Congratulations to Stephanie Ortega in California, the winner of the 2025 Swift Campout Video Challenge! Watch Stephanie’s 90-second video capturing her low-key summer solstice overnighter here…

For the second year running, we teamed up with the Swift Industries crew to host the Swift Campout Video Challenge, which encourages participants to capture and share their night out in a 90-second video. We received submissions from all across the globe and came together to pick a favorite. This year’s winner is Stephanie Ortega of California, who created a lovely short video from a group campout that included trail work, swimming, tasty camp food, watercoloring, stunning trails with big views, and friends coming together. What’s not to love?!

Stephanie will take home a massive prize package worth around $5,000 that includes a complete Pelago Stavanger bike, a full suite of bags from Swift Industries, wheels from Velocity, Widefoot Cargo Cages, a rack and basket from Old Man Mountain, a shirt from Party Shirt International, a £100 gift card from Passenger Clothing, a toolkit and palette from Art Toolkit, a coffee kit from Coava Coffee, a Field tube from Nocs Provisions, an Encase Pump and a pair of Morse Cages from Wolf Tooth Components, and much more. Find a quick recap of Stephanie’s Swift Campout below, followed by her winning video submission.

Words and photos by Stephanie Ortega

Any excuse to escape the city, we take it! People think LA is just a sprawling urban center, but damn, we have some good trails and massive forests to enjoy from rocky to lush singletrack. So, the Solstice campout begins.

Over the past couple of years, a few friends from the Lowelifes Respectable Citizens Club have worked to restore a bunch of backcountry trails we call our second homes. This year, we decided to enjoy our labor. We had a little bit of everything: fire road, tacos, painting, brush work, swimming, and just a bunch of rad folks hanging out.

Our journey started with four, and we picked up a few others along the way. We shuttled up to the start of our adventure in the forest. As we descended the fire road into the Angeles Forest, we then cut through to hop on a singletrack trail that tends to get overgrown and full of poison oak and poodle dog bush. Our mission was all about fun, but why not clear up the trails with a light brush work as we descended into camp?

After some light brushwork, it was time to get to our campsite and go for a nice cold swim. We got into the water and hung out until the sun started to set, and we started to shiver a little. We dried off and started setting up our tents and making dinner. By dinner time, we had an additional five others who joined us for some delicious tacos, hangs, and camping.

The next morning, we made our own take on chilaquiles before our next singletrack adventure back into the city. A couple of people headed back up the fire road while five of us continued our way to our next connector trail. We’ve all had some sweat spilled on this trail with Lowelife trail work weekends, but four of the five in our group had never actually ridden it, including me. It was such a blast and a reward to know that we helped restore the trail we now had the pleasure of riding.

After a descent, we got a little climb back out of the forest before the final push back into the city. But before we ended the fun weekend, we stopped to grab some burgers and then what felt like a long road ride back home because we traded the dirt and trees for concrete and street lights. The whole adventure was 20 miles of singletrack, fire roads, and a tiny bit of pavement with 2,913 feet of fully loaded climbing. What a trip!

Stephanie’s 2025 Swift Campout Video

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