SAN DIEGO — Following Tuesday’s live drawing for starting positions heralding the sophomore season of the Roger Norman era, SCORE International desert racing launched its 41st anniversary season with Las Vegas’ multi-time champion Troy Herbst and SoCal rookie Rodrigo Valenzuela received the pole positions for four-wheel and two-wheel vehicles during the Dirt LiveHD webcast Tuesday for the upcoming 28th Annual Tecate SCORE San Felipe 250 desert race.
Troy Herbst races in the featured SCORE Trophy Truck Division while Valenzuela competes in Open Motorcycle class.
The season opener of the five-race 2014 SCORE World Desert Championship series will be held Feb. 27-March 2 in Mexico’s picturesque fishing village of San Felipe, located 125 miles south of the U.S. border on the East side of the Baja California peninsula along the azure waters of the tranquil Sea of Cortez.
The race will start another new chapter in SCORE history, continuing the tenure of Norman as the owner of the world’s foremost desert racing organization. The race will be televised as a one-hour special one month following the event on the CBS Sports Network, in the most expansive television package in SCORE history.
With entries accepted up to 5 p.m. the evening before the race, over 200 entries from over 20 US States and 10 countries expected to enter the race that will feature competition in 35 Pro and 6 Sportsman classes for cars, trucks, motorcycles and ATVs in the popular ‘spring break’ race.
Drawing the first starting slot for the unlimited Class 1 open-wheel desert race cars was defending class champion Cody Robinson. Riding the first ATV off the line will be team led by Michael Zelenka.
With 25 entries so far in the marquee SCORE racing division for high-tech, 850 horsepower, unlimited production trucks, Troy Herbst, who splits driving time with teammate Ryan Arciero, Foothill Ranch, Calif., drives the No. 91 Monster Energy Terrible Herbst Motorsports Ford F-150 SCORE Trophy Truck.
A unique part of Tuesday’s drawing was the special drawing for the top 12 finishers from the nearest previous SCORE Baja race entered in the current race in both SCORE Trophy Truck and the unlimited Class 1. six of the top 12 SCORE Trophy Trucks from last November’s 46th Tecate SCORE Baja 1000 entered the race in time for the drawing along with four racers from the unlimited Class 1.
Valenzuela, just 17 years old from Calexico, Calif., will ride a KTM 450EXC motorcycle in Pro Open motorcycle class.
The SCORE World Desert Championship series will be visiting Mexico for the first of three annual SCORE Baja races in 2014. This year’s race is the first as part of a new three-year contract with the Mexican government to hold the ever-popular in San Felipe.
The live drawing for starting positions, by class, for the season-opener was held at the SCORE-San Diego Tech Shop. The drawing was broadcast live on the internet during a special Dirt LiveHD webisode at www.score-international.com. The festivities included a special Baja Pits ‘Taco Tuesday’ with food proceeds going to Cruz Roja-Mexicana.
The start draw for the season opener of the 2014 SCORE World Desert Championship series determined the starting order within each of the various classes in the elapsed-time race.
In Tuesday’s live drawing, SCORE Trophy Truck had the most entries of any class with 25, followed by the Class 10 with 19 and Class 19 with 14 entered in time for the drawing. While 133 entries were received in time for the start draw, late registration is expected to add as many as 80 additional entries.
COURSE MAP, PRERUNNING
Pre-running will be allowed on the actual race course starting Friday through Friday, Feb. 28. The course for cars, trucks and Pro motorcycle classes will be one loop of approximately 274 miles and the Sportsman motorcycle and ATV classes will race one loop of approximately 250 miles. The course will include approximately 150 miles never used before in this SCORE Baja race. The course map is available online on the SCORE website and the course GPS files will be available starting Thursday evening.
PRE-RACE SKED
The pre-race Manufacturer’s Midway, contingency and tech inspection of the vehicles in the race will be held on Friday (February 28). Contingency will run from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and tech from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on the picturesque Malecon, flanked by the Sea of Cortez on one side and the popular restaurants and night clubs of San Felipe on the other. Racer registration will be held from Noon to 5 p.m. on Thursday (Feb. 27) and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Friday (Feb. 28) at the San Felipe Marina Resort, a few miles south of downtown San Felipe.
HISTORYonics
The season-opener of the 2014 SCORE World Desert Championship series, the 28th Tecate SCORE San Felipe 250 annually provides a greater economic impact to San Felipe than the popular six-week-long ‘Spring Break’.
The race began in 1982 and was not held between 1985 and 1989, the first five years of the seven-year combined High Desert Racing Association-HDRA/SCORE Desert Series of US and Baja races. It has been held consecutively each year since 1990.
In its first 27 years, the race has been held in San Felipe all but 2007 when political issues forced a last minute move by SCORE, starting it in Ensenada and finishing it in Santo Tomas. Ironically, 2007 saw a race-record 394 starters and a race-record 288 finishers even though the race was moved and the course changed just 10 days before the event. The records when the race actually started and finished in San Felipe are 341 for starters in 2006 and 220 for finishers, also in 2006.
ON THE SCOREscope
In its 41st year as the world’s foremost desert racing organization in 2014, the five-race 2014 SCORE World Desert Championship series, with three special events held in Baja California, Mexico, and two in the United States, starts with the 28th annual Tecate SCORE San Felipe 250. Starting and finishing in Ensenada, the 46th annual Tecate SCORE Baja 500 will be held June 5-8 and the third SCORE Baja race, starting in Ensenada and finishing in La Paz, the 47th annual Tecate SCORE Baja 1000 will be held Nov. 12-16.
