BITD PARKER 425

PARKER 425 Story: Shaun Ochsner Photos: Shaun Ochsner & Best in the Desert

The Best in the Desert Parker 425 has always been a widely popular race to start off the season with. Best in the Desert had to make some changes to this year’s event. Covid-19 concerns forced the series to move the start and finish line off of the property of the Colorado River Indian Tribe (CRIT). The event was moved into the desert just off of Shea Road. There also was not an opportunity for the top classes to qualify this year due to the CRIT closure. Instead, a random drawing of entries was held to determine starting positions. To limit exposure, the drivers meeting was held online, and tech and contingency was held as a “drive through” event.

What followed were two days of off-road racing at the level everyone has come to expect from Best in the Desert. The green flag dropped Friday morning as several classes of race vehicles rocketed off into the desert, setting off on a journey on the 126-mile course. Three laps later, winners would be determined. Wheeler Morgan took the class 10 victory with a course time of 5 hours, 53 minutes and 38 seconds. Racing was tight in class 5 with Cade Garcia finishing just a

minute under Troy Grabowski. Randy Merritt continued his winning streak in class 7200.

The Parker 425 was the final race for the Trophy Lite series. Dave Taylor led the first lap. Larry Schmueser had the lead on the final lap. Behind Schmueser was Taylor. Both drivers suffered flat tires but continued to claw at the championship. Greg Bragg was able to pass both drivers for the win. Patrick Whitt ended up taking home the championship, beating Schmueser by one point.

ABOVE: Randy Merritt continues his winning streak.

ABOVE: Patrick Whitt earned a hard-fought Trophy-Lite season championship, beating competitor Larry Schmueser by a single point! DIRTSPORTSWORLD.COM | 31

BEST IN THE DESERT Saturday’s event saw 18 trick trucks blast off into the desert. Josh De Jong led the first lap but stopped for a significant amount of time with mechanical problems. Steve Olliges then took over the lead. Olliges had the lead at the very beginning of the race as he was first off the line. At one-point BJ Baldwin was also out front. When the dust settled, reigning 2020 champions Harley Letner and Kevin Thompson put their Concrete Motorsports trick truck on the podium with the overall victory. Other winners during Saturday’s event included Dustin Grabowski in 6100, Connor McMullen in 6200 and Michael Frye in 1500.

CHAMPS TAKE THE VICTORY: 2020 Trick Truck champions Harley Letner (left) and Kevin Thompson (right) start off the Best in the Desert season with a win.

Story By: LaChelle Halliday Photos By: Speed UTV

Speed UTV has taken the internet by storm becoming popular demand continuously trending on all platforms given one of its co-founders’ worldwide popularity in the powersports industry, Robby Gordon.

Robby has led a significant life of racing throughout his years to encompass racing entities including Indy Car, NASCAR, CART, IMSA, IROC and off-road sanctions SCORE, Dakar Rally, NORRA and BITD. Gordon also competes in the Stadium Super Trucks, which he owns and founded in 2013 while also managing the Speed family of brands, including the energy drink Speed Energy that has sponsored his racing efforts since 2010. Sharing co-founding duties is Todd Romano, infamously known worldwide as the Tonka Trophy Truck driver who competed in the SCORE sanctions including the Baja 1000, Stadium Super Trucks, and even took chances at the King of the Hammers. Romano provides 30 years of racing experience along with 20 years in powersports business to assist in the grandiose Speed movement taking the industry by storm.

The Gordon-Romano duo dates back heavily with both having extensive and firsthand design capabilities working together on the birth of a previous UTV. Six years ago, the duo partnered with Arctic Cat to design and build

the Wildcat XX which ultimately went on to win UTV of the Year two years in a row. What the team had created was a masterpiece machine but there were a few issues that arose around its entrance to the public. Firstly, without a large buzz circulating the industry about the new UTV, it succumbed to being denied onto the sales floor of large western brand dealers. This was culminated from a possibility of not being what the dealers were envisioning, or a misunderstanding of its differential characteristics from others on the market. Overall, the Arctic Cat Wildcat XX failed, falling short of the two-time trophied UTV expectations.

Feeling defeated the duo began to envision a new way to design, manufacture, build and market a UTV in today’s market while evading mistakes that were made previously. The two decided they would establish the demand, build the car and organically market the build straight to the consumer. Subsequently, Speed UTV was born.

