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Baja 1000 Race Report
2005
By Uncle Ed Paulsen
Above is a picture of Ed's extensive pit
planning work
As you can see Ed is very creative with plastics : )
I got the opportunity to run chase & pits for my boss
who drives a class 3 truck in the Baja 1000. Surprisingly
it won for the 4th time in a row! Really cool/low key guys
with little $ & no flash, just determination and smarts.
Their truck is straight out of the original Mad Max, rusty
chains holding the doors, cracked lenses on all the lights,
bullet holes and all! Tractors finish the 1000, these guys
are all farmers and it shows. The only mechanical were 2 broken
front coil springs, we had to drive backwards on the course
to get to them the spares. Luckily it was at night and well
after the really fast vehicles had gone thru.
We all have trail ridden well over half of this year’s
course, but only a couple hundred miles/day. My impression
sitting at Valle De Trinidad (RM530) at 4:30am and still watching
bikes grind thru is this: it is one bad ass looong bitch of
a race. I have a lot more respect to anyone, in any class
that grinds thru that Motherfarker. Some Eurotrash lamented
that the Baja 1000 was not the biggest off-road race in the
world, the Paris-Dakar was. Hmmm, I didn’t see any 10
hour maintenance/sleep breaks at the end of the 200 Km special
section. It didn’t really drive home until I saw it in
person, but one is a Rally and one is a race.
Anyway, I only got to see the pro bikes once at Borrego junction
(RM200 heading south across highway 3 towards San Felipe just
east of El Diablo Dry lake bed), I don’t know who was
on the 6X Travis Pastrami bike, but they sure as hell did
not look lost, low on gas or needing a ramp to show some skill.
Honda #1 had about a 30+ minute lead at that point. I am really
amazed by the #1 sportsman finisher, Bob Laughlin who raced
the whole enchilada solo! 80% of the bikes were going at a
typically brisk La Port pace. I only saw three things that
would really scare me out there; 1) Booby traps (Most were
just jumps, but a few were rather large holes filled with
old refrigerators and cinder blocks, after the first teams
saw them everyone knew about them from the radio) 2)Trophy
trucks and class 1 buggies (These things are on the edge &
angry, getting passed by them could be bad, bikes have 2 hr
head start but that’s not nearly enough in a long race)
3)Darkness.
The Family of Kanuks in the Motorhome mentioned in the press
release below were like the KilledKenny family X6. Really
cool gang. The motor home is a 1972 that was gutted in a fire
last June! They just threw in some laminate flooring, a new
hot plate and called er good - Ay. We all sat on the roof
watching the trophy trucks and Bikes roll thru while eating
burnt corndogs and drinking warm red-bulls. It made me homesick
for SB2.
All in all it was another fun adventure; now I just need
to get a MC team together. Who wants to spend a small fortune,
beat their bike and risk life/limb for a $5 plastic trophy
at the San Felipe 250 with me?
Eduardo
Score press Release:
November 19, 2005
The Cinnamon Ranch Ford Bronco of brothers, Don and Ken Moss,
completed the 38th annual SCORE Baja 1000 off road race on
November 19 leading Class 3 and securing a fourth consecutive
SCORE Class 3 series championship. This marks the 17th Class
3 event win for this 1979 Ford Bronco. The Mosses finished
the 709 mile course in just under 25 hours traversing the
Baja peninsula through silt beds, narrow rocky passes, dry
lake beds and beach front trails. As one of over 340 starters,
the brothers triumphed to be one of only 163 finishers, giving
the nearly 200,000 spectators a glimpse of Bishop, CA’s
homegrown champions.
Don Moss guided the Bronco off the starting line Friday and
drove the first 200 miles, where it was brother Ken’s
turn to race the Bronco off through the night. Don took over
the driving duties once again on Saturday morning, bringing
it in for the win. The #300 entry was the third off the line
in their class of 6 starters and finished three hours ahead
of only two other finishers in the class.
Given the technicality and difficulty of this year’s
course, the Moss brothers set their focus on finishing and
in the weeks prior to the race checked everything on the Bronco
while crew chief Dave Grundman finished fabricating a new
axle truss, to add some more strength and clearance to the
Bronco. However, despite their diligent preparation the rugged
terrain claimed two front springs; one at race mile 60 and
one at race mile 210. “I’m sure our competitors
thought they’d got a break when they passed us early
in the race as we made repairs, but they didn’t get to
enjoy it for long. We just reeled them back in once we got
rolling,” said Don. This Class 3 team has also added
yet another race finish without a flat to the BF Goodrich
record, as the tire company celebrates its 30th year in SCORE
desert racing.
The Cinnamon Ranch team consisting of 19 crew (which included
the 7 drivers and riders) and 3 chase trucks came from all
over and included a motorhome of crazy kanuk’s. Joining
the team for the 2nd year was an insanely dedicated crew of
6 from Quesnel, B.C., Canada. The canadians covered the pit
at Borrego. “We never quite know what to expect from
our Canadian crew,” Don commented. “They even stopped
off in Sacramento to spend a day helping work on the Bronco
before continuing on their way to Mexico. They asked me what
Borrego meant in Spanish and when I told them it had something
to do with sheep, they said they’d bring Velcro gloves….just
in case ! Seriously, these people travel a long way to help
us out and I am very appreciative and grateful. I hope our
win made it worthwhile.”
Television coverage of this event will be broadcast on a
one hour special on December 10 on the NBC network. A different
one hour special will premier on the Outdoor Network on Sunday,
December 18 and yet another special will air in January on
the Discovery HD Network. All three shows will be co-produced
by Aura360. The Cinnamon Ranch Bronco is sponsored by River
City Differential – Rancho Cordova, CA; Deaver Springs
– Santa Ana, CA; King Shocks – Garden Grove, CA;
Cinnamon Ranch – Bishop, CA and BF Goodrich Tires.
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