Credit where credit is due: None of these Companies or Teams listed are sponsors; yet without their good will and racing family mentality, we would not have made it to the finish.
Mad Melvin Motorsports (Lower A-Arm, Hardware, 2 Axles, Trailing Arm, Radius Rod and Labor!)
Peak Racing/Motorsports (Hub, and Bearing)
GHR Motorsports (Rear Shock)
A Sincere appreciation and thank you from the Goliath Motorsports Team of Scott Yancey #1967
As the days drew close, the nights grew long. The anticipation, prep, planning, packing, double and triple checking everything became the only things on our minds. Wives went to bed alone, kids wondered if daddy loves racing more than them and sleep was as plentiful as the first few weeks of having a newborn.
Casey Drew the short stick and went to the drivers meeting as the rest of us headed down to Primm to go over #1967 and the pit plan 10 more times before bed. The only reason I mention this boring fact is this: What can happen will happen, which somehow happens to us quite frequently. Thinking he would save time, Casey used Valet to park his majestic steed. At the conclusion of the drivers meeting, Valet lost his keys for 45 minutes; apparently they are like a warm third hand as a young valet attendant decided to put them in his pocket for safe keeping. I cannot vouch for the cleanliness of the keys upon return, but at least they were warm.
It’s now 11pm, and for those of you who were down at Primm the night before, knew It was windy, wet and cold; The perfect time to go over the car one more time before bed! As much as sleep sounded like a logical decision, we somehow passed it up and decided to go over everything AGAIN and talk strategy. 2:45 AM, Bedtime!
As the hotel started to slowly come to life around 3:30, we were as ready and eager as a 15 year old going on a date for the first time. We were completely stoked as the starting order put out by BITD showed us starting 10th off the line. As the motorcade moved to the starting line; somehow we ended up getting shuffled back and actually left the starting line in the 42nd position.
The sun is just about to creep over the horizon as the green light dropped, and off we went! Scott was able to pull a good line getting the car out front for the first couple of miles without having to eat dust right away.
Backstory: In a brilliant planning strategy to not change a flat every 20 miles like we did last year at The Mint, we decided to stay with our 30” Moto Race Tires and filled them with Tireblocks. This added a significant amount of rotating mass to our set up. In a scramble and slight panic I called Travis at Sparks to let him know what we did at the last minute as our clutch engagement was as slow as George Bush is to answer a question that a writer hasn’t prepared him for. He gave us his words of wisdom and WOW! We had a rocket ship again!
Back to racing; so now that you know that our clutch is tits, Scott and Casey begin a charge through the pack. At RM 7 things seem to be going well as we passed Johnny Angel broken down. By RM 8 the chatter bumps were so rough that they wished they were wearing mouth guards. Casey’s sternum hurt from the constant rattling, of which was so bad that it vibrated the visor retaining screw at RM9. (He had to hold his visor shut for the remainder of the lap!)
Scott beat the car like a one eyed snake on a Friday night with no date, yet the car held together without going limp. In his feverish pace, they were stuck behind #1943 on a graded road with random boulders strewn about. At RM 24.5 #1943 dodged right, giving us the gift of a bowling ball sized boulder, Scott tried to avoid it as much as possible, yet it still found its way into the drivers side lower A-Arm. Luckily we have LSR Suspension components that hold up well to a hard flogging. The rock hit hard enough to push the A-Arm into the Axle, of which was slightly bent as well. The car continued on track without a largely noticeable difference or need to pull over, so race pace continued.
We missed Parker and had a freshly rebuilt Engine from Sparks, so the hamsters hadn’t quite got broke in yet; however it seems like the rings finally seated on the dry lake bed as the car was able to hit 85.4 MPH. All felt well and a comfortable race pace was well underway.
At RM66 While passing a 5 Unlimited in the Rock Quarry, Scott hit a boulder in a silt pocket blowing the fuse to the power steering. He was able to maintain his pace but hand fatigue was setting in as he neared the Buffalo Bills parking lot. As the infield wasn't on the GPS file, Casey was calling corrections as he seen them. Coming over a rise the course fell away and the car was loaded to one side. When it came down it sustained catastrophic damage to the lower shock eyelet, as well as bending almost every component on the rear of the car. Yet it Held together. As if motivated by the dozens of desert rats and race fans, the car took on a mind of its own and decided to Air Out the jump underneath the Polaris RZR banner; crippled from the last hit to the rear, the car just couldn’t hold on any longer. The eyelet completely broke off the shock, the bolts sheared off at the hub and the radius rod bent due to the added pressure, as well as the axle.
