jakecarver91
Active Member
2016 Baja 500 Race Report
The 2016 SCORE Baja 500 was a brutal race from the time we left the driveway to the time we pulled back in. Our team had planned to leave around noon on Wednesday, June 1st to arrive at our rented house in Ensenada by 9PM. We were planning to get a good night’s sleep on Wednesday night and wake up early Thursday to start pre-running the course. Unfortunately, the three primary clutches I had on order for the race that were supposed to show up on Tuesday, were delayed until Thursday due to the Memorial Day holiday. I had ordered the clutches over a month prior to the race, but they were on back order from the factory and by the time I found out they were not making it in time, I had very little time to scramble to find another way to have fresh clutches for the race. Luckily after posting on AZ RZR (a facebook group) Tuesday night, I received a message from Blake Van De Loo Wednesday morning offering up a new primary clutch that he happened to have with him at work in downtown Phoenix. I also received a phone call from Dan Fisher of Lonestar Racing who offered up a new primary clutch that he had at the shop. I have to give a huge thanks to these two for getting me up and running and even sending me to Mexico with a brand new spare for race day. By the time we were loaded we were about an hour behind schedule, so one chase truck headed east to Lonestar to pick up the clutch on the way out and the chase truck I was driving headed to downtown Phoenix to pick the other clutch up from Blake. We got the clutches and were off to Mexico! Unfortunately at that point it was 3PM and I10 heading west through Phoenix was bumper to bumper traffic.
We made it to Buckeye, AZ in time to make a quick stop for some items we needed for the trip, fueled up, and kept heading west. The temperatures were exceeding 110 degrees on I10. About 80 miles from Yuma our first trailer tire separated. We pulled over and made a quick change and told the second chase truck to continue on in case we needed to pick anything up in Yuma. We were back on the road with no trailer spares. 5 miles later, POP, another tire separated and I watched the tread fly into the traffic behind me as cars swerved to miss it. I slowed down and realized the tire was not flat, the tread had just been peeled off. We continued towards Yuma at 60 MPH with 70 miles to go. We radioed up to our other chase truck and asked them to stop in Yuma and buy 5 new tires so we didn’t end up stranded in Mexico in the middle of the night. At this point it was 5:40PM and the truck was 20 miles from Yuma. Knowing most tire shops would close at 5 or 6, they hammered down and began calling shops. Pep Boys had 4 tires and wheels (they didn’t have any tires for the 14” wheels we had on the trailer so we decided to move to 15” wheels) ready to go when we pulled up at 6:30PM (yes we made it 70 miles on a tire with no tread). We un bolted the 4 wheels in the parking lot and went to install the new ones, and as luck would have it Pep boys gave us wheels with the wrong lug pattern. We had 10 minutes to make it to the only other store open, Sams Club, to purchase new tires. They sold us the new tires at 7PM but would not mount them on our wheels, so we went back to Pep Boys, where they mounted them for us. Jesus, the manager of the store was a Baja fan that was eager to help and actually came to visit with us two days later at tech and contingency down in Ensenada! It was now 8:00PM, we had 5 new tires mounted, and we were on a 2.5 hour trip to the Tecate border crossing that was going to close at 11PM. We made it just in time at 10:40PM to the crossing and continued through. The rest of our drive to Ensenada went well and we arrived to town around 1 O’clock AM. We were all starving so we made a stop at MK Taco and had some tacos before checking into our house for a few hours of sleep.
On Thursday we all woke up early, one truck headed out to chassis tech with the race car, and the other truck chased us as we pre ran the first and last 80 miles of the course. Unfortunately we were not able to pre-run the sections in between which would later prove to be the worst sections in the entire race. Friday we made our way through tech and contingency and wasted the whole day as usual. After the drivers meeting we headed back to the house to make sure all the trucks were loaded, the sat phones were all in the right vehicles, fuel cans were topped off, etc. We went to sleep at 1 O’clock AM on Saturday morning, again.
