King of the Hammers 2021: Finishing the Toughest Race in the World

[Music] we're here at the 2021 king of the hammers race we're already dirty we're all settled in so when we get here the first thing we do is we set up this garage we've got to get the tarps down get the lights up get everything set so we can work on the cars all week and and we're not rebuilding the transmission we're doing little things we're tuning the brakes we're doing the shocks we're changing tires we've got lots of things that need to get done on the cars this is the main area that the whole team works out of and then we also have our own cook to feed the 40 people that are here so it's it's a big undertaking we took the car out this morning ran a little bit we were working with some plumbing issues that we got handled and they're they're all good now so now we're just dialing in our brakes and then we'll be ready for qualifying the big car in the morning so this is really really cool tommy dykstra is a customer who saw what i did last year by finishing the 4400 class in a gen right jeep he bought all the parts and built it himself in his garage and already qualified to race in the 4400 class so his jeep's ready and uh i think it's awesome and i i wish him the best for sure once this stuff is done we get the cars and we take off and we get three days to pre-run the race course they change the course every year it's one of the things that i love about king of the hammers is you never know what the course is going to be so this course is prob honestly the worst course i've seen king of hammers race on you know i've raced for the last seven or eight years now and this is by far the worst one especially for the 4400s you know we're racing utv they have a shorter course the rock loop is you know it's similar but not as many of the add-on trails that they throw in for the 4400s on lap three you know so tommy is going to have to work for it you know i i think this was a rough year for him to jump in and try this but you know i think if he can keep his head on straight and just stay moving and protect the vehicle you know i think he'll do good and that's that's the same boat we're in you know just keep the vehicle safe and keep moving [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Applause] nasty rapper jeep okay my name is jeremy jones i drive a trent fab top shelf um race car i guess uh 4800 class my number's 4837 picked the class just because it's not quite as high dollar as the the unlimited class but you still get a lot of the same speed and the same performance out of the car my name is dan young i co-drive for jeremy jones out of laramie wyoming for car 4837 we have pre-run every single every inch of every single trail picked our lines very very diligently we've got over 300 different points that we've marked throughout everywhere uh just warning us of some coming up so for the most part my head's kind of just buried down into the gps uh watching and being able to call out what's coming up ahead so that he's forewarned so we don't catch a g out wrong trying to figure out what the fastest line less like less rutted and rough line after the trophy trucks they absolutely murdered the desert so we have had to kind of pick our way through just because we don't have the suspension and we don't have the tire that they have going through so um rock wise we have gone over every inch of every trail and so we feel very prepared we've been through everything at least two or three times it gets pretty long in the tooth you you're you're getting tossed around and slammed around the rocks i think are one of the worst parts you're motoring through them so fast that everything is just jostling back and forth and you're taking hits your neck gets a little bit tired and sore by the end of the day but i wouldn't change it i wouldn't trade it it's still as much fun as you can have getting your ass handed to you so mickey came into the program last year um through tony pellegrino they've been kind of watching and we had a third place finished here before nationally and a top 15 at hammers and then last year we ended up on the baja boss we had a top five finish and second nationally um it's a super tough tire last year was a bit of a learning curve on them i just kind of had to figure that figure out my cornering a little bit they're just a little bit different than the maxis i ran before but they're definitely more controllable and they handle great through the desert uh once we got into the rock lap last year man they were they were smooth they grabbed they bite we raced them the entire season last year and it is i'm flat floored at how tough they are we took some hits uh specifically in tennessee that i honestly can't believe that they didn't explode the wheel much less tear it hole in the tire so they're huge it's they're awesome we had a smoking run up until the point where we center punched a rock going up the rock base that slowed us down just the scout and then coming down the hill um i think that i reached up and tried to shut the front locker off and i might have hit the fuel pump and it killed the car and so it took us about 15-20 seconds to get the car running again which