The road traveled was never an easy jaunt to success for the duo, but the journey granted an abundance of knowledge that entrepreneurs only know as hard work and dedication. While deciding which dealers they would utilize, they were taken aback by the demand from dealers requesting the opportunity to purchase the UTVs which still had yet to be built. Reflecting only a few years prior, the Wildcat XX won Best UTV for two years and was unable to get a simple meeting with dealers, yet Speed UTV hadn’t produced a physical car but was being begged by dealers for the business.

Speed UTV has built something entirely that the industry has never seen. The hurdles to finance the project were tremendous with large named banks, Wells Fargo, stating “talk to us in five years” or Chase replying, “Are you kidding me?” when approached to fund the adventure and believe in Speed UTV above the competition. As more retorts of “no” began pouring in with the questions of “what if it doesn’t work”, it became apparent that larger entities were not endemic to the business outline of Speed UTV. Finally, TCF and Freedom Roads, both with business models based around power sports, were excited and were convinced in the fruition of success.

“We’ve had great success because our story is exciting to everybody. They all believe in what we’ve done because of our reputations, years in the industry, what we’ve done in the past with a 0% fail rate. We have a 100% success rate with everything we’ve done in powersports.” Todd Romano.

Building a demand for a UTV that still hadn’t been built wasn’t a challenge for the team as they were able to capitalize on the fan-base Robby has accumulated over his years in the racing spotlight. With one million followers, Speed UTV is able to host weekly live events, teaching the consumer on the engineering, safety and new renditions of the UTV they will be purchasing, with forty thousand viewers exclusively interested.

TODD: I’d say you really can’t beat it. (laughing) No offense to what you guys do but I can’t buy editorial space anywhere that gets me forty thousand visitors exclusively interested in my product. I just run a YouTube channel on a Wednesday night it doesn’t cost me a dollar and that channel actually makes me $10K a month. Speed UTVs are built on three chassis- Baja Bandit, El Diablo, and El Jefe with three editions: A base model, Limited Edition and Robby Gordon Edition. Each UTV is equipped with the same components in every UTV only changing the number of doors, a few plastics and a cage to encompass a four-door body. At 75-inches wide for all models, Speed UTV ultimately went above and beyond expectations and requirements necessary for a UTV and surpassed the ROPS certifications and obtained an FIA certification as well becoming the only company in powersports to have an A+ or B pillar rating. Thus, allowing the Speed UTV, right off the line

to have the ability to enter into the Dakar Rally, World Rally X, and the 24-hour Le-mans. Striving for the safest yet fastest UTV possible, Speed UTV engineers designed the cage to encompass the rollover bar from the top of the window line straight to the floor to strengthen the cage for possible forward crashes. Standard on each UTV are five-point harnesses in each carbon fiber race seat, lumbar support air bladder, and wrist restraints.

All components are designed, engineered and manufactured by Speed to include the 3.2 internal bypass shocks with the first ever high speed / low speed compression rebound adjustment. From the fully customized Seep patented beadlock wheel with full face removal allows for a narrow body by having a zerooffset wheel. Hugging the full face beadlock is a Speed UTV 32.5-inch tire with the Speed logo designed into the tread of the tire. Learning from other sanctions of racing led to the bulkhead transmission becoming the mount for the suspension creating more space without overcrowding tubes and with the transaxle in the back of the motor, becoming patented by Speed UTV. Hailing their individuality, they stand patented as the only company to have front steer, front spindles similar to every offroad car made excluding other SXS rivalries.

Speed UTV is the first ever to have a three-speed shift on the fly ability, allowing and designed for quick deceleration when coming up to a hill or object rather than up and down shifting. When in racing, running the Speed key tune adds 300HP allowing the car to reach speeds of 118MPH. No need to upgrade motors as the tuning is standard and included on every UTV, but only can be unlocked with purchase. Adding to the leveledup craftsmanship, the engines in each UTV were fully designed and built by Joey Arrington, the mastermind behind NASCAR engine builds while the transmission and differentials were engineered by Albins. The engine, first ever flex fuel sensor and dual injectors, firing lean on one injector as boost is coming in and increasing the pulse on both injectors, has the ability to grow amid displacement limitation changes. With a different bore and stoke the engine can go to a 1256. The factory turbo injectors can withstand up to 500HP allowing little to no need for aftermarket products, while also encompassing enough room in the bed, equal to a Ford Raptor, 50 square-inch to house 35-inch tires with room for storage boxes. Even equipped with a tailgate, Speed UTVs are the only SXS to carry a spare tire below the shock towers, proving how much ingenuity has gone into the design and creation of each UTV.

