Here’s the rundown of the weekend, must say we definitely made our mark with the smallest engine of the field by over 125cc’s…..and some of the best flights of the field!
The race started on Thursday with testing on a small test track with the guys from Elka where we noticed in the gigantic whoops that we were absorbing the whoops and not skimming over them….the whoops were between 3-4 feet! So we decided to re-valve the fronts stiffer and continued with the tests, now we stayed atop the whoops and could attack them full throttle. Also, with the stiffer valving this would insure a perfectly flat platform when jumping and WOW can this thing fly!
Friday was a day for getting everything checked out and ready for the race, a complete run-through of the Wildcat was done to checkout all bolts, pivots and chassis. This thing was tight; nothing came loose even with all the intense testing from the day before, essentially, just had to clean the Sport waiting for qualifying on Saturday.
Saturday morning at 10am was the first time we would drive on the track for practice / qualifying, where we first really felt the clutching shortfalls of not receiving the clutch weights from AC. With our Traxion Gripper 26″ x 9″ we were revving at only 7500rpm and it showed on the straightaways where we would lose 5-6 length to the other contenders in the mod 600-850cc class. Luckily we had by far the best suspension geometry and made up for the lack of straight line speed and I must stress that this is in no way a problem that came by the Stage 3R products from Evolution Powersports but, by our inability to clutch the motor correctly. We finally qualified 13th overall and 3rd in our class.
After the disappointing 3rd place qualifying effort and taking into consideration the 3′ deep ruts that formed in key corners, we decided to put on our 27″ Traxion Gripper tires in order to further improve our cornering speed. It worked! The race was scheduled for a 7pm start and a length of 1hr on a track that Beau Barron qualified as the hardest and most demanding in North America! After the start, we kept our position and slowly made our way through the field with some great passes and some serious air, we would pass Maverick Turbo’s in the jump section and several journalists called us the Wildcat high flyers…at the end of the grooling first heat the generalized washboard effect was present throughout the track and got so bad that I had to hold my breath in several sections not to lose it from compressing in the suspension seat! So after the first of two hours, we were first in class with a commanding 1min lead over second and two laps over third! And with by far the smallest engine out of all 26 participants we finished 8th overall…
After a great first day that saw us finish in 1st place in our class (Mod 600-850) and 8th position overall, we were ready for the start of the 2nd race. As with the first race it was a rolling start in dual file like a stock car race, at the green we launched ahead of the 6th place Maverick to later get passed back by him once up to speed, coming into the first corner I fit the Wildcat Sport in a small opening on the inside line going into the first corner. Luckily we made it out unscaved and were still in 8th position going into the jumps section, passed 2 Mavericks on the next 2 table tops and was in 6th going into the sand pit drop, kept my position for the remainder of the technical section (approx. 1 mile). Getting on the front straightaway (about ½ mile) I stayed on the inside and got passed by both Maverick’s and the second place modded CF Moto, the modded CF Moto’s (4x) would hold with the Maverick Turbo on the straightaways (honestly doubt they were under 850cc’s, they flew by on the straights) but, the agility, suspension geometry and setup of our Wildcat Sport would hold off anyone in the jumps section.
Once I saw the second place contender pass me I knew I still had 51 seconds in the bank, so it was only a game of following him within that time frame and we would still win our class. I stayed within 4-5 seconds of him just to put some pressure on him to force an error but at the 42 min. mark of the second 1hr heat, as I was riding a berm on a right handed turn going into the sand pit drop the outer tie-rod end let go and that was the end of the race for us.
It was gut wrenching, but we proved to all 15,000 spectators and journalists that the Wildcat Sport Limited is a force to be reckoned with, out jumping with perfectly level flights in the jump sections and awesome cornering even if we were 4” narrower than the 1000’s (thanks to the Arctic Cat suspension geometry, Elka Stage 5 shocks and Pace Offroad sway bar). I must say I had a blast driving this machine, never felt so confident on landings (our Wildcat X 1000 flies perfectly straight on jumps that have proper length jump faces, but those are rare). The Wildcat Sport with its shorter wheelbase makes an awesome platform for most ATV tracks that have shorter jump faces and tight whoop sections. Everything held together perfectly, just the outer tie-rod, but as I stated to Arctic Cat and Evolution Powersports this was the ultimate torture test…you’ll know why when the videos will be ready.