The car was literally 25 yards from the Buffalo Bills parking lot. Of which BITD was kind enough to drag the car to. The rest of the team was waiting in the pits and heard what happened. There was a feeling of failure and heartbreak as we all thought that our day was done. Derryke came over, looked at the car and knew that the car was fixable, it just needed every part that we didn’t have spares to! Rexy, Derryke, Matt and the rest of the team started sprinting through the Main pit trying to find anyone who would lend us what we needed to continue on.
Thanks to Peak, Mad Melvin and GHR Motorsports we were able to get everything we needed! Hurdle #1 Complete. As the rules state, unless you are in the pits, team members are not allowed to work on the downed vehicle, only the Driver and CoDawg. We had to set the parts on the curb as BITD took possession and handed them to Scott and Casey. They worked as fast as possible and got the rear of the car back together. Without their efforts, it would have been the end of our day. The fix was enough to get it to the pits to continue fixing the front A-Arm and Axle that I spoke about early on.
Rewind a bit. As we were waiting for word on our team before we knew they were broke down, I was cruising the pits and came along Peak Motorsports and seen 2 Crew members doing a double rear axle replacement. I couldn’t help myself and helped them get their team back in the fight, I guess that’s just the Marine in me. As it turned out, besides it being the right thing to do, they came to our aid giving us parts and jumped in when we got our car into the pits after Casey and Scott fixed the rear of the car. Mad Melvin Racing, also jumped in giving us nearly everything we needed and helped change the A-Arm and front axle.
Once we buttoned the car back up, Matt and myself got in the car to bring her home. We knew that our race was over so there was no need to kill the car. Getting a finish would have to do. We headed out into the desert and were doing well, for what it was and came upon Trophylite #6066 on its side in a super soft right hander. Knowing that our race was done, I jumped out of the car to help them right themselves. A few minutes of digging out underneath the wheels to allow the truck to be pushed over did the trick. The team gave me high fives and commenced to getting back in to finish their race. We took off and a few miles later they caught back up and passed us with respect and avoided roosting our faces off. As I recall I think they finished 5th in class.
About 4 or 5 miles from Pit A in the wash we seen UTV #1999 pulled over to the side In the middle of nowhere. The Co-Dawg was out with a towstrap and hook in hand, I seen his eyes through his flipped up Visor and seen the desperation. I couldn’t let them wait out there like that. So we hooked up and off we went down the sand wash singing Prince, gonna party like it's 1999; I almost hate myself for those few minutes. Did I mention how spot on the new clutch weight adjustment Travis gave us over the phone from Sparks. We were in 4 Hi going 30 miles an hour pulling another RZR and the belt temp never got over 151! Later I found out that was the UTV Underground Sponsored Car of Chad Ragland. Pretty cool in my book! Anyhow this is getting a bit long, but we dropped them off at Pit A and went on to complete the lap finishing our Mint 400 adventure.
Thank you to all of our families that put up with our racing addiction, the volunteers that work without pay and the Teams that helped us get the car to the finish line!!!
Team Owner : Scott Yancey
Driver: Scott Yancey
Alt Drivers/ Navigators: Matt Jaskol, Casey Wiesel & Derryke Rich
Prep/Fab: Derryke
Logistics/Prep: Casey
Logistics/Photos: Rexy
How do we submit this to Warfighter Made? We're coming for that Perseverance Award!
Mad Melvin Motorsports (Lower A-Arm, Hardware, 2 Axles, Trailing Arm, Radius Rod and Labor!)
Peak Racing/Motorsports (Hub, and Bearing)
GHR Motorsports (Rear Shock)
A Sincere appreciation and thank you from the Goliath Motorsports Team of Scott Yancey #1967
As the days drew close, the nights grew long. The anticipation, prep, planning, packing, double and triple checking everything became the only things on our minds. Wives went to bed alone, kids wondered if daddy loves racing more than them and sleep was as plentiful as the first few weeks of having a newborn.
Casey Drew the short stick and went to the drivers meeting as the rest of us headed down to Primm to go over #1967 and the pit plan 10 more times before bed. The only reason I mention this boring fact is this: What can happen will happen, which somehow happens to us quite frequently. Thinking he would save time, Casey used Valet to park his majestic steed. At the conclusion of the drivers meeting, Valet lost his keys for 45 minutes; apparently they are like a warm third hand as a young valet attendant decided to put them in his pocket for safe keeping. I cannot vouch for the cleanliness of the keys upon return, but at least they were warm.
It’s now 11pm, and for those of you who were down at Primm the night before, knew It was windy, wet and cold; The perfect time to go over the car one more time before bed! As much as sleep sounded like a logical decision, we somehow passed it up and decided to go over everything AGAIN and talk strategy. 2:45 AM, Bedtime!
