dustybronco
www.sextonoffroad.com
- Location
- Kamas, UT
If you haven't read Part I please do at this link. Here is the rest of the story.
http://www.rockymountainextreme.com/showthread.php?p=671719#post671719
Thursday Carl’s wrist was in worse shape and he and Danny headed to town while the rest of the pit crew went with me to the Remote Masters pit. Lining them up for the 4th 5th and 6th pit stops we headed back to camp. As we came back to camp we noticed Hammer Town had grown in population from the small village we started with to a massive city of Campers, Tents and Motor homes stretching all the way across the lake bed and merging into the two suburbs of campers to the west. There had to be at least 20,000 fans, volunteers and racers. Finally preparations to the Race car were made and Carl returned with a wrist brace and news he had nothing more than a sprained wrist. The doctor told him he could race. The drivers meeting that night gave us the heads up for the final race. We would start 83rd the next day and had the route laid out in our GPS. We made a light dinner and headed to bed to do our final pre-runs in our heads.
The Main Race was finally upon us and preparations were complete. We lined up in our position on racers row at 0530. The sun had yet to waken and neither had the crew. Carl and I spent the final hours discussing various strategies for the race. Staying warm around the fire the sun and the entire city of spectators awoke. We climbed into 4465 at around 0745 after the National Anthem was sung. With the lead cars roaring onto the course we made our way in pairs of two’s to the start line. We took off with a roar of Ford thunder approximately 25 minutes after the leaders. The first section of course was a grueling 12 miles of Whoop de do’s and rough sections of desert. It was very disheartening every time we were passed by the faster cars running larger tires, better suspensions and bigger motors. No worries we will get them in the rocks. Through out the first section we came across lost tools and broken down rigs. This is a 135 mile race breaking down in the first 10 miles is not a good showing. Perhaps tough old Fred is not at such a disadvantage.
We hit the first pit and slowed to 25 mph, this was not a planned stop so all we did was locate our crew and stick the thumbs up out the windshield. We rolled along for another mile of desert and bottlenecked into the first rock trail Crowbar right behind the east coast Bronco Lou Levy. We sailed down Crowbar passing 3 or 4 rigs slowed or stopped due to breakage. About the middle of Crowbar we passed Dustin Webster with his hood up. Shouting to him he gave us his always encouraging shout. Near the bottom of Crowbar we had an option of two lines and since we had not pre-run this section of course we didn’t really know which to choose. The lane on the left had traffic so we chose the right lane. We thought we might be in trouble when we heard the crowd stand up and say “They are going for it”. We approached and crossed over an axle shaft drilled into the rock for a winch point and started off way too far right. With the passenger side climbing a rock and the driver’s side starting to drop I gave Carl a little encouraging word to steer driver and get ready to gas it. The front end started to drop and we realized the water fall was rather tall and straight down. Too late now the rear end started to chase and the buggy started shift left. Gas, gas, gas, Carl stomped the throttle and the front end pulled away from the ledge enough to allow the rear to drop back down and we settled down the waterfall like a spider monkey shimmying down a Banana tree. At the bottom we heard mention of a flat and suspected something wrong. We had yet to know it but the right front tire had been punctured and was now flat. We exited the entrance to Crowbar and headed out onto Soggy Lake Bed, more aptly named than Means Dry Lake Bed, being it was full of water. Carl could feel something in the front end but the buggy handled well enough and we continued the next ten miles to the pit. Suspecting we had a flat we pulled into the second pit looking for our guys Mark and Aaron. They had set themselves up a bit far back and we had a hard time finding them. Immediately we pulled into the pit, Mark the pit leader took off running and left Aaron alone. I looked at Aaron and ask “do we have a flat?” Aaron stared back and said “you want air in all four tires?” “what? No” I said “do we have a flat”. At that time Mark came back with a completely new pit crew from Jimmy’s 4x4. The Jimmy’s guys changed our front tire with their jack and tools that Mark had forgotten to bring. Just goes to show the support everyone receives not only from their own team mates but other competitor’s teams as well. Quickly we were on our way and back into the desert we dove.
The next section of desert was rougher than the first, with whoops that were bigger than buildings. There were many cars broken down here and before we could make it back to the main pit we came to a pile of cars stopped below a sand hill. From a distance we watched a buggy come from out of view to the right to make a high speed approach to the sand hill. Not knowing what was going on it looked like a spectator trying to climb the side of the course. We headed in at high speed and looked to the other 4 vehicles at the bottom for directions. Receiving none we followed the other buggy straight up the sand hill and with loads of v8 power climbed our way to the top. Carl and I later discussed this tactic still unsure if we had just cut 4 competitors off waiting for their chance at the hill, but hey it’s a race after all. With in a few miles we made it back to main and stopped at the next check point. We headed through pit row waving to our guys as we headed south east to the start of After Shock.