The two U.S. races on 2014 SCORE World Desert Championship calendar are the inaugural SCORE Imperial Valley 250 in Plaster City, Calif. (April 25-27) and the two-day, single-race Inaugural SCORE Desert Challenge, location TBA in SoCal (Sept. 25-28).
SCORE TROPHY TRUCK (25)
91 Troy Herbst
1 B.J. Baldwin
18 Juan C. Lopez
11 Rob MacCachren
39 Ron Whitton
36 Glen Greer
52 Elias Hanna
44 Todd Jergensen
84 Nick Vanderwey
73 James Lin
34 Ken Losch
78 Danny Ashcaft
47 James Bult
50 Zak Langley
17 Jason McNeil
55 Mark Workentine
5 Clyde Stacy
48 Jimmy Nuckles
72 Robert Acer
15 Armin Schwarz
3 Mark Post
7 Steven Eugenio
19 Tim Herbst
45 Gary Magness
21 Gus Vildosola Jr
CLASS 1 (9)
100 Cody Parkhouse
131 George Peters
121 Damen Jefferies
101 Justin Matney
133 Todd Romano
180 Jim Anderson
163 Paul Keller
199 Mike Thurlow
142 Steven Sells-1st RS
CLASS 1/2-1600 (8)
1600 Ernesto Arambula
1630 Kevin Smith
1609 Jose Ruvalcaba
1606 Ruben Sanudo
1697 Jorge Sampietro
1636 Christian Celaya
1615 Jesus Velez
1614 Hiram Duran-1st RS
CLASS 3 (2)
300 Donald Moss
303 Chris Wilson-1st RS
CLASS 5 (1)
509 Jose Lopez
CLASS 5-1600 (1)
565 Martin Rangel
CLASS 7 (5)
736 Gregg Hempel
707 Scott Brady
722 Pete Sohren
700 Dan Chamlee
717 Pat Sims
CLASS 7SX (3)
741 James Burman
747 Justin Park
745 Roman Paniagua
CLASS 8 (0)
CLASS 9 (1)
910 John Scharf-RS
CLASS 10 (19)
1089 Arnoldo Gutierrez Jr
1016 Cody Robinson
1029 Thomas Bjorstrom
1068 Cody Reid
1013 Kevin Carr
1014 Jorge Valdes
1098 Shane Scully
1049 Ty Godde
1002 Mark Lawrence
1062 J.J. Schnarr
1031 Mike Johnson
1018 Ricardo Malo
1080 Peter Hajas
1076 Gerardo Iribe
1009 Rafael Navarro IV
1006 Mike Lawrence
1011 John Langley
1088 Luis Salgado
1045 Patrick Dailey-1st RS
SCORE LITES (0)
CLASS 11 (2)
1149 Alejandro Rivas
1121 Dennis Hollenbeck-1st RS
STOCK FULL (0)
STOCK MINI (0)
CLASS 3000 (3)
3030 Paul Broughton
3002 Paige Sohren
3003 Reid Rutherford
TROPHY TRUCK SPEC (3)
872 Jonathan Brenthal
871 Larry Connor
874 Billy Bunch
BAJA CHALLENGE (1)
BC1 Randolph Hoover
HEAVY METAL (0)
CLASS 17 (0)
CLASS 19 (14)
1937 Marc Behnke
1949 Alonso Lopez
1921 Jaime Kirkpatrick
1932 Matt Parks
1944 Scott Estes
1905 Marc Burnett
1917 Derek Murray
1915 Thomas Graves
1901 Douglas McCrady
1942 Scott McFarland
1904 Cory Sappington
1930 Sean Cook
1933 Todd Romano
1903 Jose Romero -1st RS
CLASS 2 (0)
CLASS 4400 (0)
CLASS 6100 (0)
Pro Motorcycles
OPEN M/C (3)
19x Rodrigo Valenzuela
1x Colton Udall
4x Ricky Brabec
LIMITED M/C (0)
CLASS 30 (4)
321x Mark Winkelman
309x Todd York
306x Fred Sobke
329x Brad Baker
CLASS 40 (3)
410x Giovanni Spinali
407x Jack McCormick
401x Rob Huggins-1st RS
CLASS 50 (1)
515x Earl Roberts
CLASS 60 (2)
611x Jim Dizney
609x Donald Lewis-1st RS
SCORE IRONMAN (1)
702x Tony Gera
Pro ATVs
Pro ATV (6)
15a Michael Zelenka
1a Adolfo Arellano
12a Brent Columbo
22a Jose Torres
33a Alex Schickedanz
14a Said Sanchez
Sportsman
SPT BUGGY (3)
1501 Brian Siller
1577 Martin Hoffman
1515 Derek Fletcher-1st RS
SPT UNLTD TRUCK (4)
1450 Richard Garcia
1494 Vincent Munoz
1405 Chris Miller
1444 Jim Bunn-1st RS
SPT LTD TRUCK (0)
SPT UTV UNLIMITED (0)
SPT M/C (7)
293x Kent Choma
204x Sheldon Bradlow
225x Alberto Morales
209x Ted Callagy
222x John Sylvester
294x Todd Powell
219x Carlos Sanchez-1st RS
SPT ATV (2)
103a Greg Delgado
140a Don Higbee