Full time production is scheduled to begin March 2021 with the first customers obtaining their UTVs mid-April to early May.

Story By: La-Chelle Halliday Photos By: V. Clark, S. Clark

High school can be a daunting stage in life plagued with popularity, exams, college applications and varsity sports that can leave any teenager exhausted battling against others their own age. However, to one sixteen-yearold, rather than taking on other teens, she is battling individuals twice her age. Hailing from Kansas City, Missouri, Valerie Clark, at sixteen, is entering the ring as off road racing’s new 6100 contender.

Walking straight into the big leagues didn’t occur overnight or at a one-time hefty cost. Valerie originally saddled herself onto a horse before finding her passion in off road unlike her father who had already caught the dirt bug racing side by sides. After a heated discussion requesting her father to stop racing to invest the money on her horse, her father proposed a new idea. Rather than shoveling costs for horse riding, he teetered around the idea of purchasing Valerie’s own side by side to race. Valerie agreed catapulting her life onto an unknown path full of dirt, adventure, and lasting friendships.

YOUNG GUNS Practicing her newfound skills was no easy feat in the town of Kansas City, MO with only a few areas of short course that ultimately weren’t ideal for her style. Ultimately, Valerie and her father had to fly across the country to capitalize on the young racer, landing them in the desert of Nevada where most desert legends practice their own skills. As the time passed by Valerie having been brought up on rock crawling with her family, was finally ready to get behind the wheel at her first race. The duo took a chance and sat Valerie in the truck on the second day of the 2018 Rage at the River letting the young girl at 14 years old loose in the dirt. Astonishing those watching, she placed just outside of the podium but was later disqualified for being under the minimum age of 16 by Kenny Thatcher himself.

Two years later, a few phone calls, plane rides, training and spending almost half of 2020 away from home, Valerie is setting and breaking goals higher than most high school students can even imagine. Finally of legal racing age, 16, Valerie is stepping into a new spotlight as one of the few females in the highly competitive class of 6100. Mr. Kenny Thatcher saw a light in the young girl’s eyes when he officially disqualified her 6th place finish that couldn’t be extinguished and began to plan the deal that would change Valerie’s entire future.

Kenny Thatcher, a dominate voice in offroad and his community, owns the truck and rides shotgun navigating for the young racer while coaching her through the challenges alongside Valerie’s biggest fan, her father. The duo is closely knit, so close in fact they share the seat driving but never together.

DSW: How is it sharing the seat with your dad?

VALERIE: (laughing) well, we split the driving 50/50. We tried racing together and it just didn’t work. (laughing) If there are odd numbered of laps, we will play rock paper scissors, winner will take the extra lap.

Looking forward, Valerie has set some unprecedented goals for her age. However, the battle that is packed into such a young adult, this girl will be hard to hold back if any dare tries. Those who have tried are no longer apart of her successes now or going forward. Valerie lost a few friends who interpreted her original overflowing excitement of racing as bragging and boastful. Unfortunately, those individuals would never know the purest happiness Valerie and many others have found in their passions. Those passion, beyond what the past few could comprehend, to be crowned the first ever King of the Hammers Princess along with a SCORE overall points champion title to add to this aspiring teen’s rising name. Overall, Valerie does aspire to one day become a stunt driver while continuing her racing goals and driving obsession.

With such high aspirations and goals, and a chaotic schedule, one can wonder how this teen can even manage multiple moving parts throughout the week. However, Valerie is beyond her years and able to balance high school, playing rugby and still traveling cross country training for another upcoming race.

DSW: How soon will we be seeing you in Baja?

VALERIE: 2021! I’m still trying to convince everyone to do the Baja 1000, but I will ironwoman one day!

Stating that the stress is overwhelming at times she holds tight to her family, her faith and those close to her, especially her 8-year-old sister who looks up to Valerie. She is ultimately a champion at heart as well as the dirt, taking time to teach others, guiding them in their faith as it has done for her. Valerie is far from sitting on the sidelines or taking a break any time soon, as she recently added a film she will be filming with in Texas. This young gun has a bountiful future ahead of her and we’ve only seen the peak as this young but dominating youth begins to show the offroad community that she is simply getting started.

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