CHAMPS REMAIN UNDEFEATED IN BEST IN THE DESERT

Story: Shaun Ochsner Photos: Harlen Foley

The Concrete Motorsports Team of Harley Letner and Kevin Thompson remain undefeated thus far in the Best in the Desert Series. Letner and Thompson locked up the 2020 season championship and wasted no time winning Best in the Desert’s first event of the year¬¬– the Parker 425 in January. With time trials canceled due unforeseen permitting issues, Letner and Thompson started out front based on point standings as stated in the rulebook.

As the race got started, the Concrete Motorsports team took full advantage of their starting position. Letner hoped the 30 mileper-hour wind would keep his competitors further behind, eating his dust. Racing smart, the team built a good lead to keep them out front. Letner was careful to follow the marked course. He was penalized at last year’s event for shortcutting. Having owned up to his mistake

Letner pushed forward to help earn the team the 2020 championship. This year the team has been very careful not to jeopardize their success. Letner, known as a “wheel-man” knows how to drive the Trick Truck by making it slide through corners. He is on the gas when it counts. All of these carefully calculated moves allow a driver to make up time on the race course, or in Letner’s case, keep the competition at bay.

Silver State has some tight terrain surrounded by lots of trees. One mistake and your truck ends up being stopped by a tree. Those don’t normally move. Letner and Thompson had to be laser focused with the help of their codrivers to navigate through the terrain. “The game plan was to hammer down and go” says Letner. He wanted to get the truck to the pits for a driver change with enough time for Thompson to get back out on course without getting passed. They had Adam Householder and Kyle Jergensen hot on their tail. The entire Concrete pit support team worked quickly and flawlessly with a timed stop of 33 seconds to change out driver and co-driver, splash fuel and service tires. In the end the team won the overall victory by three minutes. Kyle Jergensen and Adam Householder finished within two minutes of each other. Letner and Thompson have sights set on their next victory¬: The Vegas to Reno race in August.

One of the closest races all day was in the 6100 class. Ray Griffith won by thirteen seconds over Justin Blower. Griffith’s competitors were all within a minute of each other. He started fourth in class and kept digging. Griffith fought through the dust and tight twisty turns of the Silver State course. Even with an issue with one of their jacks in the pits, Griffith kept pushing eventually reaching the first-place truck. His crew told him he was only five seconds back on Blower. Griffith went into overdrive, pushing past Blower during the last few miles of the race.

UTV classes saw the highest number of entries with the Can-Am team of Phil Blurton and Beau Judge taking the victory in the UTV Turbo Pro Class.

Event in Saudi Arabia Story by: Shaun Ochsner Photos: Extreme E

After months of planning and buildup, the inaugural Extreme E race was successfully held in the desert of Al Ula, Saudi Arabia.

The track was about five and half miles long. It wound through canyons, ravines and deep sand dunes well known in the Saudi Arabian desert. There were thirty-three total waypoints.

Things didn’t exactly go smoothly for the Ganassi racing team of Sara Price and Kyle Leduc. Leduc rolled the Hummer replica Extreme E electric vehicle during a Friday practice and qualifying session. The team thrashed all night to get the vehicle put back together for the next day’s race events.

Rosberg X Racing duo Johan Kristofferson and Molly Taylor were the closely watched team all day. Even with a 60-second speeding penalty and less favorable starting grid spots, both drivers displayed excellent driving skill and car control, winning them the first ever Extreme E victory. Things continued to get worse for Sara Price and Kyle Leduc. Both drivers continued to struggle. When Kyle Leduc got behind the wheel he made contact with competitor Claudia Hurtgen that ended the weekend for both teams. Dust was blamed on the collision and Extreme E organizers had already revised the event format once before.

ELECTRIC OFF-ROAD RACING The purpose of the series is to bring attention to endangered and damaged habitats around the world. While in Saudi Arabia, drivers helped clean beaches along the Red Sea and examined the habitat of the endangered Green turtle and Hawksbill turtle. Extreme E uses a floating ship called the St. Helena that moves around the world as their command post, leaving little footprint on land. The series is as sustainable as can be, using with no single-use plastic on-site. Everything is recycled and bio-degradable.

Racing electric vehicles with 100 percent clean energy in hot and dusty environments is the attention the series wants to bring to a new style of racing. The vehicles run on a hydrogen fuel cell battery developed by AFC Energy.

The next venue for the Extreme E Series will be Lac Rose, Dakar, Senegal on May 29, 2021.