January 10, 2018- Parker, AZ- What an awesome way to kick-off the 2018 season! I raced at the BITD UTV Winter Nationals last weekend in Parker, AZ and had so much fun racing in the desert! We headed to Parker early on Thursday morning to make sure we got there in time to go through tech and contingency. After tech, we finished some last minute prep on my car and we were ready for Friday’s race. I would be racing the short course race in the Production 700/800 class. The short course is still much longer than what I usually race, but I was excited to do it. It was an hour long timed race and we estimated we would do about three 15.5 mile laps in the allotted time.
We lined up on Friday afternoon and got ready to take off. This race was a dead engine start, so I didn’t take my eyes off of the flagger. The flag dropped, I started my car, and took off. I got the hole shot off the line, and after a few quick in field turns, I headed out into the desert on a long straight away with my foot to the floor. BITD did not allow us to pre-run the course, so I was super focused as I settled in to the first 15.5 miles. The course was marked well and fairly easy to navigate. Within the first lap, I had about a 30 second lead on second place. The car was running flawlessly, so I had no reason to pit. I went through the Parker Python, passed the pits, and headed back out for my second lap. I was able to maintain my 30 second lead through lap two, and everything was still running great, so I passed the pit again and headed out for my third lap. I was able to maintain my lead through lap three, but time didn’t expire, so we were going to head out for a fourth lap. My car is designed to race short course, and my aftermarket fuel tank is perfect for that. But this was a much longer desert race, and I wasn’t going to make a fourth lap without refueling. My pit crew radioed to me and told me to pit. They were ready for me and had me refueled and out of my pit in about 30 seconds. As they were putting up my window net, second place passed by the pits, taking over the lead. I took off after him. As we headed back out into the desert, the course had become chewed up and extremely dusty. I tried to pass numerous times, but I couldn’t get it done. I crossed the finish line after 62 miles in 2nd place.
We have three weeks off before we begin the 2018 WORCS, DIRT, and Quad X & UTV Racing Series, so we will be doing prep work and testing on my cars before those series begin. I am looking forward to 2018!
