I dont think RG is bringing a "Frankenstein" UTV to the 1000. Robby has a big money development program with Arctic Cat. His Robby Gordon Motorsports program is not bringing 3 new machines to the Baja 1000 for fun. This would be a business deal and his contract, just as it was when he was with Polaris, is he will be in a Arctic Cat UTV, not some one off build. Bringing some home made Frankenstein out for a 1 time race is not what RG does nor what Arctic Cat would want. Plus adding this to his program thins the focus on his TT program which is also part of his business program. What Robby did with Max at the Bluewater was for fun, but for Robby it is also a long term future business plan, as Max will be the heir to the Gordon Racing legacy.
I dont know for sure, and or what I do know I could not say anyways. But I would expect to see the next model of the Arctic Cat line up being brought to the races. The rules do say this must be a production model available to the public. Is Arctic Car getting a 1 race waver, before the big announcement of the new 2017 model? Maybe, who knows? But the Robby I know would not put his own money and time into a Frankenstein machine, or 3, if their was nothing more behind it.
Now for the rumors of the Arctic Cat UTV with a Yamaha engine (AKA a Frankenstein) Maybe most dont know this, but for those who do, lets look at the relationship both companies have. Arctic Cat used to have a relationship with Suzuki for their engines. A few years ago that went away and Arctic Cat and Yamaha came together to partner on the Snow Mobile side of the business, and this venture has been very good for both companies. Yamaha supplies the engines, and Arctic Cat designs the sleds, and each put their own body work and touches on the machines. Both the Yamaha and Arctic Cat sleds are built in Arctic Cats MN factories, again a big plus for Yamaha. The Yamaha YXZ1000 engine is actually a 3 cylinder 998 cc turbo motor (Genesis) Yamaha built for their partnership with Arctic Cat and is in many of their sleds. Yamaha decided that engine would also work in their UTV (under 1000cc's) and they pulled the Turbo off of it for the first gen YXZ1000 UTV. So with knowing this, it only makes sense that Arctic Cat would again partner with Yamaha on the UTV side of things. Its way more cost efficient for both sides to do so. The engine is not only proven in the snow sled side of things, but Yamaha has proven it to be a good platform for the UTV side of the business, and they have made a proven 5 speed trans for it also. Again another huge plus for both sides in regards to engineering & production costs.
