The race started off well, with Nick Nelson making  his way physically to the front of our class and right on the heals of class 25 which starts in front of our Class 24 by the time we made our first rider Change @ Race mile 37 in Ojos Negros.  From there it was time for our bike builder Kenny Sanford of S&S Motorsports to get on the bike.  This was Kenny’s first time on the bike during a race down there since he first started supporting our team in 2008.  So with this he would be playing double duty by both riding as part of the team as well as taking care of the bike as lead mechanic.  Kenny had a few pre-race jitters but I felt that he would do well regardless, once he got on the bike.  The pit and rider swap went well and he was off and making dust as well as eating a fair amount too.  This early in the race all the competition is fairly tight so there is a tremendous amount of dust to deal with.  Kenny got out and started charging immediately and quickly caught a couple of dirt bike’s that had went by during our short pit.  A hard right-hander snuck up on him while doing 60 plus and eating dust.  He then found him self and the bike wrapped up in what has since been labeled the “Barbed-Wire Straight Jacket”.  This guy works wonders of magic with building our race bike’s and his talent doesn’t stop there, as he pulled off his best Houdini maneuver to get him self freed up from a seemingly hopeless situation.  He then untangled the quad and fortunately both he and our race machine weren’t any worse for ware other than a few scratches and wounded pride.  Kenny then remounted the quad and showed the same amount of heart and determination that he showed in building the machine.  He charged hard never giving up a single position during the remainder of his ride to Race Mile 96 and passed one of the Class 25 bikes on his way too boot.  When we put Jorie Williams on the bike at RM96 we had roughly 6 minutes on the rest of our class and were keeping Class 25 honest.  Jorie made great time over the summit, however as he was heading into the rough stuff he noticed that the dry break on top of the gas tank was leaking terribly.  He stopped several times and either was able to make it stop or he had lost enough fuel that it wasn’t coming out any more.  I tend to believe it was the latter, as he was on the lake bed a mile and a half from the pit physically passing into 4th overall quad position and ran out of gas.  He tried raising our pit by radio with no luck.  Fortunately for us this kid has no quit in him and he immediately started pushing the quad with every thing he had.  The pit eventually saw him a came to his aide.  They got the machine fueled up, made a quick duct tape fix to the cap on the dry break that we would have to replace at each pit for the remainder of the race.  Micheal Kelley got on the bike and went to work.  We lost an hour and change during this mishap and slipped back to 15th overall and 10th in class, so at this point every rider would be required to ride their hearts out the remainder of the day to try and salvage a decent finish and as many points as possible for the championship standings.  Micheal had a good run to Borrego and I got on and took a bath in the fuel leaking out of the dry break till San Matias where we had to change out a tire and up-grade our duct tape dry break cap.  From this point Micheal got back on and road his butt off to the Valley De Trinidad pit.  An extremely fired up Jorrie Williams got back on the bike at this point and hung it out over the cross to the Pacific side at San Vicente where we were finally starting to see that we were making our way up in the standings  Nick Nelson waded his way through several more riders on the coast section in route to Santo Thomas.  I would then get on for the final leg of the race and make my way back over to Ojos Negros then into Ensenada for the finish.  When I got on the bike Kenny let me know on the radio that I was physically 10 min behind 2nd place which on corrected time made it 17 minutes so I new all I could do was charge hard and see how the cards fell.  We lucked out due to attrition as the team that was leading broke an axle on their way from Uruapan to Ojos so that put us in 2nd.  We had a quick and flawless pit in Ojos for our final pit stop and I made my way to the finish line from there.  We ended up 2nd in class for the day just 12 minutes and 45 seconds behind 1st and 6th over all quad.  This keeps us in a solid 1st place in the point standings for the Class 24 Championship.

I am genuinely proud of my team and pit support crews for their never give up approach under the adversity that we experienced during this race.  It is this kind of perseverance that wins championships and I am confident that we will be duking it out for the overall near future.

Words: Brandon Brown (Quad75)

Thanks to all of our sponsors that made this effort possible!

MotoXNutrition, S&S Motorsports, Quad75.Com, Klim, Fox Racing Shox, Teixeira Tech, Maxxis, Hiper Technology, Rekluse, IMS, PWR, Wiseco, Maxima, FullBore, Spider Grips, Power Madd, Crower Power, UPP, Trail Tech, Scott, Bling Star,  UNI, MotoSport Hillsboro, Pirate Insurance, SCR Graphics, Galfer, TCS, Precision Racing Products, Hot Rod Bill, Mark Garrett, Water Well Developing, Kelley Blocks.

