General Tire SNORE Mint 400 – Best Race North of the Border?

North of the border most notable race of the year? You be the judge. Now we know that the season just started but we certainly feel that this Off-Road classic has transformed itself into a worthy adversary. SNORE sure isn’t snoozing on this one. SCORE and BITD… take note.

It all started with the prerun that they call “Fun Run” on Thursday and then Friday’s contingency activity held on Freemont Street. The race was held Saturday north of Las Vegas on parts of the historic Mint400 course. Four times 100.6 miles to be exact.

McBeth, McMillin, Johnson and Steele battled back and forth early in the race leaving all bets open on who would pull off a trophy truck or overall win. But once the dust settled over the City of Sins, our champion was none other than Bebo (AKA Andy McMillen).

Two out of two for 2009. With those odds, we might just have to take Bebo to the craps table with us. What’s this kids secret? Obviously driving skill, and a top notch pit to fix a broken drive shaft, skidplate and header along with no flats during the entire race may have been the winning combination. In true family racing tradition Scott McMillen started the race with daughter Jessica as co-driver. Jessica suffered some shoulder pain and had to be replaced by Todd for some right-seat driving. After two laps Andy was in the drivers seat with a 6 minute pit stop to weld up a torn exhaust header.

The 3rd lap with Andy behind the wheel was rather uneventful until around Race Mile 80. The #31 Trophy Truck began to vibrate enough that they knew the driveshaft was going. But who wants to change a driveshaft by themselves in the grueling hot desert? No problem for Bebo and his top notch pit crew, they cruised into the pits since the main pit was just 20 miles away. The crew quickly returned the truck in grade ‘A’ condition. But wait, it’s not all good. That pitstop gave Cameron Steele the needed opportunity to take over the lead over Andy.

Cameron Steele started 1 minute ahead of Andy, so all that was needed was to get within 59 seconds to turn this one into a Steele victory. Fast forward to RM43 in the last lap and Andy was 1minute and 10 seconds behind Cameron Steele. That is only 10 seconds on corrected time! Things were looking interesting!

Then Andy got the break he needed as Cameron was forced to pull over to change a flat tire. So you would think that it’s all in the bag now right? Nope. Andy pushed on but hit a ditch rather hard and was now battling rocks and who knows what flying over the hood, roof, and dashboard. Worse yet was that some debris wedged itself into the throttle body and now it was stuck at 1/2 throttle at times. Even with an injured throttle body and a clogged up air filter, they decided to press on for the remaining 40 miles. “I had to use my foot behind the throttle pedal to return it and that was hairy in a couple of spots” reports Andy after the race, “I had to play with the throttle to somehow get it going.” They ended up finishing and winning over Cameron Steele by less than 5 minutes.

“This race truly separates the boys from the men. I am sore from just racing 2 laps in a trophy truck that is rather smooth” says Andy. Keep an eye out for this kid when he races next at the BITD Terrible’s 250 in Primm April 17-19th as he is currently in the points lead.

A few notable events during this race:

- The McBeth truck was driven by Tim Herbst for the 2nd half of the race.

- Bj Baldwin put his engine to rest within the first lap. Looks like his winning streak hasn’t started yet for 2009.

- Bobby Baldwin made it back home early for brunch after a broken rear end ended his race.

- Rob McCachren raced in a 1600 car and we have mixed reports of him finishing 7th overall or 7th vehicle over the finish line. Either way, Rob is clearly worth a surprise anytime he is behind the wheel.

The new Blitzkrieg built 7200 truck of Travis Bozzano looked and handled like a trophy truck but the V6 sound and power gave it away. Householder sheered wheel studs late in the race, but was able to keep going.

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Drive and race-dezert.com puts on race in Plaster city – RDC 250

Quality racing is alive and well in Plaster City with race promoter DRIVE, the host of the 3/21/09 Race-Dezert 250 race event. Yes, you read that right! We put on an off-road race! When Doug and Jon of DRIVE approached us in 2008 and pitched the idea of race-dezert.com coming on board as a title sponsor of one of their races in a new series we were a tad skeptical. But the pure drive, energy, and refreshing ideas made it an easy sell and we became believers of DRIVE. With our first race under our dezert hood, we still feel jazzed about what just happened.

Friday contingency started at about 4pm in the desert just a few feet away from the main pit and start/finish line. The weather did its job by providing a slight breeze through the otherwise grueling hot Imperial Valley desert. We set up a RDC booth alongside some of the other vendors and fired up the charcoal barbecue for free hot dogs, chips and drinks for everybody. We met lots of people on our website that we hadn’t met in person before so we can put faces with the names but watch out because now we know what you look like! And we might say, thank goodness for avatars! We had a great time meeting all of you!

To challenge the young upcoming racers, DRIVE held a TrophyKart race that evening. TrophyKarts are limited to children from about 5 to 16 years of age. They raced 5 laps of 1.5 miles each. TrophyKarts have been originally designed for short course racing and their belt drive system wears out almost as quickly as a tire in Nascar, hence the rather short TK race. There was a strong sportsman vibe and everyone gladly agreed to keep having TK races at future DRIVE events.

Saturday morning the race was scheduled to start at 8am but the ambulance DNF’ed before the race even began! The chartered ambulance for the day broke down in route to the event and instead of starting the race without it, Drive was forced to delay the start till 9:40AM. DRIVE handled the situation quickly and communicated well on their 2-way radio channel to inform everyone of the situation as it developed.

After the race start delay there were no more hiccups and the event was flawless for the remainder of the day.