Finally, we are to the fun part, RACE DAY!!! We arrived at the start where our chase crew dropped us at 9:00AM. We patiently waited during the start delays and used our time wisely by cracking jokes with other racers about who was going to break down first. Johnny Angal made it clear that “when” I break down, he would be passing me with his middle finger out the window. We laughed it off and made sure to tell him that we were happy he ran into issues with his new prerunner while he spent the week getting to know the track! As we waited to take the green flag in line, the course official came up to the car and said there was a new speed limit that was 5MPH due to the accident “until we see the policia waving us on”. Before I could ask him where it started, the flag dropped and we were off. Even though we were not obeying the 5MPH, and we were clipping along at somewhere around 30MPH we soon realized that no one else was obeying the speed limit either, when Jagged X blew past us on the pavement even after starting 30 seconds behind us. We said screw it and hammered down behind Jagged X. We would follow their dust for several miles. As we made our way out of town, just before the 37MPH speed zone at mile marker 9 Marc Burnett caught us. We quickly pulled over and let him by knowing that the pace he was running would not last long. When we were cruising through the speed zone he was already pulled over and working on his car. We went back by him and continued on. We soon caught up to Sims where he was sitting off of the side of the road with a front left tire hanging on by a strand at RM27. We were now physically 3rd place behind Wayne Matlock and Jagged X. Less than a mile later we got stopped at the infamous log jam.
While sitting at the log Jam, Jagged X took the initiative to start going around the buggies. I thought it was a great idea, as it looked as if it was a jam of 10 or 12 buggies and us 4x4 UTVs could most likely squeeze right around them and be on our way. Wayne followed jagged and we followed him. As we crested the next hill, I think all of us came upon a big surprise; approximately 40 additional trucks and buggies. Knowing our path didn’t lead around all of these guys we jumped back in line. As we all sat and everyone grew impatient, I looked to my right and saw Cory Sappington and a line of other UTVs going around us. At that time I had two decisions; stay in line as I knew the trucks and buggies were getting pissed and have 10+ UTVs gain another hour on me, or follow the pack. I as well as many others followed the pack. Once again we would all find another hill that would hold us back from passing the remaining 10 or so trucks and buggies. We all began to merge with trucks and buggies as they grew more and more angry and impatient. Sirens were sounding as if it were 911 and middle fingers were poking out of every window net I could see. Sappington jumped back in line and immediately got tangled up with a 10 car. Cognito jumped in line and Ampudia floored his class 8 truck into the back of them using them as his brakes on a downhill grade. Johnny Angal jumped back in line and got nerfed by a truck as well. I thought for sure 50% of the UTVs were not coming out of the jam. I noticed Wayne ahead of me signaling guys to let him in and trying the courteous route rather than jumping in the first gap possible so I followed him. We both jumped in line un-harmed and the buggies around us were relatively satisfied, at least for the circumstances. We would wait another hour from this point as everyone fought for positions further up in line. Alonzo Lopez was the only UTV to get through the jam ahead of everyone and buy himself a 1 hour buffer in front of every other UTV. We came out of the jam roughly 10th place and knew we had some time to make up.
Knowing that the rest of the field was just sitting in the same 1.5 hour jam that we were, we tried to remain calm and keep a pace that would get us through the remaining 450 miles of the race. We went by Wayne a few miles later as he was fixing what looked like a flat tire or possibly a belt failure and continued on. Only a few miles later, I noticed Wayne in our mirror and we quickly pulled over knowing he was on a mission and knew the course much better than we did. Shortly after, we were caught by the general lee NA car for which we pulled over and let by as he bounced out of control over the whoops. From that point on we saw no action until we started to get close to our first schedule pit stop at RM70. At approximately RM 68 we caught back up to the General Lee car that was still bouncing over the whoops as our 4 seat chassis and Lonestar Suspension was soaking them up. We got right on his tail and hit the siren, but he proceeded to floor it as the whoops came to a halt and try to run away from us. We knew we had a pit in less than 2 miles at this point so we let him go. We almost missed our pit at RM 70 because there were 50 + chase vehicles on the side of the road, but we were able to find them at the last second before we were too far from them to stop. The crew did an awesome job of fueling us up, refilling our camelbacks, and changing a belt as we knew we were going into the hottest section of the day and wanted to make sure we had a fresh belt to run after idling for an hour and a half at the log jam. We took back off and turned off the pavement towards BFG pit 1. This was by far the scariest part of our race. There were 5 + cars that we met in the next 15 miles that were traveling backwards on the race course. Most of them were locals who would fly off of the track barely avoiding a head on collision with us. We also passed some pit vehicles including Brenthel Racing who were going the wrong way on the race course. This was very disappointing since these guys all knew exactly where the race course was, and that they were traveling backwards on it putting other racers in danger. We caught the 1907 NA general lee car again around RM 83, a couple miles before BFG pit 1. We patiently waited for him to pull over again and he floored it to try to lose us just like the last time we caught him. We following him 2 miles until we passed the BFG pit. My co driver and I both noticed that he had no mirrors and his back bumper had some fresh dents in it, so we assumed this was not his first time blocking someone in this race. We gave him a bump and he moved over. Our bump was strictly bumper to bumper and no tires made contact. We passed him and continued on. Approximately 1 mile later there was a hard left around a barb wire fence after a long straight. We made the left looking back to see if we had any other competitors behind us but all we saw was the general lee car a couple hundred yards back. Right before the corner there was a G out. My co driver and I both happened to be watching the general lee car as he bottomed out going too fast through the g out and it sent his ass end up in the air. The car turned sideways on its two front wheels and when it landed at a 90* angle to the course the rear tire caught and sent him tumbling. We both said “oh sh$t!” and I began to slow down and stop as we were going to turn around and make sure they were OK. There were several spectators in this location that went running to the rescue so we continued on.