Support Crew,

Paulina Nelson, Michelle (The Cookie Lady), Kelly Sanford, Mike Kelley II, Bill Nelson, Brad Aboltin, Chino & Kenny Sanford!

Riders,
Brandon Brown, Jorie Williams, Kenny Sanford, Nick Nelson & Micheal Kelley III

The race started off with an irreparable rear brake issue within 30 miles into the race.  All the riders sucked it up and dealt with it for the entire race.  “It’s hard to commit yourself to doing what we do with the knowledge that you can’t hit the binders when in trouble” said team manager and rider of record  Brandon Brown, “…so I’m really happy with how every one of our riders dealt with the adversity”. The only other problem they had was on a virtual check point heading into the finish in San Felipe.  “I got led aria by some course markers from prior races heading into town and by the time I got it figured out it was too late and we ended up with a penalty” further stated Brandon.  Even with these couple of problems the 106A quad still had their next closest competitor by 25+ minutes when the official results were tallied.

We would like to thank the Riders, pit crews and all the sponsors that helped put this quad on top of the podium.  Special thanks to: MXN for prepping our riders with the goods to make it happen!  “The use of MXN’s supplement line was without a doubt a major contributor to our success and win!” Special thanks to Kenny at S&S Motorsports for doing the same for the quad!

Riders: Brandon Brown, Jorie Williams, Mike Kelley III, Nick Nelson.

Sponsors: MotoX Nutrition, S&S Motorsports, Quad75.com, Fox Racing Shox, Maxxis, Klim, Hiper Technology, Texiera Tech,SCR Graphics, Rekluse, Flex Handlebars, Bling Star, Precision Stabilizer, MotoSport Hillsboro,  LRD, UPP, Crower Power, Spider Grips, PWR, Maxima, IMS, PowerMadd, Trail Tech, TCS, Galfer Brakes, Wiseco, Scott, Fulbore, Water Well Developing & Kelley Blocks.

Pit Support:  Kenny Sanford, Mike Kelley II, Paulina Nelson, Bill Nelson, Brad Aboltin, Chino & crew, Big Frank & Crew.

The Quad75.com/S&S Motorsports Class 25 6A Team is pleased with this years results and poised for an even better 2010 season. After a bit of a rocky start at the San Felipe 250 in March, they quickly made some much needed changes to the program for the Baja 500 and clicked off a win.  In fact it was the first win ever in any pro class, dirt bike or ATV for Suzuki in the SCORE Series.

Next up would be the Baja 1000!  We acquired an 05′ TRX 450R that had minimal use and went to work.  We chose the 05′ TRX because we had vast experience with the machine and felt it would be our best bet for having a successful race in what looked to be the most brutal and technical Baja race in recent years.

Leaving no stone unturned, Kenny Sanford of S&S Motorsports tore the bike down to the frame and split the cases on the engine immediately after I dropped it off at his shop in Puyallup Wa.  “The quad looked to be in great shape, however for this race we couldn’t take any chances so we decided to start from scratch”  stated Kenny.  So long story short.  Over the course of the fallowing three and a half months prior to the race, Kenny meticulously built the quad from the ground up with the help of a long list of sponsors and co contributors.

The race machine turned out great!  After running it in a small local hare scramble the week before we left for the sake of shaking it down, we were ready to head for Mexico.  When we arrived in San Felipe to do our scheduled pre-running and finale suspension tuning a week prior to the race.  All went well and the bike was set up perfectly for the task at hand.

Come race day, we got off to a good start however shortly after we ran into a streak of small blunders that ultimately put us out of the running for the win.  Not to get detoured we all got our heads back in the game and started chipping away at the lead that the majority of the field had on us.  By the half way point we had clawed our way up to the second place spot.  At this point we fought back and forth with the 4A bike for over 250 miles for the #2 position.  We had a great battle going and left a pit on the coast with in seconds of each other until bad luck would strike one last time.  We ended up getting short fueled at that pit and ran out of gas 10 miles from any where.  We lost two plus hours getting this problem resolved, and made our way in to Ensanada with a very respectable 3rd in Class and 3rd overall ATV.  This set us up solid for the runner up spot for the series in Class 25.

We were incredibly happy with the results for the year.  “This was mine and Kenny’s first full year effort putting a program together in Baja…” said one of the team cordinators Brandon Brown “And considering we pulled off a win and second in the series points for the season.  We couldn’t be happier, or more poised for next season”.