killed our time a bit so we're hoping we'd start probably top 25 and we'll just pick them off through the desert as we go jeremy jones in 48-37 that's the legends class he was doing really well but in spooner's canyon the car got damaged really bad and he was unable to finish as well [Music] hi this is ted delker here i'm driving the north shore raceworks 906 car 4400 class mickey thompson came on board right uh right off the get started running this car last year been working with them on the baja boss since the get-go the tire handles really well for us excellent traction in the rocks good stability at speed just been a really good fit definitely a competitive tire out here last year we didn't get as much pre-running as we wanted so this year our goal coming in was to pre-run everything so we've ran the desert section we're gonna run that again tomorrow so we'll have two laps in the desert and we've ran all the rock trails and then the new trail king's graveyard we went and walked out yesterday that's gonna be a pretty gnarly one so put some eyes on that and try not to slide down it yeah that one's gonna take out a lot of cars so i'm gonna be prepared we finished uh 20th last year we had a pretty good day had a couple small issues but i think about everything i mean cars looking good i think we're ready to put in a good finish this year this race is really about endurance you know i feel like this race after running a couple years now is mostly one in the garage right this if you don't come here prepared you might as well just pack it up and go home you know it's there's a lot of luck involved there's a lot of car prep involved and then just being patient and getting through your day carefully but also you know maintaining that race pace so it's a real big balance compared to just a lap race it's not quite a sprint the whole time just trying to keep pace and keep the car together [Applause] we're just working through getting this car dialed in so jordan can get the finish that he's been looking for for the last few years with this new car um it's been a process a lot of new things that we've worked through over the last couple years we've got a lot of the bugs worked out we've been just fine-tuning little details like brakes and cooling on the front diff with the help of sam and kyle and cole and the rest of the team these guys have been knocking stuff out and i really got to give a lot of credit to them as well tomorrow morning both tommy and jordan will go out and qualify on a short course that's combined of jumps berms and then they go through the rocks and that qualifies them for their start position that's where you figure out how many guys dust do i have to eat or can i be up at the front with clean air and running away from the rest of them that are fighting the dust [Music] had a pretty smooth run i think we're sitting in 10th right now lots of cars to go but we'll be sitting in a pretty good spot uh come race day yeah the uh first part it's got a couple uh really good jumps um so you just gotta kind of lean the car in there and hope that she flies all right uh the corners were a little chewed up but powered through and then we got to the rock section which is more of my background we're pretty smooth through the rocks that rock slab is actually pretty slippery um and we didn't have to work nearly as hard as a lot of those guys so i think that's a big advantage there we scooted up that pretty quick and get back in the dirt and uh around the last section car is pretty much ready to go we're going to go out this afternoon and run the first 15 20 miles of race course just to make sure it feels good and see how those whoops are looking and then we'll just do a nut and bolt check check all the fluids and let it sit till race day so the course is super gnarly is here it shares the same part part of the same course that the trophy trucks are running so it is beat all the desert portions are super blown out the rocks are you know just as aggressive as always we're going up one of the super steep rock faces that we usually go down um it's a lot shorter course this year so it's gonna be important to make sure we nail every point on that course because if there's a point where we lose time there's really no opportunity to gain that time back during a run so a smooth clean run is going to be super important so right now we're looking really good jordan got a really solid qualifying run today it was clean it was right where he wanted to be top 20. not too you didn't want to be too far in the front with everybody raging behind him so i think we're set up and lined up for a good day on saturday right where we planned on being so i'm looking forward to it now they're going to do what's called a race prep so they're going through everything in great detail he did damage a couple parts on that big jump landing so we've got to get some new ones to put on there but not not a big big deal and uh yeah the guys will have it buttoned up and ready to go [Music] we had quite the exciting race day right off the start we were having mechanical problems with our front diff pump which causes the front diff to overheat rather quickly without that pump and without