We reached After Shock after 15 or so miles of high speed whoops and desert hill climbs. At this point we had traveled about 45 miles and were ready for some rock crawling. We dove into after shock and the crowd started to grow. By the time we reached the mid point obstacle there were 1500 fans and 8 to 10 racers bottled up in the canyon. Watching the other racers gave no encouragement for the next section of rocks. One car was jammed in the middle. One jammed up on the left and two trying to climb the right. The first car on the right made the climb and the second was spinning tires in a hole. Carl waited in line while I jumped out to asses the lines. While waiting another racer pulled up along side Carl and asked him to back up a little. Well the jerk cut him off and started on the right line as soon as the car in front cleared. Payback is painful and soon that car was stuck. I had found the line and was tired of waiting so I spotted Carl in and with out spinning a tire we made the rest of them look stupid. Stupid that is until we got to the top of the s turn where Carl got a little throttle happy and bounced 4465 on its drivers side right in front of you know who, El Jerko. With my encouragement and yelling the car was now pushing into Fred trying to tip him back over. With one tire spinning on the hood and the other spinning on the roof above Carls head that car broke his rear axle and was out of the race. Like I said payback’s a *****. With a little encouragement the crowd jumped down grabbed the side of our buggy and flipped it upright in time for us to take off and leave the rest of the cars wondering what happened. I didn’t climb back in until the next check point just in case more spotting was needed. We belted back up, exchanged high fives and headed for Sun Bonnet.
We climbed through Sun Bonnet with no challenges and made the Masters pit stop. The crew was prepared for us and we received a couple quarts of oil, our first fuel for the day, and a couple of snacks for the occupants.
After pitting we headed to Outer limits and ran into our first missed turn. Looking at the GPS we realized we were off course and made a complete 180 and got back on track. We headed down Outer limits and bounced across the next section of desert. The next sections of desert we high speed and we had old Fred up to a whopping 53 mph. We did manage to pass a few cars along the way and as we rolled into the check point by the BFG pit we saw Shannon Cambell tear out like he was on fire. I’m sure he was, because for the second year in a row he burned up a transmission. We made a hard 90 degree turn and headed into another fast section watching Shannon eat up the miles while we plugged along. Around Mile marker 95 we pulled along side Roger Lovell who was having fuel issues. Roger was able to race along side of us for a few miles but dropped back before we hit Resolution trail.
Please be patient for Part III. RME only allows 10000 words and apparently I type like a woman talks. TOO MUCH!
http://www.rockymountainextreme.com/showthread.php?p=671719#post671719
Thursday Carl’s wrist was in worse shape and he and Danny headed to town while the rest of the pit crew went with me to the Remote Masters pit. Lining them up for the 4th 5th and 6th pit stops we headed back to camp. As we came back to camp we noticed Hammer Town had grown in population from the small village we started with to a massive city of Campers, Tents and Motor homes stretching all the way across the lake bed and merging into the two suburbs of campers to the west. There had to be at least 20,000 fans, volunteers and racers. Finally preparations to the Race car were made and Carl returned with a wrist brace and news he had nothing more than a sprained wrist. The doctor told him he could race. The drivers meeting that night gave us the heads up for the final race. We would start 83rd the next day and had the route laid out in our GPS. We made a light dinner and headed to bed to do our final pre-runs in our heads.
The Main Race was finally upon us and preparations were complete. We lined up in our position on racers row at 0530. The sun had yet to waken and neither had the crew. Carl and I spent the final hours discussing various strategies for the race. Staying warm around the fire the sun and the entire city of spectators awoke. We climbed into 4465 at around 0745 after the National Anthem was sung. With the lead cars roaring onto the course we made our way in pairs of two’s to the start line. We took off with a roar of Ford thunder approximately 25 minutes after the leaders. The first section of course was a grueling 12 miles of Whoop de do’s and rough sections of desert. It was very disheartening every time we were passed by the faster cars running larger tires, better suspensions and bigger motors. No worries we will get them in the rocks. Through out the first section we came across lost tools and broken down rigs. This is a 135 mile race breaking down in the first 10 miles is not a good showing. Perhaps tough old Fred is not at such a disadvantage.