This was definitely the roughest course that SCORE has thrown at the race contestants in a long time and we were completely pleased with how the machine held up, ran, and handled.  It all came together due to a lot of sponsors/ contributors that we would like to give thanks.

Special thanks to:  Bling Star for title sponsoring the team for the 1000, their pegs & aluminum products.  Kenny @ S&S Motorsports for working tirelessly to make sure we were riding the best quad possible at each event.  Sean @ TCS for taking the time and effort on a frame skid plate that should eventually become the standard in Baja.  Hot Rod Bill for an impeccable wiring system for the lights.  Trail Tech for the lighting and last minute back up lighting.  Mike Cafro for advice any time we needed it.  SCR Graphics for going above and beyond to make sure our program looked Pro.  Fox for unbelievable suspension.  ARS-FX for the suspension components that made the bike track better than anything we have ridden yet.  And Klim for making sure all the riders looked as good as the Bike!

A big thanks to the companies and people that supplied the parts and labor that make the puzzle complete: Bike: MotoSport Hillsborro, Tires: Maxxis, Wheels: Hiper Technology, Flat Protection: Tire Balls, Bars: Fasst Co., Clutch: Rekluse, Piston: Wiseco, Cam: Crower Power, Levers: Works Connection, Filter: UNI, Breaks: Galfer, Grips: Spider, Oils & Chemicals: Maxima, Plastic: Full Bore, Pipe: CT, Case saver & Sliders: UPP, Hand gaurds: Power Madd, Goggles: Scott, Cooling: PWR, Stabilizer: Precision, Tank: IMS, Athlete Supplements: Moto X Nutrition, The Cookie Lady, Paulina Nelson, Kelly Sanford, Big Frank and his crew, Bill Nelson, Brad Aboltin, Alberto (Chino) Wong, and the Fines Double team for their track side assistance when ever we needed it.

And thanks to all the riders that contributed through out the year; Rider Of Record: Nick Nelson.  Riders: Brandon Brown, Jorie Williams, Josh Edwards, Jason Greenhaw, Mike Bender, Shilo Strunk.

Please keep an eye out for the full bike build and write up in an upcoming issue of ATV Action Magazine!

The team at the finish!

Brandon Brown Reports on Baja 1000

Friday morning we went to the track to get some practice in on the Mx part of the track, with the track only having a few events a year the track was pretty simple and I got it dialed within the first practice. During practice I was having some issues with my suspension, luckily Mike Hallock with Exit suspension was on hand and he revalved my shocks and got them dialed in for the race.
Saturday was a pretty laid back day, I did a Pro Practice which gives us a chance to practice the whole track and I basically used this practice to do the last minute fine tuning to the shocks. I then used the rest of the day to Hydrate myself and eat to prepare for the 2 hour main event on Sunday.
I came into the race Sunday morning feeling pretty good, and I felt that I was going to turn my season around and start getting some top ten finishes. The Crazy Horse Campground facility has no starting gates since they only have a few races a year, so for the start of the main event we did a dead engine start. When the flag dropped for the 28 rider Pro Main Event my quad started first kick and I got a great jump out of the hole. I ran the first 2 laps in 9th place right behind a train of the top 8, on the 3rd lap I was going down the beach section and launched off this pretty big single that the WORCS crew put in for the spectators on the lake in their boats. When I landed my left side heel plate on my nerf bars broke and sucked up under my rear tire and locked the rear end up, I struggled to get that out and finally just broke it off but I dropped back into 19th. With another finish outside of the top 10 not what I was wanting I put my head down and got myself back into the 9th spot at about the hour and a half mark. At this time I was starting to feel the Arizona heat and I just settled into the 9th spot and held it to the checkered. The 9th was my best finish of the year it built my momentum up a little bit going into the next round.

Here is his Race Report.

