Best in the Desert Racing Association held their 3rd annual Blue Water Desert Challenge this past weekend, October 11-14, 2012, in Parker, Arizona . The Blue Water Resort and Casino hosted many of the events over the 4 day event. The weather was over cast for Thursday’s class qualifying for the 2 day racing event. The clouds soon turned into rain for the racers practice lap of the 3 mile qualifying loop, but stopped shortly afterwards and clouds cleared before the start of Qualifying. Randy Merritt and Chris Golding finished 12th of 32 class 7200 and 1000 race vehicles. The Mongo Racing Class 7200 was set up for racing and qualified in race trim. The team knew the course would reward those who qualified well.
Merritt started the two day race event on Saturday morning at 1020 am behind the wheel of the KC Hilites General Tire TNC Machine Mongo Racing Class 7200 Ford Truck in the 7th row. The Blue Water Desert Challenge format consisted of 3 laps around a short desert course for a total of 73 miles per day, equaling 146 total race miles for the weekend.
Merritt entered the event in the top 4 in the season Point’s Championship standing and knew he needed a finish, but a good finish would tighten up the point’s race. Merritt started 12th in the 3 rd race of the day and finished 5th on day one.
Day two brought new excitement as Merritt and Golding knew they had to charge hard for the win. Merritt started on the inside of the third row and got the hole shot off the start. At the start of the third lap Merritt had the second place truck in Class 7200 in sight and was charging through the desert and dust. Near mile post 2.4 of the desert loop Merritt radioed in the truck was stopped and had no fuel pressure. The team knew there was enough fuel in the truck, but stood by helplessly as Golding was able to get enough fuel to get the KC Hilites General Tire TNC Machine Mongo Racing Class 7200 Ford Truck back on the track.
After the race Merritt stated, “It started out to be a good finish to the race on Sunday.We had 2nd in sight on the last lap, but had a fuel delivery problem and BAM, dead in the desert! Well we got to the finish line and settled for 7th on the weekend and we are still in the points hunt. The last race of the year is next and it’s a double point’s race. It should be exciting.”
After the race the Mongo Racing team dissected the fuel cell and found a defect in the fuel pick that explained the symptoms experienced during the race. Merritt said, “The issue has been corrected and now its time to get ready for the next race.”
Merritt in the KC Hilites General Tire TNC Machine Mongo Racing Class 7200 Ford Truck finished the Blue Water Desert Challenge 7thin class 7200 and is still only 13 points behind the Point’s leader headed into the final race of the BITD season, December 1, 2012 at the Henderson 250 near Las Vegas Nevada.
Mongo Racing BWDC Results:
ClassPlaceNameNumber
7200 7 Merritt, Randy 7281
DayLap 1Lap 2Lap 3Day TotalTotal
SAT 00:27:51.76400:33:26.01700:32:45.351 01:34:03.13203:52:21.870
SUN 00:29:16.84800:35:04.416 01:13:57.474 02:18:18.738
The MongoRacing Class 7200 Unlimited Ford number 7281 is sponsored by KC HiLiTes, General Tires, TNC Machine, ICON Vehicle Dynamics, Trail Ready Bead Lock Wheels, Kincaid Racing Engines, Yukon, Wilwood, Pro AM, EBC Brakes, Master Craft Safety Innovations, Lucas Oil, K&N Filters, Borla Exhaust, MSD Ignition, and Mongo Made Graphics.
By Steven Draper