This year’s Parker 425 would go down in the history books as one with many changes.

For the first time in more than 40 years of racing Parker, the event would be split into two heats separating the faster classes such as the Trick Trucks from the slower, more budget friendly classes. In the past few Parker 425 races the issue of heavy dust and closing speeds of unlimited car and trucks made for some interesting situations out in the Arizona desert, and a few spectacular crashes as well. Luckily no one was hurt in any of these, but in the interest of safety for the racers BITD made the decision to split the race.

The pre-dawn start for the first heat would have the class 1000 cars take off first. Roger Starkey opened up a lead and never looked back, taking the overall win for the first heat with a time of 7:21:39.861. This was a blistering pace never seen before in class 1000 at Parker and just 10 minutes slower in what would be the overall Trick Truck time.

Following Starkey in class 1000 was Jason Coleman in his Jimco with a time 7:33:28.137 for the 425-mile course.

Rounding out the top three for the morning race was Corey Goin, who was just four minutes back from Coleman.

The second race started with Robby Gordon first off the line followed by SCORE’s 2015 TT Champion Apdaly Lopez and off-road legend Rob MacCachren. Gordon held a commanding lead until misfortune hit, forcing him to bow out of the race at RM106.

This handed the lead over to Lopez but it was very short lived, as Lopez ran out of gas just a mile or two after passing Robby. Being that all BITD races are “no chase” races, Apdaly had to wait over an hour to for race officials to bring in some fuel and get him going again.

This gifted Rob MacCachren the lead going into the second lap, which he would dominate until running into trouble himself with engine issues that would take him out of the race. The second place overall and first unlimited buggy of Sam Berri would also drop out with engine issues.

All of this carnage would place the overall lead into the hands of Justin Matney, who would maintain that lead position for duration of the race despite being challenged by an angry pack of racers behind him. This would mark the first time in years that a 4WD truck wins an overall at a major race.

Following Matney was the team of Tracy Graf and Justin (Bean) Smith. This combo has come a long way in the last year and are steadily making their way up the grid.

Coming off of semi-retirement and a Baja 1000 win with Rob MacCachren was Andy McMillin, who announced his return to a full schedule in desert racing just days before. McMillin teamed up in a new truck under the TSCO brand and Toyo tires. It was a great showing for the five-time Baja 1000 champion who will surely get faster as he gets used to the new program.

Next on the list for the BITD season is the every popular Mint 400. Stay tuned for our coverage.

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