WORCS Rnd. 5 Toutle, Wa

Round 5 of the World Off Road Championship series brought us up to my backyard in the rainy state of Washington where we could get out of the desert and get into some trees. With the track located only 20 minutes from my house it made the weekend very laid back and didn’t seem like a WORCS race at all.
Friday was practice on the motocross track and the track was in primo condition hence the rain storm that blew in Thursday night. Since the track is one of my local riding areas I already had the motocross track down and used the day to test out my thumb that I squished between the rear sprocket and the swingarm on a dirt bike on Wednesday. Come to find out that my thumb felt better when I was on the bike then off.
Saturday rolled around and it was a pretty uneventful day, I went out and rode the Pro practice and got a feel for the off road section. The track was what I expected with tight tree sections that got rough with ruts and stumps.  What I didn’t expect was for them to use the drag strip as part of the course, where in which they were clocking us at up to 77 mph.
Twelve o’clock Sunday afternoon and it was time for the main event to start, I got a gate pick on the way outside and the first turn was the tightest one we’ve had all year. The gate fell and I got an awesome jump out of the hole and rounded the first corner in about fifth, I made a small mistake on the motocross track and lost a few positions and as we headed into the woods I was in the nine spot. On the second lap I made a pass to move into eighth and I ran there until Eichner passed me which would be the beginning of a 5 lap battle going back and forth with him. I pitted for fuel on lap 7 and Doug got around me and as I was on the hunt through the woods to get him back my quad started to overheat and I had broken the bolts to my gas tank so the only thing holding it on was the two bolts to my front plastic. I made it back to the pit and we did a quick spray out of the radiator and duct taped the gas tank on and I was back on the hunt, until I made it back into the woods and my quad stalled about 4 times due to overheating. With the bike overheating I lost another position putting me in 8th and with 2 laps left I was in survival mode and I just wanted the quad to finish. I held my spot as I crossed the finish line and with an 8th place finish, not what I was wanting coming into this race.  However I`m just happy it wasn’t a DNF.
The weekend could of went better but I’m content with it, the next round is at Straddeline ORV park in Olympia, Wa and I plan on coming out swinging.

I’d like to once again thank all of my sponsors for all their support!

Quad75.Com, Moto X Nutrion, S&S Motorsports, MotoSport Hillsborro, ARS FX, Maxxis, Rekluse, Klim, PWR, LRD, Hiper Wheels, IMS, Power Madd, Wiseco, UPP, UNI, Spider Grips, FullBore, X-Factor, Crower Power, Trail Tech, Maxima Oils, Scott Gogles

Jorie Williams #10 Charging through the woods!

Quad Magazine’s Nick Nelson Wins The Baja 500

PLAYING BY THE RULES FINALLY PAYS OFF

Nick Nelson Leaving Ensanada at the start of the race!

Quad Magazine Associate Editor Nick Nelson and his team finally get the big “W” that has been eluding them for nine long years. After the biggest display of rule enforcement by Score International to date, the 5A Suzuki QuadRacer R450 went from an unofficial 3rd place finish to a solid 1st place, finishing forty minutes ahead of the 2nd place American Honda team of Wayne Matlock.

The 5A team was the only team in the Class 25 Premiere ATV class that did not receive penalties for cutting the course or speeding on the highway. Nick Nelson, Brandon Brown, and Josh Edwards rode their nearly stock-motored QuadRacer R450 to an honest finish in 10 hours and 26 minutes.

“We had a near flawless day—our Suzuki QuadRacer R450 ran solid from start to the finish,” said Quad Magazine’s Nick Nelson. “Every team member did their job; no one crashed, broke anything, or did anything outside the Score rulebook. Kenney Sanford of S&S Motorsports did an excellent job prepping our bike for this brutal race. Our Maxxis tires with TireBalls performed flawlessly with no flats allowing us to concentrate on merely gassing and inspecting the machine in every pit. Our CT exhaust powered, FOX/Walsh suspended Suzuki just kept taking the abuse like we needed it to. We are also extremely excited to deliver Suzuki its first ever Pro win at any SCORE Baja event!”

Brandon Brown on the way in from Uruapan.

“We would love to thank our sponsors and pit crew, who have stuck by us for a decade worth of trying. Special thanks to Paulina Nelson, Allen Knowles, Alberto “Chino” Wong, Ron Edwards, Bill Nelson, Big Frank, Brad Aboltin, Kenney Sanford and Jason Greenhaw. We’d also like to thank Quad Magazine, Suzuki, CT Racing, S&S Motorsports, Fox Racing Shox, Walsh Racecraft, Precision Stabilizers, Maxxis, Hyper Wheels, PWR , Blingstar Industries, FASSTCO, K&N, Galfer, Spider Grips, MotoSport Hillsborro, PCI Race Radios, UPP, Dobech, TireBalls, IMS Products, Scott Goggles, PRM-ATV, Clarke, Moto X Nutrition, Trail Tech and Klim Technical Gear.”

Action photos by fotosolweb.com

Nick Nelson, Brandon Brown, Josh Edwards & Mechanic Kenny Sanford at the finish.