In an unusual and unprecedented conclusion to the NHRA season, RevZilla/Motul/Vance & Hines rider Richard Gadson was crowned the 2025 Pro Stock Motorcycle world champion on Sunday after relentless rain showers forced officials to cancel all racing activity at the In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip in Pomona, CA.
The NHRA’s traditional season finale in Pomona was disrupted by a massive storm system that engulfed Southern California from Friday onward and forced the cancellation of qualifying sessions for all four NHRA professional classes. Elimination brackets were then set on the basis of the championship point standings coming into the sixth and final race of the Countdown to the Championship playoffs, which put Gadson on top of the Pro Stock Motorcycle field, just 21 points ahead of teammate Gaige Herrera.
But a hoped-for winner-take-all championship shootout between the two Vance & Hines riders ultimately floated away when dogged rain showers extended into Sunday afternoon and forced NHRA officials to cancel the race.
The decision handed Gadson his first NHRA world championship after a breakthrough season that featured his first four career victories, including two wins during the Countdown that propelled him into the championship lead at the most crucial point of the season.
For Gadson the turning point came with his realization that success in Pro Stock Motorcycle is as much a function of mental preparation as it is preparation of the machine.
“If you want to win out here you have to take it from great riders like Gaige Herrera, and they don’t give it up easily. I always knew that if I could find my groove, I had the capability to be a champion. It was a goal, not an expectation because I knew getting there would be hard and take a lot of determination, grit and tenacity. I didn’t have a timeline, if it would be my first season, my second season or never, but I’m really happy the team believed in me and gave me the chance to be here,” Gadson said.
“My crew-chief Eddie Krawiec and I worked really hard for this. We dug down deep to figure out how to up our game and put ourselves in this position. I was hungry and determined and I feel like I raced with a chip on my shoulder and I had something to prove, and we were able to get it done. Now I’m looking forward to next season, because Gaige will be even hungrier to get it back and I’ll be hungry to defend it.”
Despite winning seven races this year, Gaige Herrera’s bid for a third-straight world championship came to a soggy end for the rider who has been the class of the field since joining Vance & Hines in 2023.
Herrera’s 31 number one qualifiers and 28 wins over the past three seasons have made the two-time champion one of the most dominant racers in recent NHRA history in any class, but after securing the regular-season championship at the U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis, a slow start to the Countdown put him on the back foot just as Gadson was gaining momentum.
Although Herrera equaled Gadson with two wins each during the Countdown, critical early round losses at races in Reading and Charlotte ultimately spelled doom for Herrera’s championship hopes. In the end, bad weather scuttled what had been shaping up to be a highly anticipated showdown.
Herrera took the disappointment of not being able to challenge Gadson head-to-head in stride.
“I was ready to race, so was Richard and the whole team, but there was nothing we could do about Mother Nature. She does what she does. I wish I was on top, but I’m happy for Richard too. He had one heck of a year, and we finished one-two in the championship, so as a team, we can’t ask for anything better. He deserves it,” Herrera said.
“All in all, I had a great season. I had a few bobbles in Reading and Charlotte, and I think that’s ultimately where the championship was decided. This year has put me in a different mindset than my first two championship seasons. It’s really tested me as a rider and tested how Andrew Hines and I work under tough conditions. We’ve grown from it and gotten stronger and it’s made us much better together. Next season Richard and I will be a deadly combination too. We might be teammates, but once we fire up our Hayabusas in the burnout box, the gloves will be off.”
RevZilla/Motul/Vance & Hines Suzuki crew chief Andrew Hines said it was disappointing not to be able to settle the championship battle on the track, but that the outcome nonetheless reflected highly on the team’s outstanding preparation throughout the season.
“We’re super proud of what we did for these guys to go one-two in the championship this year. We do our best as a team to try to give each rider the best bike every single round. The performance of our two Hayabusas was neck and neck all through the Countdown. It came down to a matter of whose fortunes went which way at the right time, and Richard was able to put it on kill almost every run. He was darned near flawless all season long. Now he’s a world champion,” Hines said.
“Next season it will be a cool dynamic for Eddie and me, both former world champions ourselves, to be tuning for the two most recent world champions in the class,” he said. “It’s another part of the great legacy of Vance & Hines and it makes us super proud of all the hard work we put in as a team.”
At the conclusion of the 2025 NHRA season, Gadson and Herrera finished first and second in the standings, with 2,584 and 2,563 points, respectively.
The RevZilla/Motul/Vance & Hines Suzuki team returns to action at the opening round of the NHRA 75th Anniversary season March 5-6, 2026, at the NHRA Gatornationals at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, FL
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