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TrailReady
Motorsports escapes disaster in Silver State 300. In our first race since the 2010 Baja 1000, TRM left the starting line of the SS300 ready to rumble with our new Ford ProTruck. We had just received the vehicle 3 weeks prior after it sat in a trailer since its last race in 2009. Three weeks wasn’t enough to thoroughly go through the truck especially since we spent the bulk of that time converting it from a Chevrolet to a Ford. In any case, it was running and driving as we sat at the starting line on a perfect desert morning with a mild breeze promising to clear the way through the field of competitors in front of us. Carl Fitts, the 2007 and 2008 Best in the Desert mini production truck champ, who had prepped the ProTruck for this race sat in the driver’s seat with owner Larry Trim riding along as navigator. Charging off the line, it was clear that the truck was running and handling better than we expected, so we pushed hard to move through the field while the wind was cooperating. We were soon passing class 10 cars who had started in front of the ProTruck class. We saw 110 mph and caught some great air time on some of the big rollers. While working our way around one car that was slow to get over, we found a rock on the shoulder of the graded road that eventually resulted in a flat tire. While changing the tire, we found the source of the oil smell from minutes before in a loose crank case breather. By the time that was corrected, most of the field was by. So now we’ll concentrate on finishing the race and take the opportunity to make notes in prepping the new to us truck for V2R. We were bombing along and getting through the Ultra 4 cars when in a downhill sandy wash at RM57, the Ford suddenly lurched right and then left up a bank, stopped, and then rolled down onto its roof. Race over with a sheared sector shaft in the steering box. I couldn’t help but think about the terrain we had covered prior. The mountain pass with steep drops, the high speed graded roads and big rollers along with bad G-outs. It couldn’t have broken at a better time. Damage to the truck was limited to cracked fiberglass. TrailReady Motorsports looks forward to the Vegas to Reno event. photo: David Taylor |
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Check out TrailReady Motorsports TV at www.youtube.com/trailready. We'll be adding new video clips after each event, along with other great clips we come across. |
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