Ultra4 American Rock Sports Challenge, August 2014

The Ultra4 American Rock Sports Challenge took place at Miller Motorsports Park in Tooele, Utah Friday, August 22 and Saturday, August 23, 2014.

Post-race interview with Mike Klensin

“The last time I raced there we had 4^th in the main; we were right on track to do the same this time around.”

Miller Motorsports Park’s website says it’s as if the seven acre rock crawling course adjacent to the off-road short course “was custom-designed for Ultra4 racing.”

The Ultra4 American Rock Sports Challenge requires that drivers do “six laps of the Off Road Short Course as well as two circuits of the Rock-Crawling Course. After the first lap is completed on the Off Road Short Course, the drivers can choose when to switch over to the Rock-Crawling Course. To combine the high-speed, big-air action of the Off-Road Short Course with the low-speed, high-torque, very technical driving required on the big rocks places a premium on both driving talent and mechanical engineering.”

Photo by Acacia Pinnell

Mike says “I usually race faster than I qualify; that was the case here – mid pack in the qualifying lap.”

Mat Carpentier was co-driver; he’s a UTV racer exploring new styles of racing – like Ultra 4. Mat posted to Facebook “Glad I get the privilege to co-drive this race.”

Mike says “It rained real hard Friday night; a torrential downpour made it super muddy.”

In order to see the course, Mat had to  spend part of the race with his visor up.

Photo by Patty Pinnell

You’ve got to see this.

The Discount Tire American Rocksports Challenge Highlight Video shows the effect the thick, slick mud had on the rocks. Heavy and slippery equals the potential for dramatic rollovers. (Catch John Brock under the car at about :24 and Brock and Mike Florian at about 1:01.)

The video will help you appreciate what happened next. Mike says …

“Things were going great.”

“We were the first solid axle car in our heat race; the first, second and third were IFS cars.  On this course they typically do better than the solid axle cars.

Second heat race started around 8th off the line and finished fourth, which is really good. We were happy.

Photo by Patty Pinnell

Going into the main we had expectations of finishing top 5.

That was very realistic, we wouldn’t have any problem with that.

The main race started and we had to go one full lap around the short course; on the second loop we headed into the rock section. They do that to spread out the cars, so the faster guys are out front. It works good because we were able to move up a few positions before entering into the rock section.

Photo by Patty Pinnell

We followed a couple fast lines through the rock section; but the car in front of us got hung up in the second obstacle. Which isn’t a big deal, you just have to back up and move over a foot and then go again.

We tried to go around and got stuck ourselves – which would have been no big deal except the transmission and reverse stopped working again.

If we had reverse we would have just backed up and went ourselves. We would have been more cautious if we’d known reverse didn’t work. We had to wait for the entire team of 25 cars to go through before we could get a tow from the course workers and back off the obstacle.

Photo by Patty Pinnell

So once we got towed back we were good to go and just drove our race and were able to make back 9 positions to finish 16th.

It was about a 30 minute race. We could have gotten the top five; but that’s racing.”

What’s the next race?

“The official season is over, but the nationals race is coming up. I have to talk to John.”

Stay tuned.

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