We soon made it to the long slow climb that led to the summit. The temperatures were now rising above 100* and we were sweating profusely. As we were slowly making our way up to the summit, our car began to run hot. Our car was hitting 215* with the fan running the whole time. We knew we were in trouble for the upcoming lake bed. We made our way down the summit and continued on to the lake bed. As we were entering the lake bed we went by Burnett was broken down at a pit in the middle of nowhere. When we made it to the silt beds our car began to get even hotter. The car was running 221* and the belt gauge was reading 230*. We slowed down as much as possible without getting stuck. We were crawling through the silt beds when my co driver said “oh crap pull over” Murray Racing was right on our tail. Sorry if we took a second to get out of your way, we thought we were alone out there!!! For the remaining portions of the lake bed we fought overheating issues into the evening. We passed back by Murray once we got a silt free area that allowed us to roll into the throttle. We then caught Johnny Angal and made a pass on him in a wash, making sure that we flew the bird out of our window nets as we went by. We pounded through silt, whoops, rocks, etc. until we finally made it to our second scheduled pit at RM 205. We pulled in extremely worn out and tired from the brutal heat and turtle pace that we had been running the past 130 + miles. We had been hearing a clank in our front end for 20 or so miles but we were so busy trying to chug Gatorade and eat sandwiches that I completely forgot. Luckily Justin Quinn and his co dog Mikey were waiting right next to our crew to get into their car that was not far behind us. Mikey said “hey your front axle is all messed up”! LOL. I told Jesse Fletcher on our crew to check it out and he quickly scrambled for a spare axle to replace it with. While the guys were working on the car, I decided to turn one of my 2 batteries off as I knew we were going into the night and I figured I would try to save one in case we had charging issues, this would later come back to haunt us. The guys replaced the axle, topped off our fuel, and sent us on our way. The pit felt like 30 seconds since we were trying to get some food and liquid in our bodies. As we were sitting, Murray Motorsports and Jagged X both passed by us. Luckily when we pulled out, the Murrays were just down the dirt road about 100’ and were still in their pit; we passed back by them and continued on. We hit RM 210 where Jagged X was making a driver change and we passed them. We were back in a decent position and we continued on.
The next 30 miles of the race would be the most brutal beating I had taken in a long time. The whoops to San Felipe definitely held up to their reputation of the most brutal whoop section in desert racing. Our car handles most things you throw at it with ease, but these whoops were indescribable in certain areas. Some areas we could hammer down and get moving at a good rate of speed, but some areas felt like small jumps, one after another, that caused us to bottom out each time. Our shocks had to be 1000 degrees because by the end of the 30 mile stretch, even the small whoops were causing our ass end to whack the sand. The whole way to San Felipe our vehicle temperatures did not drop. We were still running 221* and it was tough to keep the car at that. With the wrong combination of throttle and speed our temps were jumping to 226* and I was forced to lift so that we wouldn’t hit 230* and go into limp mode. As we approached San Felipe and the portion of the course that was not on GPS, we caught up to Cory Sappington. We followed him until we found a good straight away to get around him. We were pumped to see another car after what seemed like the longest, slowest section of the race. Our crew was waiting in San Felipe to watch us drive by and make sure we didn’t have any issues. We flew past them on a high speed straight away and I hit my second wind of energy. I was having fun again. Unfortunately the next straight away we would turn on to would be just as whooped out as the last 30 or so miles were. We proceeded to bounce through the whoops and continue on to our next schedule pit at RM 345. From San Felipe to RM 345 was my second least favorite part of the course. It was silty, rocky, whooped out, and slow going. Somewhere between RM300 and RM345 we were finally cruising at a decent pace through a sandy wash and all of the sudden the car lost power. I pumped the throttle a couple times dumbfounded as to why the car was running poor. I looked at the dash and noticed we were in limp mode with our temperature light on and our gauge was reading 248*. Being tired and cranky I raised my voice at my co dog and said “why weren’t you watching that” of course this wasn’t going to help our issue at this point but it had been a long day/night and I was bummed. I later apologized. We slowed down and tried to let the car cool but it hit 258* in a matter of seconds so I pulled over and stopped. I let the car idle thinking the fan would cool it, but little did I know, our voltage had dropped below 12 and our new brushless high flow fan didn’t have enough juice to kick on. The car hit 268* and I shut it down. I hate shutting