Baja 1000

[tntmo 898]

I didn't even realize it was coming up, but the Baja 1000 is this weekend. I'm sure Team Honda will have a huge presence as usual, but who are the other contenders? Is there a KTM or Husky team out there getting ready for a spoiler? Anyone have friends racing? Wish I could make it!

[PastaPilot 17]

Yup festivities and border crossing horror stories start today. All that aside, I'm sure Honda will be back with their full complement of super riders bred on baja dust and raised on two wheels at wicked fast speeds. I am sure KTM will be back with the specially prepped 690 and a fine complement of riders, hopefully this year they'll make it wihout so many flats and put the smackdown on Honda. I'm one that's peaved at them for discontinuing the XR650R. I haven't seen any other news about other manufacturers that are bringing a presence. I'll maybe take a look around and get back.

[Yeti 0]

I didn't even realize it was coming up, but the Baja 1000 is this weekend. I'm sure Team Honda will have a huge presence as usual, but who are the other contenders? Is there a KTM or Husky team out there getting ready for a spoiler? Anyone have friends racing? Wish I could make it!

I saw both the Honda and Husky team trailers heading south from LA yesterday. Also stopped and talked to Baja Bill at the rest stop for a few minutes.

[xxxinsd 0]

Been listening to baja chatter on the vx-170 all day. their getting ready. hope its not a turkey shoot for the bad guys.....safe.... i know.

[husky4me 0]

It was fun, people very friendly, and had a blast!!! Glad I made it... Fist time I ride there to watch the race. Here are some pictures:

[Joliet 0]

Class 22; CRF450X finished 9 of the top 10 spots. A Honda 650 came in in 6th place. That is some serious domination of a sport. Congrats, Ken

[dirt dame 561]

It was fun, people very friendly, and had a blast!!! Glad I made it... Fist time I ride there to watch the race.

Nice pictures. Glad that you had a fun and safe time down there.

[husky4me 0]

It was fun, people very friendly, and had a blast!!! Glad I made it... Fist time I ride there to watch the race.

Nice pictures. Glad that you had a fun and safe time down there.

Thanks... I never felt unsafe over there... People were supper friendly, but they confused our group with racers.. They asked for autographs, and pictures, and waved at us... But I did not go to any isolated area... I did have a higher speed crash on my XC while riding a dirt trail at night, and may have injured my ribs (my jacket does not have chest protection, and this will change). It was painful riding back. But made it back in one piece.

[PastaPilot 17]

I'm a bit of a Baja newbie but I thought the 1000 race was from Ensanada to La Paz. I was a bit suprised to see this year was only 630ish miles and was a loop out of Ensanada. Is this the way it always is? I was certain last years course was over 1000 miles, 1080 if I recall. What's the scoop?

[husky4me 0]

I'm a bit of a Baja newbie but I thought the 1000 race was from Ensanada to La Paz. I was a bit suprised to see this year was only 630ish miles and was a loop out of Ensanada. Is this the way it always is? I was certain last years course was over 1000 miles, 1080 if I recall. What's the scoop?

I was also confused. We asked the same question to our friend Joaquin (his wife supports one of the teams) and he said the idea is to have around 1000 miles, but apparently this year's the track was shorter due to difficulty getting permits from land owners to use the land. I don't know if this is accurate, but I'm just passing on his response.

It was really crazy to see general public (non racers) with plated SUV's or quads running around the racing route in the middle of the race (kind of playing with their live's and racers lives as there was zero visibility with all the dust). I bet there have been some fatal collisions... It was a cultural learning experience for me...

[ssaint 0]

Last post was right....it changes every year. This is the shortest 1000 I have heard of, but they are commonly in the 800 mile area. Last years was a lot longer, actually about 1200+ miles.

So far I haven't heard any horror stories from this year. Hope it stays that way.

As for La Paz, it runs from Ensenada to La Paz some years, and other years it runs a loop back to Ensenada, like this year.

Everything on this years course was within easy 3 day trip distance. Our last trip was 3 days and 710 miles, so I guess we could have run the whole course.

