Exciting route changes and celebration in downtown Marquette set to feature at October's LSPR
Photography by DirtFish
Words by David Evans, DirtFish Head of Media
The city of Marquette – on the southern shores of Lake Superior – will be the place to party on the final day of the 2025 ARA National Championship presented by Kubota.
The traditional season-closing event in America’s premier rally series is undergoing significant changes to its route, with a revised plan for the start and finish and new mileage through the event’s second day.
Looking ahead to the October 17-18 event, co-chairman Steve Gingras outlined the revisions for the fall-time rally in Michigan.
“Our preliminary plans are to start the event on Thursday (October 16) evening with a parc expose, a welcome party and the cars on display. Friday morning would mean much less pomp around the start. We’d get straight out to Al’s Playground and the traditional four stages we’ve used in the Kenton area before.
“For Saturday, we’re hoping to use three stages we came very close to using last year. The new roads are south of Ishpeming, we’re planning three loops of three. They were used in the 1970s – they’re great. There are multiple surface changes, multiple different types of road, it’ll be really good to get into them.”
Like many of the roads in the Upper Peninsula, these stages have world championship pedigree, having featured on the route for the Press on Regardless Rally in 1973 and ’74.
“We’re not planning to use the usual ski hill stage on Saturday afternoon,” added Gingras. “We’ll still use Mount Marquette, but we’ll have a regroup before the last stage to invert the field. The action will build and build as the cars come through, with Travis Pastrana and Brandon Semenuk the last ones.
“After that, the finish is in downtown Marquette. We’re going to take over the two blocks of the main street area where there’s lots of bars and restaurants. We’ll bring the cars into town and have a block party atmosphere with a live band and entertainment – we’re looking at a big screen with the potential for some livestreaming from the stages.
“And we’ll be sharing some LSPR bucks with all the volunteers, so they can go to whatever bar or restaurant they want to spend their money.
“We’re working through all of this as a team now – we’ve got things mapped out and most of the [land and road] permissions are in. It’s really important that we keep the event fresh with new innovations and different roads where we can.”
Words:David Evans
Tags: ARA, ARA 2025, Lake Superior Performance Rally, Steve Gingras
Publish Date May 30, 2025 DirtFish
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