the cooler in the system so that definitely changed my mindset right off the start almost it was a lot earlier in the race than i was ready for something like that but i just knew we had to kind of go into survival mode and just keep the car moving keep it alive and not damage it along the way or compromise it for the rest of the race [Applause] [Music] all right on race day what i do is i chase the race car in our gen right terramoto it's it's a lot of fun taking shortcuts and everything without getting on the race course because that's a you could get dnf for that it's a huge penalty and still get eyes on the car that's that's my main thing is i want eyes on the car all right we made it and we are all the way out at pit one which is just off soggy dry lake and further from here is cougar buttes so the cars will come through here continue cougar buttes then they're gonna head way out toward that far mountain and then they'll loop back in here one more time for fuel parts work on the car whatever we need and then they head back out to maine where they'll get more fuel and then on to lap two behind any good team is a headquarters or a base right so this is what we call our base radio and these run on 60 foot antennas that are anchored to the trailer the team talks on one radio channel and the car talks on another radio channel so that there's no interruption and this gentleman inside here actually monitors both and relays some information from the car to the team as he comes into the pits so this is a very important aspect because this race is over such a vast area that we have to have a really good base radio to communicate with all the different areas is so many miles apart [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] eventually at about a mile 100 um ended up having to call it a day because his throttle pedal wasn't working anymore he's got a what they call a fly-by-wire throttle pedal that is run by the computer and it just stopped working and it was gonna he was getting to the very technical section of the racecourse through the rocks and uh it was just not gonna go well so he pulled the plug and that was the end of his day we knew already based on the amount of oil that had pushed out of the front differential but the pump was not working so now it was up to jordan to manage the temperature of that front differential by slowing down and then send them on to main pit where they had the extra parts and everything they could to work on it and get it fixed [Music] you know we we uh we got that diff pump fixed um it was about a 45 minute pit stop back at maine so we we really struggled to be moving at the pace i wanted to be moving out on lap one i really had to dial it back a bit [Music] so stay here [Music] [Music] um we got moving again but then we were behind a lot of people you know going into those first rock trails spooners outer limits so we get to idle issues on lap two after chocolate thunder and there's a car rolled over right in the middle of our line because once they had that front differential problem they had to make up time and that really put them in a different spot in the race where they were caught in other traffic it's really easy to run the trails but on race day it's it's twice as hard to run any single one of these trails when you have cars broken you know cars upside down people scattered all over the trail everything's just constantly changing [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] so my name is gunner velazquez i'm jordan's co-driver i've been his co-driver for about eight years now uh basically just met him online he uh had an ad for on pirate 4x4 for a co-driver needed i responded to it and got the gig and been uh history ever since yeah when i met jordan he was about 14 years old and he didn't even have a learner's permit he didn't have a driver's you know license anything so that was pretty funny that was always the joke that if we got pulled over he wasn't even legally allowed to drive at the time you know when we first started driving together i mean it was kind of a learning process for everything i hadn't been in the rocks this was about eight years ago this is king hammers are still relatively new i was more of a desert guy jordan uh he had trophy carts that he didn't uh lucas oil series and we were both kind of learning together and tony helped us along the way just you know we've just put a lot of hours a lot of seat time and it's been a good ride we definitely have uh grown up together almost like brothers and uh just yelling at each other and it's a it's very a lot of energy in the car to be said so that's that's a good time though we definitely get it yeah i just try to remind them to have a good time when we're out doing this and uh you know just keep the little triangle on the line that's my big big goal so you know we'll try and get this car to the finish and uh just uh you know do our thing [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] jesus so like i said before the race course is different every single year this year it's the hardest it's ever been it's 219 miles and they added a trail called king's graveyard it's brand new they just cut it through this