Although typical, it still was a true three-ring circus. Eddie "Paco" Perez, Eric "Lightforce" Lane (who botched the high-grade John Mull Meat deal), Jason "Scale Skipper" Kincaid, Pat "Poi Boy" Chicas, Mike "Barko" Bartolotti and myself.

Cedar City says a lot about this nation - Burgers and Brew and some Rockcrawling too.

Mini-photo gallery

We worked our way out of Vegas hot on the tail of the time clock. We had two-plus hours worth of driving to do and some steep grades to overcome. Loaded with several hundred burgers, another hundred or more hot dogs, a dozen or more cases of cold ones and a half-dozen grins a mile wide, working our way up to the Goodyear Skyjacker Extreme Rockcrawling Nationals in Cedar City, Utah.

The famous and all-too entertaining Craig Stumph was on hand with a few of his boys and the man-eating Commando. Some day soon, he's looking to work his way down south for a Baja race. But for now, the ARCA Cedar City event will have to do. Tomorrow he'll be scaling the rock walls without the son whom he rolled over at ARCA's first event in Johnson Valley. Dallas is on a Mormon Ministry somewhere up north and may be reading this with thoughts of what a good time it could have been. As you remember, Dallas and his buddy got the boot from the course marshal after they entertained the crowd with a heated debate over which line to take over an obstacle. True showmanship.

The Off-Road.com, Lightforce and Skyjacker crew bolstered a steady stream of burger-belching, brew-guzzling rockcrawlers throughout the mid-90-degree day. The first-ever ORC burgers and brew was a classic success. Jason Bunch and the Tri-County crew showed up with word that the "new" Black Diamond coil spring suspension is due to arrive upon the shop floor for installs within the next three weeks.

And not a suprising entry into the three-ring enclave was the presence of the one of the men who is responsible for "putting Baja on the map." It was none other than the Jeff "No Uncertain Terms" Cummings of BF Goodrich, who, as you may have read in this month's new BFG Mud Terrain KM article, is soon taking BFG into the rockcrawling arena with a tire. What tire? Well, you'll likely see the new Mud Terrain KM, but look a bit further and you may just see an all-out rockcrawling champ tire. Look to the season finale in Farmington for a possible full-force presence.

Will this mean that the legendary BFG-clad Rod Hall will rival the legendary Goodyear-clad "Rock" Walker Evans? It very well could be the case. Rod has been racing the Baja since the creation of the world-renowned race. But does the guy know rockcrawling? Bet your rosey-red backside he does. He's been training America's finest Special Op teams to traverse some of the most wicked terrain that mother nature can conjure up - and that include hard-core rockcrawling.

We were standing around the Barron Hilton's bunkhouse barbecue sipping a few cold mixers when the question arouse. It was an open-ended question fired-off to an open-ended few BFG know-alls.

"So," I said with a sharp note of inquisition, the twelve pack of journalist coming to a halt somewhere in between there trip to Tahiti and right after some fantasy trip to the Bahamas. "When is this Rod Hall fellow gonna get off this desert-racing kick and work his way onto the rocks and with old "Rock" Walker Evans?"

Nonetheless, the circus went silent. It was a heart-thumping stand still.

"Um-huhhhm!"spoke the short guy with the stern kick of an ornery steer in his voice. "You see, the keyword here is "old." When you get old and slow, you're on the rocks. When you're fast, you race, haul ass and win championships in the desert. That's all there is. You don't stop a good thing."

The silence sustained itself mid-sip on the Martini.

"But who knows, I may just give him something to worry about. Who knows, when the time is right, I'm game." Rod went on to say that he's been approached with the notion of taking his championship wrath to the rocks - by BFG nonetheless. "I've been approached."

He's got a conglomerate of off-roaders in his stable, years of experience and a matter-of-fact-I-will attitude, but what's the hold up. First off, Rod's got a shin-full of other projects he's yet to clear from the workbench. The Hummer II project has yet to debut. The Class 8 assault Hummer used in the U.S. military as an freedom fighter needs an elite-style trainer to attend to the commie ass-kickers who drive the beast. And. . . "Well, we've got to make some adjustements first. We've got a full schedule as it is with our Best In The Desert efforts. It depends on how much time I've got and how bad BFG wants it. I'm not against it."

As for presence, another trend to taken hold of the wheel is the almighty woman. For those of you who didn't make it to the inaugural ORC Burgers and Brew, you're probably sneaking away just to sneak a peek a what went down today. Let me tell you, you should've built the wife a rig and sent her to the rocks of Cedar City.

Amy Bulloch, collectively assertive behind the seat of the '89 YJ her father Jim Petersen (owner of a kick-ass fab shop in Farmington, NM) built, seams to think this trend is catching on. The rig is outfitted with a Dana 60 front end, a 9 inch rear and a smooth-chugging torque monster beneath the hood, the fuel-injected 350 Chevy. Amy's testament of success in the rockcrawling world was a sixth-place finish at the Rock Garden rock crawling competition event in Farmington, also available for your review on this month's rockcrawling coverage at Off-Road.com.

Anyway, Dan (we've done forgotten his last name but he hangs out with Tri-County, JP Offroad and a slew of dedicated off-roaders - so you may know who we're speaking of) is in tune with this wave of woman working their way into the rockcrawling world. He's predictions are clear: women, center-seat rock buggies (enabling the pilot to view all wheels at a glance and the rig be slim and slender enough to make the trek through tight canyons), small powerplants (light weight and nimble), rear-steer and the re-establishment of leaf springs (for stability and simplicity).

So, to leave you with a solemn note to sleep with - and rock with for that matter - we met up with Tom Woods and family, wife Melody and Shawn (spelling), who were cranking out rock-worthy drive shafts for many of tomorrow's competition's crawlers.

"He's a saint in disguise," said one crewmember wondering around beneath a Jeep with a wrench. But, there's another side to Tom Wood's line of drive-them-home driveshafts, The Rok and Roll Driveshaft (at the time of publication, it was uncertain whether Tom would go with the traditional spelling of "rock" or go with the flow of his new invention).

"Well," says Tom. "What the hell would you call it . . . The Rok and Roll Driveshaft!"

Tom, who says this thing ain't never been tested, nor has it seen the light of day, is pretty damn enthusiastic about the introduction of the wheel - I mean driveshaft.

When the thing does the bump and grind on a rock, it doesn't bump and grind your rig into a stand still, twisting your driveshaft into a pretzel. This thing's got an outer protective shield, or sheath as Tom inadvertently called it, which rolls on a set of bushings.

This theoretically means that you can rest the weight of your rig on this driveshaft and rest this driveshaft on a rock, rev the shaft into a high-RPM throttle stomping frenzy. The shaft will faithfully keep turning your tires into rock-gripping traction action - and not pretzled into a driveshaft that leaves you stranded.