the season. Cody will start January in 4th place overall with the 2nd highest points total of 1874. Brandon Arthur, Charlie Pauken, and Blake Granger each picked up wins but Granger in El Toro Loco was the overall winner for all 4 events.
===== OCALA, FL =====
12/14 Sat Aft: JIMMY CRETEN [Bounty Hunter] defeated Dan Dahlgren [Shark Bite]
12/14 Sat Ngt: We do not have results from this event
===== OKEECHOBEE, FL =====
12/7 Sat Aft: JIMMY CRETEN [Bounty Hunter] defeated Kory Kinal [Jekyll & Hyde]
12/7 Sat Ngt: JIMMY CRETEN [Bounty Hunter] defeated Dan Dahlgren [Shark Bite]
Jimmy Creten sweeps the weekend in Okeechobee plus one win in Ocala giving him a 5-race winning streak, at least. We still need results from Niota and Ocala, Florida so he might be up to a 7-race winning streak.
===== TUSCUMBIA, AL =====
12/7 Sat Aft: DEVIN JONES [T-Rex] defeated Mason Rife [Outlaw]
12/7 Sat Ngt: MASON RIFE [Outlaw] defeated Kaley Engstrom [Shark Attack]
Mason Rife has a big reputation to live up to driving the Outlaw truck on the Monster Truck Wars tour, as the star team has made a habit of racing wins. We still don’t know how Mason did in Hephzibah, Georgia (we do not have any results) but we was 2-for-2 in final round appearances in Tuscumbia.
===== VENTURA, CA =====
12/7 Sat Aft: ROB POUTRE [USA-1] defeated Alden Blythe [Rampage]
12/7 Sat Ngt: ROB POUTRE [USA-1] defeated Paul Craighead [Boss Gator]
12/8 Sun Aft: BYRON CADIGAN [Bear Foot] defeated Stanley Hernandez [Lone Wolf]
Byron Cadigan was the only one to beat Rob Poutre in Venture, California and it was a barnburner of a race. They were event coming through the hairpin turn and both drivers were wide-open to the final jump, getting the biggest air of the weekend and using up all of the shutdown space. Poutre won both brackets on Saturday which gave him a 4-race winning streak.
====== EVENTS THIS WEEKEND =====
Gonna admit, we’re still working on building our schedule for 2025, so there’s a good chance that we’re missing events for this upcoming weekend. If we are, please let us know in the comments!
Anaheim, CA (Monster Jam Stadium Championship Series West)
Chandler, AZ (Monster Truck Chaos)
Dallas, TX (Monster Truck Wars)
Greenville, SC (Monster Jam Arena Championship Series East)
Nashville, TN (Monster Jam Arena Championship Series Central)
Salina, KS (Kicker Monster Truck Nationals)
Salt Lake City, UT (Monster Jam Arena Championship Series West)
San Diego, CA (Monster Jam Stadium Championship Series East)
Troy, AL (No Limits! Monster Truck Nationals)
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