It’s been 145 days since Brandon Semenuk drove a Subaru WRX in anger – not that you’d have known it when Friday’s opening day of the 2025 ARA National Championship presented by Kubota got underway in a deep-frozen Michigan.
The Canadian was on sublime Sno*Drift form, winning all eight of the day’s evening stages to build an advantage of more than two minutes in just 50 miles. Ahead of the event, the triple American champion admitted he’d actually preferred the roads around Atlanta 12 months ago, when winter skipped a season and left the place looking more LSPR than Sno*Drift.
That unseasonably warm event left Semenuk short of seat time aboard a snow-spec WRX, but he still looked totally at home on this week’s all-white and sheet ice stages.
“It’s nice to be back on snow,” he told DirtFish at the end of Friday evening. “The first couple of stages in that loop were actually a lot better than I thought they would be – they developed really well. But the last two were like so slippery and still lots of fresh snow on that last stage. It felt like you’re getting swallowed everywhere.”
Conner Martell starred on the final round last year, hustling Travis Pastrana all the way through LSPR, but coming south in Michigan and hitting the series’ winter round for the first time exposed the 27-year-old’s lack of experience on these roads and in these conditions.
Adding a splash of colour to the stages, the ex-factory 2015 Kubota-backed Subaru Impreza was comfortably second, but Martell admitted the night wasn’t without incident.
“We’re already off to a crazy start,” he told DirtFish. “We had a little spin on stage two. Then on the third stage in the second loop, we came up over a left five over crest and just hit ice and went straight off into what looked like a driveway; we drove up over some banks and back onto the stage. So yeah, some good excitement to start the day. I’m just glad we finished.”
A series returning Nick Allen (Ford Fiesta Rally3) topped the L4WD standings and held a strong third position after day one.
Subaru drivers Tayler Hoevenaar and Jimmy Pelizzari were squabbling over the lead of the Regional event before the former eased his Forrester clear with two big stage times to close out the opening evening’s action. Overall, they sat fourth and sixth respectively with Cameron Steely’s Ford Focus RS splitting them in fifth.
Hoevenaar’s not normally one to look at the times during the event, but he couldn’t resist it halfway through the first leg.
“BK (DirtFish’s Brenten Kelly) was there telling us if you’re not first, you’re last, so I had a look,” he laughed. “We were second overall [in Regional]. Sounds like Jimmy [Pelizzari] had some moments in the second loop – maybe I’ll look at those times again! But, oh boy, we’re here and looking forward to tomorrow.”
Sean Donnelly placed his all-new Renault Clio Rally3 seventh overnight, with Camden Sheridan (Subaru Impreza) and Alastair Scully (Mitsubishi Mirage) establishing an early advantage in Regional NA4WD and O4WD respectively.
Reid Andress rounded out the top 10 in his new Subaru. In the battle for two-wheel drive honors Chris Cyr guided his Fiesta ST to a comfortable National L2WD lead, with Matthew Nykanen doing the same in his BMW in the O2WD National class. Among the Regional two-wheel drive runners, Chris Nonack (Subaru BRZ) topped limited while Emmons Hathaway (Honda Civic) was out front in open.
