BAJA 500 thread

[badassmav]

Well ladies and gentleman, the Baja 500 is again in our cross hairs. I heard rumor that there will be no summit this race. Yay! The course should be known in a week or two, but for now, let the banter begin!!

How many of the Polaris guys out there are confident that this is the race for you all to turn the points battle around? How about an Arctic Cat finding their way to the podium? What will be the amount of entries in our growing class of pro sportsman UTV? What percentage of our class will find their way to the checkered flag? 75%? 20%? What will the margin of victory be? Minutes, or an hour or more? Will this be the last Baja 500 for the vulnerable CVT drive system?

One thing for certain, the entertainment value starts here. Now. Our car is so far away from ready, it isn't funny. Still fighting belt and clutch issues. Had a disappointing test yesterday at P.C. I read somewhere about a friendly wager . Hmmmm...

 

[Johnny]

Im not a Gamblin Man but I am Registered to Race the 500 if I even had a clue as to how to get to the starting line and how many pit support trucks I will need I would feel better about it, guess ill just wing it for the Win. I kinda Like this Racing Thang.

 

[Rusty5150]

Im not a Gamblin Man but I am Registered to Race the 500 if I even had a clue as to how to get to the starting line and how many pit support trucks I will need I would feel better about it, guess ill just wing it for the Win. I kinda Like this Racing Thang.

Johnny I can help you with logistics. I have a little Baja exp. I've pitted down there a few times.


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[Johnny]

Hell ya Rusty I need help !! so no summit means I can chase with two Trucks?

If I only need two trucks I have some extra cash for Gamblin

 

[badassmav]

Your car is pretty clean Johnny. Looks awesome (as a Polaris can) Do you have many test miles on it? Did you build it yourself? I saw you were running strong early in the SS 300 race. Impressive! We're happy to see a new car join the ranks. Welcome to smack alley! About the summit, don't bank on that just yet. Only rumors for now.

 

[GOVACHO]

Johnny I'm sure I could help out with something. If you need hands just let me know, I would help out in a min.

 

[Johnny]

we only had 25 Miles on the car

we now have 325 test miles we took it to the ss300 as a test and didnt do so well we had put a screen in the back of the clutch air scoop and it got plugged with tree and bush parts, ofcourse we never had a clue as to check it but we did get to change 2 belts during the race and the last one was so hot we couldnt do much over 40 MPH the last 40 or so miles

We still had a great time racing

we did build the car here at the shop and Thank You

 

[Bajaxp]

Well ladies and gentleman, the Baja 500 is again in our cross hairs. I heard rumor that there will be no summit this race. Yay! The course should be known in a week or two, but for now, let the banter begin!!

How many of the Polaris guys out there are confident that this is the race for you all to turn the points battle around? How about an Arctic Cat finding their way to the podium? What will be the amount of entries in our growing class of pro sportsman UTV? What percentage of our class will find their way to the checkered flag? 75%? 20%? What will the margin of victory be? Minutes, or an hour or more? Will this be the last Baja 500 for the vulnerable CVT drive system?

One thing for certain, the entertainment value starts here. Now. Our car is so far away from ready, it isn't funny. Still fighting belt and clutch issues. Had a disappointing test yesterday at P.C. I read somewhere about a friendly wager . Hmmmm...

Reid...this was BY FAR your best post ever! Good on ya mang!

 

[tatum]

Im not a Gamblin Man but I am Registered to Race the 500 if I even had a clue as to how to get to the starting line and how many pit support trucks I will need I would feel better about it, guess ill just wing it for the Win. I kinda Like this Racing Thang.

Baja will be slightly rougher than SS 300.

 

[facteryfmf]

Baja will be slightly rougher than SS 300.

I'm not buying your story. ...

 

[tatum]

I'm not buying your story. ...

Its just a guess. I haven't seen the course yet.

 

[Bajaxp]

Baja will be slightly rougher than SS 300.

Haha...just slightly! The Baja 500 is the real deal. Iconic and rough. BTW, what is wrong with the summit? I was super bummed that they had to eliminate it from the 250.

Who is going to be there at the 500? We should be able to get 20+ cars there in the Pro UTV class. Coastal? Murray? Need two Glazscraft cars, UTV Inc? Lonestar? Lansky? Rockstar-girl? Hans? Cognito? Simms? John Deere? Todd Romano? Sappington will be there! Alba? Greg Rowe? Dennis Jean? Sean Cook? Return of Tim Burke? Thomas Graves? Rito? Who am I missing?

Let's rally the Pro UTV desert racing familia to race the iconic BAJA 500. Woot...woot!

 

[Rusty5150]

Branden Sims!!!!


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[Bajaxp]

Branden Sims!!!!


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Ok myopic man... I said 'Simms' right after Cognito.

 

[Rusty5150]

Ok myopic man... I said 'Simms' right after Cognito.

My bad.


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[Bajaxp]

My bad.


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Haha...all good.

I would love to have another shot at Simms. He beat me by something like 20 seconds at the Mint after we had 3 flats, tacoed A-arm and a slipping/dead belt. Game on!

 

[NIKAL]

How many of the Polaris guys out there are confident that this is the race for you all to turn the points battle around? How about an Arctic Cat finding their way to the podium? What will be the amount of entries in our growing class of pro sportsman UTV? What percentage of our class will find their way to the checkered flag? 75%? 20%? What will the margin of victory be? Minutes, or an hour or more? Will this be the last Baja 500 for the vulnerable CVT drive system?
.

My guess or hope is we see 25+ UTV's take the green flag. I'm going to say the UTV's have a 38% finishing rate. The top 3 finishers will be within 30 minutes of each other. The next few to finish will be another 1+ hours back. As far as who wins & finishes. I think just by sheer numbers you have to pick Polaris for the win. I think Can Am has 3 or 4 teams that have proved they can win and be contenders. As far as Arctic Cat, I have seen nothing from them that shows me they are ready two contend for a win or even podium. Last 500 for the CVT? I thought the CVT was part of what makes a UTV a UTV?

In all honesty I would love nothing more than to see Polaris lose this race & the Championship this year. I'll tell you why? It will build better competition & racing in the future. It will show other manufactures there is a place for them in a once dominated Polaris class.

True story, several years ago Michelin who owns BFG was shaking up their upper management. The new management was reviewing the company's marketing & advertising stratagy and did not like what they saw in off-road desert racing. BFG had no real competition in Baja, yet had a huge budget. BFG was paying & helping Score build & mark the course on their dime. BFG had BFG Relay (BFG version of Weatherman) BFG offers free pit support for all there customers, plus helped with timing & tracking of all teams. Due to the lack of competition BFG was reviewing if they would even stay in Baja desert racing. Bob Hines who was BFG Relay was not going to get paid to do relay if they stayed. BFG was not going to organize customer pit support along the course if they stayed. If BFG left it was going to be a huge loss to the sport.

But what happened is Yokohama, Toyo, General and a few other tire manufactures came back into the sport and were offering support to teams. This the best thing that could happen to BFG as it showed they needed to be here again. BFG was losing races to these other tires. BFG could not be content on being past winners. Now they had someone to compete against.

This is what Polaris & the UTV industry needs. If you dominate for too long, then there is no reason to be there.

 

[Brian B]

Johnny and I are going to win it!

 

[SimsMotorsports]

Looks like the people have spoken LOL! I really hope I can find a way to make it happen!!! It doesn't seem like I have much of an option

 

[Brian B]

Looks like the people have spoken and I don't have much of an option

Stoked for you bro!