[ShocknAwe 0]

who won the motorcycle classes and what were the times?

[christi20 0]

Well, you can check it out at www.score-international.com

But the Honda A team won, and the Honda B team got second overall.

The B team included my friend Tim Morrton from Bajaboundmoto.com.

I did notice that the top 9 out of 10 teams all rode HONDA's. Not one KTM in the bunch. hmmmm.

I think the all womens pro team (including Jennifer Morton) finished and locked up the season championship in the 250cc pro class.

[Guest Hammerin Hammon]

Class 22; CRF450X finished 9 of the top 10 spots. A Honda 650 came in in 6th place. That is some serious domination of a sport. Congrats, Ken

I must be very carefull what I write

[ShocknAwe 0]

I am posting the write-up from Andrew DeVercelly IV, one of the dune buggy winners of the 2008 Baja 1000. Andy's great-grandfather, Andy "Pops" DeVercelly won the first Baja 1000 (1967) and his grandfather, Andy DeVercelly (II) won the second Baja (1968); and his father (Andy III) raced Baja with both senior Andy's, winning class championships with his dad in the '80's.

Andrew DeVercelly IV's write-up:

My best B1K ever:

I have been involved in off-road racing all my life and have worked very hard in this sport to get where I am today. I have had good races and bad races but this was a great race. So great, I'm not sure that I will ever be able to top it. This was my 4th Baja 1000. I've raced every year since 2005 and have now only finished 2. Rick St John asked me to ride with Dean Barrely from the start to mile 225 in his car. I didn't really know Dean and had heard that he is a smart driver and is a very level - headed person. So riding in a racecar down the rumarosa with someone I hardly knew was an adventure in itself! All we had to do was beat the car of Steve Mamer by 3 positions and the championship was ours. So here it goes.....

Part 1: Starting in car #1210.

We drew 10th starting position and Steve Mamer drew 2nd so right away I knew it was gonna be a real race. We ended up starting 9th due to a withdrawal. By mile 6 we passed #1208. By mile 11 I saw #1202 sitting on the side of the road with no obvious signs of damage and the driver sitting on the hood with his helmet off. I thought right away he had a blown engine or transmission. No way! This day is starting off way too easy. Now all we had to do was Keep It Together and the championship was ours for the taking. By the time we got to rumarosa we were the 3rd physical car and were only 10 minutes behind 1st and 2nd. Dean hadn't raced in a year and half so he said he was feeling rusty but when we started passing cars and got through the first 100 miles it was very apparent he had his confidence back by making very minimal mistakes. By the time we got to the bottom of la rumarosa we had made up 5 minutes on 2nd place. When we got to the top of laguna salada we passed 2nd place and really started getting excited. We were on a roll! When we got to the wash before the silt beds at mile 190 we caught and passed 1201! This was just going like a dream. We kept the momentum going, didn't get stuck in the silt beds, and brought it to mile 225 with a 20 minute lead! Now Rick St John and Ricky Kern were in the car.

Part 2: Borrego and car #1601

We had made it to the Borrego pit and had heard on the radio that 1601 was having motor issues. Here we go. Talkin' about raining on my parade. All 1601 had to do was finish and the championship was locked in. Maybe 2 championships on the same team and same year was too much to ask. 1601 made it to the Borrego pit and the valve cover was cracked and the motor sounded a little sick. So we replaced the valve cover, changed spark plugs hoping that would help, and Steven Eugenio got out and Adam got in. Adam took off and the motor still didn't sound good. He said it still felt decent so we would just have pay close attention to it and wait to see what it would do after the San Felipe loop. I was calling home and getting status on 1601. He seemed to be doing great as he made it to San Felipe in no time. Then I was sitting in my truck and heard a very quite voice on the radio. "This is 1601 race, the motor has died and will not start back up. Something is definitely wrong." My heart about dropped in my stomach. No way we are not ending out year like this. I immediately called Mike on his SAT phone and asked what the call was. He told me to grab the spare motor and the Eugenio clan and meet him off the highway north of San Felipe, approx. race mile 180.