down an engine that hot but it was only climbing and I had no option. We both got out of the car and realized the fan wasn’t running. I remembered my stupid battery preservation decision that I had made at RM205 and I flipped the second battery on. The fan kicked on right about the time Cory Sappington was passing by us. I was disappointed in myself for turning the second battery off but at this point I was just hoping that our engine wasn’t hurt. I tried to slowly remove the cap on the radiator but it had some wicked pressure and I didn’t want to burn my co dog and I, so I tightened it back down. We got back in the car and tried to fire it. It started right up. POLARIS KICKS ASS!!!!! We let the fan cool the motor while we shut everything down minus the rear facing lights. We buckled up and got back on course. We were probably sitting for roughly 15 minutes. For the next 30 or 40 miles we battled overheating issues and limp mode. We lost so much coolant from overheating that we had an air bubble in our system. I knew we needed to bleed it, but I knew it would take a while to get cool enough to open the cap and bleed the head, so we limped to our next pit. Our temperature was going all over the place. It would say 199* and then one second later say 260* and put the car in limp mode. We radioed our crew to tell them what was going on so that they could get tools ready. I also requested some Ibuprofen and a redbull as the last section had completely worn me out and my seat felt as if all of the padding was squished down to 1/8” thick.
We pulled in to our pit at RM345 tired and beat. I chugged a redbull, took some Ibuprofen, and killed a sandwich. My co driver said he didn’t want any Ibuprofen and I looked at him as if he was crazy. The crew slowly took the cap off of the coolant reservoir as I was yelling at them not to burn us. Luckily all of the pressure was just air. They jacked the front end up to try to get all of the air to come to the font and began filling the reservoir and fueled the car up. Another crew member, Jesse was at the back of the car trying to bleed the head. Every few seconds I would hear a “FU$*K” or a “SH$t”. Anyone who has bled the head on an RZR knows that the screw is very hard to get to, especially with a red hot turbo in front of it. As we were sitting I watched Murray and Kristen Matlock go by as my crew cracked some jokes about a girl beating me. I laughed it off and threw some choice words back at them. After about 10 minutes I spared Jesse’s hand and told him to forget it, the pit was taking too long and I didn’t want to lose any more positions. I have to give it to him though, if it were me I probably would have laughed at the driver and told him to pound sand. Jesse has always been a great tech and I am more than lucky to have him as a crew member. We took off and passed back by the Murrays while they were working on their car in their pit. Our crew had called us and said that Cory Sappington was in pits getting work done on his car and that we had passed him. They mentioned that we were now 3rd in class behind Matlock and Cognito. We were easy on the car after leaving pits until we were convinced that our cooling system was working. We then put the hammer down.
When we came back by our crew at the road crossing around RM 440ish, they burst our bubble and let us know that they had made a mistake and Corry Sappington was still in front of us. To top it off they mentioned someone else was also in front of us, but they didn’t know who. We were told we were now 5th in class physically. We put the hammer down with hopes of getting into a podium spot, but the remaining race course was smooth graded, high speed roads, with low likelihood of anyone breaking down. Just before the speed zone coming back in to Ensenada a class 8 RPM truck caught us and scared the crap out of us. We pulled over as the monster sped by. We soon passed them back when they were changing a tire on the side of the course. In the last sections, our GPS was confusing and we missed a couple turns and a VCP, having to go across the desert a couple of times to get back on course or hit the VCP. At last we had made it to the paved section going into Ensenada. The air was so moist and the fog was so bad that I had to flip my visor up and take the moisture straight to the eyes. There is always some type of element to fight in Baja no matter how close you are to the finish. We drifted around the last corner and cruised up on to the mesa. We had finally made it. Our crew was waiting as I gave a brief description of our race on the big screen. This was a hard fought finish for us from Wednesday until roughly 3:00AM on Sunday when we finished. We were all worn out. We then headed back to the house to get a nap in before we hit the road back to the states.
I want to give a huge thanks to the crew, my sponsors, my girlfriend, my family, and all of my friends that helped us get to the finish line of the 48th Baja 500!! Without all of these people I would not be able to do what I love! A 5th overall UTV and 5th in Pro Forced Induction UTV Class was not what we had planned for this race but we were still ecstatic to cross the finish line! Luckily for us, we run ITP TIRES and we had zero flats to fix the entire 477.5 miles.