Racing in Baja requires months...
Racing in Baja requires months of planning and preparation. Team Donahoe is masterminded by Dylan Evans, Paige Donahoe, and Kreg Donahoe.
At The Starting Line
Having Gale Banks join the team as the driver who would take the truck at the start was significant. Although his race experience is better known for the records he set at the Bonneville Salt Flats, his off-road driving experience came mostly from frequent off-road driving on his property in the Yosemite Valley. Baja is not Yosemite, but Banks is no slouch either. With a bit of coaching during his prerun miles, he was quick to pick up on the added elements that are important to driving in an off-road race situation.
After more than 300 high-horsepower Trophy Trucks, buggies, and motorcycles hit the course, our "slow" class gets to bring up the rear. We took the green flag at just after noon. Up the wash and on to the graded road at the end of Avenue Ruiz, we came upon the first surprise for Banks. At race mile 4 was a steep silt hill. The hill wasn't the surprise for him. It was there on the prerun we made the night before, and we knew it would be busy when we got to it on race day. No, the hill wouldn't be a problem, we were in a four-wheel-drive diesel F-250 on the largest and strongest BFGoodrich tires available. We had plenty of ground clearance and weighed more than four tons, so simply motoring to the top was not a question. That is, of course, unless the course was blocked by other two-wheel-drive race cars who were either stuck, or about to be stuck.
And there they were. Many of them were motionless, but a good number of them were still spitting up dirt and dust in their attempt to get up the hill. Then (as if that weren't enough) from the bottom of the hill, we saw there was a brush fire at the top. The fire, fanned by helicopters-used as chase vehicle by the big-money teams-overhead, was going full force when we got to it. Now, we've done a lot of things in Baja races, but never have we pointed the race truck at a 20-foot wall of flames and tried to drive through it-that is, until this year.
What the heck-with a cloud of thick smoke to blind us, and a steep silty hill to slow us, what could possibly go wrong? With a responsive throttle and a little sphincter clench, we blew right through the flames. From then on, it was just a matter of dealing with the booby traps set in the racecourse by the locals, and we were on our way.