The race also had a team from the Expert class take the overall quad win! I don’t think that has happened since 1999 when Charlie Lamson won the overall quad from the Expert class. The team of Gregory Price, Mitch and Kevin Canepa smoked everybody. They finished the race in 10:31:14 at a little over 47mph. I think they raised a few eyebrows. Four of the top ten teams were from the Expert class.

Rain was also unexpected but it started raining around 10:30 that evening. I can only imagine what was going through the minds of the racers on course when they encountered the wet stuff. I’m sure it wasn’t good.

Some teams were caught without lights. Some had underestimated their finishing time plus this year’s race started about an hour later than normal. This was due to the fact that it was in October rather than June, when it is usually run. There was an hour time difference now. The cars and trucks caught many teams a lot sooner than most would have liked. The first half of the course was really silty and rutted out. The second half was fairly fast.

Honda did take the one and two spots, but not one particular manufacturer was completely dominant. The sport of ATV racing has grown and all the manufacturers have stepped up and made some great products.

Doug Eichner was riding the new Bombardier Outlander 800. While they only went 200 or so miles with it, the Baja 1000 is coming up, I’m sure this was a test session for that race. It was reported that a punctured radiator put them out of the race. Alba’s Cory Hove debuted the new Yamaha Raptor 700.

Taking 1st overall was the Temecula Motorsports team of Josh Fredericks and Cyle Chislock. They apparently had a trouble-free day. I am sure they didn’t expect to see an Expert close to them at the finish line.

The Ace Hardware pro team of Shaun Moore and Nic Granlund weighed in after the finish,

“We had a couple minor problems. Nothing that was race ending, just annoying and frustrating. We had a minor tire problem in pit 4 but held the lead. Pit 5 we were still in the lead but it had shrank to under a minute.

Greg Stewart and Josh Fredricks both had problems in this pit and we took back the lead by 3 minutes once again. At pit 7, in Tonopah, we stripped out our shifter. Both Fredricks and Stewart passed us with Mike Cafro up there too. From pit 7 on, it was a struggle for us with rear tires and loosening hubs, slowing us down.

Right before pit 8, Shaun rolled the quad in the silt and he hurt his shoulder but was okay. He made it to the pit. Greg Stewart was now in the lead with Mike Cafro and Josh Fredricks in tow. We saw the first glimpse of q58 (Greg Price) at this pit as well. With tires changed and a blown shock, we were on the road. We had no other big problems except we nearly missed a rider change at pit 13 and completely missed Shaun at pit 14(road const.)

Big thanks to Teixeira and Temecula for their help in those pits. Huge thanks to all our sponsors and BITD for putting on a great race."

Huge kudos go out to Shaun Moore and Nic Granlund. The Ace Hardware team finished in 10:54:23. You can always count on these guys to put in a lot of hard work to finish. They never give up.

The Expert team of Mike Powada did an awesome job and rebounded after their crash at the Nevada 1000, bringing their T and M Maintenance quad in for 2nd place in the Expert class and 4th overall. They were sandwiched between Shaun Moore and Team Alba’s Brett Greenholtz.

Brett rode with Lynn Prosser and their finish was good enough for the last podium spot in the pro class. This was their best finish since moving up to the pro class. Another Alba team member, Steve Beilman took the 4th spot on their Yamaha. Team Alba’s Wayne Matlock suffered some electrical problems early in the race and mounted an impressive come back to finish 5th in the pro class. Mr. Alba himself, Cory Hove, teamed up with veteran Ray Schooley and rode a new Yamaha 700r. They did not finish due to mechanical problems. It was later found that it was a very simple fix but, that’s racing!! They were looking very good.

Brett Callen, another Team Alba member brought their DS650 across the finish for the final podium spot in the Expert class. A short quote from their team;

“The day before Contingency we were experiencing mechanical difficulty, but we made it. I started and rode 3 sections for 200 miles. My partners were Travis Dillon and Jason Patton who both rode 2 sections for around 150 miles each. Pretty much no problems. We took a couple minutes to bend a heel guard that was hitting the tire, but no flats. My partner Jason only had to use our stock light for the last 10 miles, and now we have the points lead”.

This makes going into the next race extremely important for those teams with a shot at the title.

The pro class is very tight. The top 5 teams, Josh Frederick, Shaun Moore, Jimmy Stephensen, Wayne Matlock and Greg Row all within 14 points of each other.

In the Expert class, the top 2, Brett Callen and David McCaroll are separated by 4 points, 329 to 324 respectively. The others are Mike Powada with 318 and Eric Pealstrom with 305 and Richard Youngblood with 296. Anything could happen at the Henderson 400. The course is very different from all the others.

Best in the Desert put on a very safe race and no major calamities to report. We hope to see everybody in Henderson, Dec 2nd and 3rd.
-mc

Editor - and check back here next week, for the VtR photo gallery!.

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