canyon and the rocks are bigger than the vehicle it's got a really steep grade to it the cars are literally like falling down this and getting wedged in the rocks and it's so bad that we weren't willing to to run either of these vehicles through it we've walked the whole thing watched another vehicle go through and uh really kind of came up with the strategy this trail is worse than all the other trails combined okay it's bad it's the worst thing i've ever seen now all that said that trail is the last trail of the race so you've driven 180 miles your car is beat down you're beat down you're tired you're exhausted you've lived on the edge of death for seven hours already so you've got to really check it up and take a deep breath this is like running a marathon you got to pace yourself and then when you get to that trail you got to like dig deep to get through that thing it's it's going to be a super tough year [Music] [Music] [Music] hey so i've been everywhere today it's fun huh i've been everywhere today and then of course toward the end of the day you know we were pretty beat we had king's graveyard after sledgehammer and that was quite the trail i told myself when we got there that week that i was running it once and it was during the race we went up to king's graveyard and walked the trail and it was absolutely insane and luckily while we were down there walking that trail there was i think a few other racers campbells uh horshol some of the other you know top guys happened to come down and and drive these trails or drive this trail while we were there scouting it and it was insane like to see some of guys like that struggling was like okay this is gonna be an extremely tough trail you know guys like that don't struggle on very much so i knew we were in for it luckily we got down pretty smooth a lot of the main lines that we had walked and that were lines were the line couple days before that were no longer lines um but we made do we got through it [Music] job [Music] [Applause] [Music] well we had a hell of a day we uh had a really clean first maybe lap and a half we're doing really well just want to thank all the guys back in the shop for getting the car ready dave annie andy um jason don tadd with all our families for letting us come out here and do this um yeah and all our sponsors so mickey thompson uh tires are great today so much grip so this time this race is all about tires man you got to have a good tire to get you to the end of the race you can't be out there swapping tires every 10 minutes so we love we love the mickey thompson tires they got us through the race today tons of grip thanks thanks to everybody thanks dr ford for putting this event on it's amazing they pulled it off in these times yeah we're happy to be back for sure that was there asking for a toy fan [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] it was pretty exciting you know i it's been a couple years since we've made it all the way to the finish especially in 4400 class like it's it's no joke that lap 3 is you have to give it every bit of energy you have left in order to you know drive the car all the way to the finish oh my god um my co-driver gunner did a great job out there helping me you know scout helping us get through the field of broken cars uh but we made it all the way and uh yeah yeah on on fumes but we made it good buddy you know i can't say enough about how well the team worked and coordinated in each of the pits and all of that contributes to jordan getting to the finish line come on man i got you thank you [Applause] just as many hours i have getting this car ready um the entire team all of our sponsors generate mickey thompson uh kmc wheels arp torco torco fuel uh yeah fox skosh rockstar garage there's so many how many who how many times zero tire [Applause] yeah then we ran out of gas coming to the finish that was a little scary it was an amazing feeling it's a feeling i haven't had in a couple years so it's good to have that much time man uh thank you i think i had the right mindset this year to get us to the finish we we did exactly what we needed to do and it felt so good to get that finish again after two years of not finishing at hammers this was my fourth attempt at the 4400 class and second finish in 4 400 so you know i'm glad i could bring it home for the team the sponsors myself i think it you know brought a lot of spirits up that we're down after the last couple years so i'm excited to see where we keep the ball rolling from here [Music] you

Channel: RockstarGarage

Views: 52,375

Rating: 4.8887415 out of 5

Keywords: ultra4, king of the hammers, koh 2021, koh 2022, genright, r1 concepts, mickey thompson, scosche, rockstar energy, rockstar garage, off road, rock race, desert racing, jeep, bronco, ford, baja boss, nitto, johnson valley, OHV, trail, brake, tire, jump, fox shocks, randy slawson, monster, redbull, roll, bounce, crash, winch, finish, jordan pellegrino, tad dowker, christopher paiva, gunnar velasquez, gambler, 4x4, build, custom, race car, survive, kmc, wheel, BBK, terremoto, tony pellegrino, LJ, TJ, JK, JT

Id: C_IWrJsbYrs

Length: 37min 30sec (2250 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 17 2021