Baja 1000 is always an unforgettable story. I was honored to be invited to drive with such a great Team Of drivers, Boris Said and Glen Plake. The BC (Baja Challenge) class was full of compition with the likes of Todd Clement, Nick Johnson, the Baldwin Team, Christian, PJ Jones and several others.
In the first section from Ensenada to Borreggo Boris Said found his way through the pack and got our car/BC-5 into the lead coming into Borrego. That’s when I jumped in the driver seat and took the car from the pit stop through the Borrego loop and into the night. We fought 4 foot deep whoops for 100 miles, silt, traffic and the darkness of night. With only one flat tire we kept a good pace.
Glen, with all his pre-running experience was an amazing co pilot and a second pair of eyes which is very much needed in this race. A couple sections we had to stop, have a good look at what was a head and let the silt settle so we could find our way threw some tricky and dangerous areas where several trucks and buggies were stuck….its always a good feeling when you can keep it running threw danger zones where there’s a lot of fallen soldiers down and now digging there way out. Just keep it running was all I thought as we drove threw the cold night and rough almost scary terrain, Keep it running because when your down, IT SUCKS BAD!!! For me personally, coming in to borego in my section still leading the race was an amazing feeling and I knew I did my job and I was happy with the job I did. We lead 2/3rds of the race and All together Glen and I were in the car for about 500 miles near 17 hours.
In Glen’s section we had one little bobble where we got stuck behind some traffic and the 2nd place car that was only about 3 miles behind us the hole race had now passed us and just barely slipped threw a water crossing called Simpsons just before the race came to a complete stop for near 2 hours. A truck was stuck in the deep trenches of the water there and there was no way around him so we waited. It was amazing to watch how many people it took and how they got the truck out of this huge water ditch at about 1 am. In the middle of the desert these are the times when you just figure out how to make the impossible possible. Eventually we got running again and back in the race, back to the cold blowing at you as you’re going 80 mph and back to the night. At one point I fell asleep for 20 minutes while glen was driving but once the sun started to rise and I saw that we were following the coastline/ocean…I was wide awake again. Leading the race for as long as we did and coming in second behind Nick Baldwin was/is amazing!!!
I have a lot of awards but this 2nd place takes the cake…or at least its right up there with a few others. My thanks go to the team Glen Boris and Kelly, the Entire Wide Open Team and all those who built our Baja Challenge Buggy BC-5, BFG Tires, KMC wheels, SCORE Racing, SOS Communications, Sessions, Vans, Alpinestar, Asterisks, Go Pro, Sean, Nick Rosa and Rich Van Every for contributing there great Images and finally Jim Hancock, my friends and Family….thanks Mom cause I know what I do sometimes leaves you with sleepless nights but I know you know I wouldn’t have my life any other way.
