Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1542014
P100 INTERVIEW I 2025 AMA H&H AND AMA NGPC CHAMPION DANTE OLIVEIRA I go year by year. I was abso- lutely stoked when I got my first championship after battling Zach Bell. "The second and third [cham- pionships] were the hardest to back up, but I feel like I've crafted that style of racing pretty well." Oliveira credits motocross for developing the speed needed to win this much faster style of racing and notes, "Al Posey was helping me out a little bit build - ing my engines here and there when I was younger, and he would always say, 'If you want to get faster, you have to race motocross.' So we started doing a bunch of local MX, because when you're little, whatever race that was going on that was local on the weekends, we were going to it, whether it was motocross, fairgrounds races, flat track, or hare scrambles, we were there! I think that always helped out later racing different stuff." Through motocross, they developed key traits for win - years finishing second Open Pro to legendary teammate Taylor Robert in WORCS, Oliveira grabbed the first of his two WORCS Championships in 2021, but he really came into his own in NGPC. Having first claimed the series title in 2020, he's been practically unbeatable there and earlier this year nabbed his sixth straight NGPC crown. He shows no signs of slowing down there and, in fact, seems to be getting better every year in the face of ever-faster competition. That surprised him as much as anyone: "I was always a woods guy, in a way, racing D-36 hare scrambles from the start, so even going to the grand prix was a big learning curve. I re - member showing up to those, at first me and my brother getting our doors blown off! Like, 'What is going on?' It took us a couple of years to get comfortable, and now we love it!" Asked how far he thinks he can take this run, he laughs and responds, "I don't know. or the bike if he didn't win; he just kept training and practicing until he became the best rider. He never asked for more than what we gave him; he just loved riding and racing. "We won a lot of races to - gether from 2017 to 2020, cap- ping it off with the 2020 AMA NGPC Championship. At the end of 2020, KTM asked if they could take Dante for the factory team, and that allowed me to free up budget to continue with Trystan Hart, who was making a big impact in extreme enduros and EnduroCross—and sign up Dante's younger brother, Mateo." "We did one year where I was factory-supported through KTM," Dante says. "I was still RPM, but KTM was building my bikes, and sometimes they'd send a mechanic with me." So, it was no surprise that Oliveira signed a full FMF KTM contract for 2021, which is where he's been ever since, and it has been a rewarding ride for both parties. After a few Oliveira began his AMA NGPC run in 2020 for the RPM Racing KTM satellite team. He signed with the FMF KTM factory team for 2021 and has remained there since—a mutually beneficial relationship.