We hit the first pit and slowed to 25 mph, this was not a planned stop so all we did was locate our crew and stick the thumbs up out the windshield. We rolled along for another mile of desert and bottlenecked into the first rock trail Crowbar right behind the east coast Bronco Lou Levy. We sailed down Crowbar passing 3 or 4 rigs slowed or stopped due to breakage. About the middle of Crowbar we passed Dustin Webster with his hood up. Shouting to him he gave us his always encouraging shout. Near the bottom of Crowbar we had an option of two lines and since we had not pre-run this section of course we didn’t really know which to choose. The lane on the left had traffic so we chose the right lane. We thought we might be in trouble when we heard the crowd stand up and say “They are going for it”. We approached and crossed over an axle shaft drilled into the rock for a winch point and started off way too far right. With the passenger side climbing a rock and the driver’s side starting to drop I gave Carl a little encouraging word to steer driver and get ready to gas it. The front end started to drop and we realized the water fall was rather tall and straight down. Too late now the rear end started to chase and the buggy started shift left. Gas, gas, gas, Carl stomped the throttle and the front end pulled away from the ledge enough to allow the rear to drop back down and we settled down the waterfall like a spider monkey shimmying down a Banana tree. At the bottom we heard mention of a flat and suspected something wrong. We had yet to know it but the right front tire had been punctured and was now flat. We exited the entrance to Crowbar and headed out onto Soggy Lake Bed, more aptly named than Means Dry Lake Bed, being it was full of water. Carl could feel something in the front end but the buggy handled well enough and we continued the next ten miles to the pit. Suspecting we had a flat we pulled into the second pit looking for our guys Mark and Aaron. They had set themselves up a bit far back and we had a hard time finding them. Immediately we pulled into the pit, Mark the pit leader took off running and left Aaron alone. I looked at Aaron and ask “do we have a flat?” Aaron stared back and said “you want air in all four tires?” “what? No” I said “do we have a flat”. At that time Mark came back with a completely new pit crew from Jimmy’s 4x4. The Jimmy’s guys changed our front tire with their jack and tools that Mark had forgotten to bring. Just goes to show the support everyone receives not only from their own team mates but other competitor’s teams as well. Quickly we were on our way and back into the desert we dove.
The next section of desert was rougher than the first, with whoops that were bigger than buildings. There were many cars broken down here and before we could make it back to the main pit we came to a pile of cars stopped below a sand hill. From a distance we watched a buggy come from out of view to the right to make a high speed approach to the sand hill. Not knowing what was going on it looked like a spectator trying to climb the side of the course. We headed in at high speed and looked to the other 4 vehicles at the bottom for directions. Receiving none we followed the other buggy straight up the sand hill and with loads of v8 power climbed our way to the top. Carl and I later discussed this tactic still unsure if we had just cut 4 competitors off waiting for their chance at the hill, but hey it’s a race after all. With in a few miles we made it back to main and stopped at the next check point. We headed through pit row waving to our guys as we headed south east to the start of After Shock.
We reached After Shock after 15 or so miles of high speed whoops and desert hill climbs. At this point we had traveled about 45 miles and were ready for some rock crawling. We dove into after shock and the crowd started to grow. By the time we reached the mid point obstacle there were 1500 fans and 8 to 10 racers bottled up in the canyon. Watching the other racers gave no encouragement for the next section of rocks. One car was jammed in the middle. One jammed up on the left and two trying to climb the right. The first car on the right made the climb and the second was spinning tires in a hole. Carl waited in line while I jumped out to asses the lines. While waiting another racer pulled up along side Carl and asked him to back up a little. Well the jerk cut him off and started on the right line as soon as the car in front cleared. Payback is painful and soon that car was stuck. I had found the line and was tired of waiting so I spotted Carl in and with out spinning a tire we made the rest of them look stupid. Stupid that is until we got to the top of the s turn where Carl got a little throttle happy and bounced 4465 on its drivers side right in front of you know who, El Jerko. With my encouragement and yelling the car was now pushing into Fred trying to tip him back over. With one tire spinning on the hood and the other spinning on the roof above Carls head that car broke his rear axle and was out of the race. Like I said payback’s a *****. With a little encouragement the crowd jumped down grabbed the side of our buggy and flipped it upright in time for us to take off and leave the rest of the cars wondering what happened. I didn’t climb back in until the next check point just in case more spotting was needed. We belted back up, exchanged high fives and headed for Sun Bonnet.
We climbed through Sun Bonnet with no challenges and made the Masters pit stop. The crew was prepared for us and we received a couple quarts of oil, our first fuel for the day, and a couple of snacks for the occupants.
After pitting we headed to Outer limits and ran into our first missed turn. Looking at the GPS we realized we were off course and made a complete 180 and got back on track. We headed down Outer limits and bounced across the next section of desert. The next sections of desert we high speed and we had old Fred up to a whopping 53 mph. We did manage to pass a few cars along the way and as we rolled into the check point by the BFG pit we saw Shannon Cambell tear out like he was on fire. I’m sure he was, because for the second year in a row he burned up a transmission. We made a hard 90 degree turn and headed into another fast section watching Shannon eat up the miles while we plugged along. Around Mile marker 95 we pulled along side Roger Lovell who was having fuel issues. Roger was able to race along side of us for a few miles but dropped back before we hit Resolution trail.
Please be patient for Part III. RME only allows 10000 words and apparently I type like a woman talks. TOO MUCH!