Noah Quantrell

The biggest class was 1400 with 5 starters and 3 finishers. Noah Quantrell took the win. He had battled an overheating transmission that they had to cool down by spraying water over the radiators. Whatever they did seemed to help and they will be back for more down the road. Cameron Reeves had a flawless day securing him 2nd place. The über built T-100 of Dan Unsicker snapped rear wheel studs early in the race and the team scrambled to make emergency repairs on the course. Of course the broken wheel studs let the wheel go, destroying the rear caliber = no rear brakes for most of the race. They also, much like our governor, will be back.

Tucker Trench

A refreshing comeback for racing in Plaster City was the use of Tucker Trench. This historic part of the course hasn’t been used since the days of Fud and every racer we spoke with after the race loved it. “It’s scenic and makes you think you are racing somewhere in Baja” claimed Joe Patteli class 8 racer, finisher and winner of the RDC250. “The last time we raced here in Plaster City was in 1985 and we rolled our truck then…the same truck we raced today with better luck on our side”.

To pull off such a flawless day of racing takes lots of manpower and DRIVE had help from no less than 40 volunteers alongside the course manning road crossings and checkpoints. Elite Auto of El Cajon supplied “Check-Point Care-Packages” consisting of water, snacks and sandwiches. RDC added our own priceless collectible, soon to be historic, RDC250 themed event t-shirts to all racers and volunteers.

So what’s next? For DRIVE it will be the night race on May 16th. For RDC it will be a handful of events the following days. Don’t miss next years RDC250 at a desert near you.

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Locos Mocos San Felipe Race Report

Koenig Racing at SCORE San Felipe 250 contingency

Racing the San Felipe 250 was a blast. It was the first Baja race effort for Locos Mocos and Koenig Racing. In a four-truck field we got second in Class 6. Truck owner Mike Koenig and Locos Mocos Head Honcho Stu Klein started the race in the Toyota Tacoma. Locos Mocos guys Troy Robinson and Tim Schrader took over at about midway and brought it to the finish after a tough 7 hours and 4 minutes.

Koenig Racing in San Felipe at RM 23

Our fun started on Wednesday at the amazing beach-side San Felipe house owned by Locos Mocos brother Steve Brosz (thanks 3 Ball and Kenna!). After the 14-hour overnight drive from Norcal, we grabbed some much-needed rest and enjoyed a little beach time. On Thursday Mike went out early to prerun the northern section while Troy preran the southern section. As always our Total Chaos-equipped prerunners were more than up to the job. (thanks Total Choas!). We all met back later at the house and held a birthday bash for our gracious host.

On Friday contingency took up most of the day. And for us it was almost as much fun as the race. (Ask any one of us how the race truck made it through tech using some fish net we found on the beach. Locos Mocos can fix anything, anywhere!) While in line with the race truck, Mark Naugle (Locos Mocos “BCG 1”) asked a pretty San Felipe girl walking by if she would sit up on the nerf bar and pass out sponsor decals and she agreed! Man, did the truck get attention with that lovely hood ornament. Our sponsors got their money’s worth of attention. Handing out 400+ sponsor decals to race fans was a lot of fun, too.

Race morning started with last minute prep and rolling to the start line. Mike Koenig and Stu Klein we’re set to drive the first 122 miles then hand the truck off to Troy and Tim for the last 110 miles. Right from the start Mike knew it was going to be a long day for him. While the truck handles the rough very well it’s the spectators lining the course that make it slow and go. They stand on the course and wait until the last second to get out of the way. It was nuts. At one point Mike couldn’t even see the road ahead as the fans were waiting that long to move. Once he got further out of town Mike set into a comfortable pace and kept the truck moving problem-free. Then came race mile 109 and the silt. Deep silt. Trying to find the best line Mike got stuck and buried the rear axle. He tried to get the truck out by himself but it wasn’t happening. Then thankfully some locals showed up and eventually got him out. Didn’t get any names, but thanks guys.

Koenig Racing at Finish. Victory

Meanwhile up ahead at RM 122 where Troy and Tim were waiting to get into the truck, an out of control class 1 car missed the turn and struck a cameraman working for John Langley’s COPS TV series race effort. Locos Mocos guy Tim Schrader an ex-EMT used his training and assisted the other EMT/racers in helping the injured spectator. The Score helicopter was on the ground within 25 minutes of the accident where he was flown to San Felipe then immediately to San Diego for medical help. Fortunately there were no broken bones or other injuries to the cameraman and besides some bruising he will have a full recovery.

Once Mike and Stu pulled into the pit and exchanged drivers, Troy and Tim quickly went to work navigating the truck down the beautiful Matomi Wash. At this point they were in a solid 2nd place and decided to take it easy and make it to the finish line. Then, Bam! Near the end of Matomi the line they chose had wash machine size boulders on both sides of the track with another boulder just a little taller than the driveline in the middle. The impact broke the yoke on the driveline. In just under 10 minutes they changed out the driveline and were back under way. The only other problem they had was getting stuck on a sandy steep uphill. A quick call to the nearby Locos Mocos chase crew was made and BCG1 arrived in minutes with a tow strap.

Just before dark the team crossed the finish line with the checkers waved by none other than Troy’s dad, VORRA founder Ed Robinson. Ed was the official SCORE flagger for this race and really enjoyed waving in his son. Everyone on the team was thrilled to have finished their first race in Baja.

Koenig Racing wants to thank all of our race crew who helped out, these guys and gals did a great job making sure we would make the finish.

Koenig Racing at SCORE Baja 250 Finishline

And special thanks to our sponsors. Without them our first Baja race would not have happened. Baja Bound.com Mexican Insurance, Total Chaos Suspensions, ORW, Red Line Oil, Dezert People, BFGoodrich Tires and , FlameLab Sports Marketing.

– Troy “Boofay” Robinson

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