Kyle Petty shares a laugh when talking about the latest edition of his eponymous charity motorcycle journey, one that’s evolved to more regional routes that go a little easier on the odometer.
“The 500- and 600-mile days of our youth are gone,” Petty says with a chuckle.
That may be, but the 64-year-old former racer has packed a week’s full of activities into a healthy 1,400 miles in the 29th anniversary edition of this year’s Kyle Petty Charity Ride. The 2025 trek begins Saturday in Traverse City, Michigan, and ends May 9 in Hot Springs, Virginia, cutting a diagonal hook from the upper Midwest back to the Mid-Atlantic — all for a worthwhile cause.
RELATED: More about the Kyle Petty Charity Ride
The ride has raised $22 million in its lifetime for the Victory Junction camp and other children’s charities, including $1.8 million in funds raised from last year’s ride. The year-round camp opened its doors in 2004 in memory of Kyle’s son, Adam Petty; in the years since, more than 136,000 camp experiences have been provided to children ages 6 to 16 with serious and chronic medical conditions.
This year’s ride to benefit Victory Junction has been billed as a “Tour of Wonders,” and with good reason. The path takes participants along Great Lakes vistas, to majestic Niagara Falls, before landing at the endpoint near Virginia’s Shenandoah region. Multiple pit stops are planned, including the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, plus some laps at Watkins Glen International in New York.
Roughly 225 riders plan to make the weeklong trip, including celebrities such as Richard Petty, Ken Schrader, Kenny Wallace and the timeless Hershel McGriff. Petty says many riders are returning participants who have created a community through their years on the road, but he adds that newcomers have breathed new life into the ride, experiencing the trip and its sightseeing for the first time.
“We try to leave it open for new people coming up,” Petty says. “New people can experience it, and it’s funny, though, if you can get somebody to come once, they’re more than likely to come out three or four more times, and some of them just become long-term connections.”
Those long-lasting bonds extend to Victory Junction, which celebrated its 20th anniversary and completed extensive renovations to its water-park facilities last year.
“It’s just been incredible,” Petty said. “We are at that place now, after 27 years, that we have kids that came when they were 8 or 9, and now they come back as counselors. We have kids that came when they were 16 or 17, and now they’re working there. That’s phenomenal because it’s that same old thing: People tell you they already believe in the product, you don’t have to sell it. They already have that passion. They already have that desire to help other people, and when you see that’s really cool. So that’s the biggest thing is hopefully we’ll see more kids than we’ve ever seen.”
Even though this year’s ride is about to set sail, another big, round number is coming up for the event’s record books — next year’s 30th anniversary. Previous milestone editions of the ride have made significant coast-to-coast expeditions — such as roughly 3,700 miles from Seattle to Key Largo, Florida, for the 25th anniversary, and a 2,800-mile jaunt from Carlsbad, California, to Daytona Beach for the 20th.
Petty says organizers are already in the early planning stages for next year. The route? To be determined.
“We’ve crossed the country just about every way you can cross it,” Petty said. “… We’ve got so many suggestions in so many different ways. The problem is we’ve only got seven to nine days when the ride starts, so I don’t want to wear these people out, man. I want them to come back for the 31st year, but we’re already planning.”
Petty still marvels at how the philanthropic venture he founded is now nearing the end of its third decade. Fads have come and gone, he said, but the charity ride’s staying power has been built by the riders’ passion and those who rallied behind the family after Adam Petty’s death in 2000 and the camp that was part of his vision for the future.
That feeling, and the ride itself, have endured.
“It’s one of those crazy ideas that just hooked with a certain group of people, and then the camp came and it gave it a purpose,” Petty says. “Even though we were going to children’s hospitals, when the camp and Adam’s accident happened, it just gave it a purpose and a focus, and so many people have come along since then. I’ve told people all the time, when we built camp, we had a personal tragedy, and we raised our hand and said, ‘I think this is what we’re going to do.’ We turned around one day, and there were people behind us that were like, ‘yes, we’ll do that with you.’ The rides have kind of been the same thing. You look back one day, and all these people want to ride with you.
“So it surprises me that it’s still here after 30 years, but when I’m on the ride and I’m talking to the people on the ride, and I’m talking to the fans that come out along the way and the people you meet, it doesn’t surprise me as much.”