Part 3: Side of the Road Engine Rebuild. Where the Magic Happened

After an hour of waiting for Adam to be towed out it was about 11:30pm. Adam pulled up behind his dad's jeep and jumped out of the car. I immediately ran up to the back of the car. No hole out of the top of the motor so that was a relief. We went to try to start it and it had no compression. I went to check the valve lash and the valve train wasn't moving. Broken Cam Gear I told him. I asked him what the call was. He asked what it would take to fix this problem the right way, how long it would take, and if I could do it. It would take about 4 and half hours to fix and would involve taking apart both motors completely and rebuilding the primary race engine. He said I want to win this championship the right way. That's all he had to say. We immediately went to work. Adam, Dan, and I took the motor out of the car while Danny Rinear, Cameron, and friend(sorry I forgot your name) worked on taking the backup motor apart and prepping those parts to install. We took apart the motor in the back of my truck, replaced the cam, both cylinder heads and put it back in the car. The whole time we were working together we were laughing, making jokes, there wasn't 1 confrontation, we worked like true champions together. We got the motor in the car by about 3:20 am. The moment of truth. We had no more time for problems so it was gonna work or we were going home on the trailer. Primed the oil system, turned the ignition switch on, and VROOM! The engine came to life again! It sounded better than it did in Borrego. Adam shut it back off to tell us how grateful he was and was racing again by 3:40am. He would then go to San Matias and Vic Bruckmann would get in the car.

Part 3: Driving back to Ensenada

After stopping a few times to make sure the car was still running, my dad, Danny, and I made it back to the hotel in Ensenada at 8am. I was getting updates from home and Vic was doing a great job of keeping a good pace. From his average I figured he would finish by about 11am. Keep in mind while all this was going on I had no idea what was going on with car 1210 so when I saw it parked back at the hotel in the morning I couldn't wait to see how they did. Rick was up and walking around the car. I ran out of my room and asked how we did. He said 1st place and won the championship! Sweet! This is one hell of a rollercoaster ride. I am starting to feel really good about the outcome as a whole. It was about 10am and we decided to go to the finish, get some breakfast and wait for the car. Every time I heard a motor I would stop in my tracks to see who it was. We waited about an hour and were walking back to the finish line when we ran into a friend. We started talking to him and were standing on the last turn coming into the finish when I heard this sweet sounding 1600 engine going through the gears on the last straight away. It was 1601! We made it! We did it! We won the freakin' championship!

Part 4: The Finish Line & Bill Savage

After the car had finished we got pulled into tech and Bill Savage had a our competitor confront him about us doing a possible engine swap rather than a rebuild. He was on Adam, Me, and the engine like white on rice. He was asking all kinds of questions and looking at the engine very carefully. He didn t mark the engine case before the start so there was no way of telling that it was the same case we started the race with. And since we did such a great job putting it back together, it didn't leak a drop of oil, so it was hard to tell that we did a full rebuild in the back of a truck. He then looked me straight in the eye and said "you aren't lyin' to me boy are you?" " No sir. " " Cause if I find out you are and you guys did cheat I will make your life a living hell." I asked what I could do to prove it. He said there must be some evidence in the case that the broken gear left behind. I told him the only way to tell is to take apart the entire engine again. He looked me in the eye again and said "Well I guess that's what you are going to have to do now aren't you." Here we go again. So Adam, Danny, and I took the motor back out the car and took it all the way apart, AGAIN, in front of him. I showed him the proof. He smiled at us and said "I believed you the whole time. I just wouldn't be doing my job if I took your word for it." He then shook our hands, smiled and said to us "I am impressed. Congratulations, you are now official class champions."

So there you have it. We got 1 hour of sleep in over 30 hours, went from high to low back to high again, rebuilt an engine on the side of a road, worked together like the champions we are, won the race and 2 championships. Oh yeah that also sealed the deal on our 3rd SCORE Engine Builder of the Year award in a row.

If that isn't what the Baja 1000 is all about, I don't know what is.