As the hotel started to slowly come to life around 3:30, we were as ready and eager as a 15 year old going on a date for the first time. We were completely stoked as the starting order put out by BITD showed us starting 10th off the line. As the motorcade moved to the starting line; somehow we ended up getting shuffled back and actually left the starting line in the 42nd position.
The sun is just about to creep over the horizon as the green light dropped, and off we went! Scott was able to pull a good line getting the car out front for the first couple of miles without having to eat dust right away.
Backstory: In a brilliant planning strategy to not change a flat every 20 miles like we did last year at The Mint, we decided to stay with our 30” Moto Race Tires and filled them with Tireblocks. This added a significant amount of rotating mass to our set up. In a scramble and slight panic I called Travis at Sparks to let him know what we did at the last minute as our clutch engagement was as slow as George Bush is to answer a question that a writer hasn’t prepared him for. He gave us his words of wisdom and WOW! We had a rocket ship again!
Back to racing; so now that you know that our clutch is tits, Scott and Casey begin a charge through the pack. At RM 7 things seem to be going well as we passed Johnny Angel broken down. By RM 8 the chatter bumps were so rough that they wished they were wearing mouth guards. Casey’s sternum hurt from the constant rattling, of which was so bad that it vibrated the visor retaining screw at RM9. (He had to hold his visor shut for the remainder of the lap!)
Scott beat the car like a one eyed snake on a Friday night with no date, yet the car held together without going limp. In his feverish pace, they were stuck behind #1943 on a graded road with random boulders strewn about. At RM 24.5 #1943 dodged right, giving us the gift of a bowling ball sized boulder, Scott tried to avoid it as much as possible, yet it still found its way into the drivers side lower A-Arm. Luckily we have LSR Suspension components that hold up well to a hard flogging. The rock hit hard enough to push the A-Arm into the Axle, of which was slightly bent as well. The car continued on track without a largely noticeable difference or need to pull over, so race pace continued.
We missed Parker and had a freshly rebuilt Engine from Sparks, so the hamsters hadn’t quite got broke in yet; however it seems like the rings finally seated on the dry lake bed as the car was able to hit 85.4 MPH. All felt well and a comfortable race pace was well underway.
At RM66 While passing a 5 Unlimited in the Rock Quarry, Scott hit a boulder in a silt pocket blowing the fuse to the power steering. He was able to maintain his pace but hand fatigue was setting in as he neared the Buffalo Bills parking lot. As the infield wasn't on the GPS file, Casey was calling corrections as he seen them. Coming over a rise the course fell away and the car was loaded to one side. When it came down it sustained catastrophic damage to the lower shock eyelet, as well as bending almost every component on the rear of the car. Yet it Held together. As if motivated by the dozens of desert rats and race fans, the car took on a mind of its own and decided to Air Out the jump underneath the Polaris RZR banner; crippled from the last hit to the rear, the car just couldn’t hold on any longer. The eyelet completely broke off the shock, the bolts sheared off at the hub and the radius rod bent due to the added pressure, as well as the axle.
The car was literally 25 yards from the Buffalo Bills parking lot. Of which BITD was kind enough to drag the car to. The rest of the team was waiting in the pits and heard what happened. There was a feeling of failure and heartbreak as we all thought that our day was done. Derryke came over, looked at the car and knew that the car was fixable, it just needed every part that we didn’t have spares to! Rexy, Derryke, Matt and the rest of the team started sprinting through the Main pit trying to find anyone who would lend us what we needed to continue on.
Thanks to Peak, Mad Melvin and GHR Motorsports we were able to get everything we needed! Hurdle #1 Complete. As the rules state, unless you are in the pits, team members are not allowed to work on the downed vehicle, only the Driver and CoDawg. We had to set the parts on the curb as BITD took possession and handed them to Scott and Casey. They worked as fast as possible and got the rear of the car back together. Without their efforts, it would have been the end of our day. The fix was enough to get it to the pits to continue fixing the front A-Arm and Axle that I spoke about early on.
Rewind a bit. As we were waiting for word on our team before we knew they were broke down, I was cruising the pits and came along Peak Motorsports and seen 2 Crew members doing a double rear axle replacement. I couldn’t help myself and helped them get their team back in the fight, I guess that’s just the Marine in me. As it turned out, besides it being the right thing to do, they came to our aid giving us parts and jumped in when we got our car into the pits after Casey and Scott fixed the rear of the car. Mad Melvin Racing, also jumped in giving us nearly everything we needed and helped change the A-Arm and front axle.
Once we buttoned the car back up, Matt and myself got in the car to bring her home. We knew that our race was over so there was no need to kill the car. Getting a finish would have to do. We headed out into the desert and were doing well, for what it was and came upon Trophylite #6066 on its side in a super soft right hander. Knowing that our race was done, I jumped out of the car to help them right themselves. A few minutes of digging out underneath the wheels to allow the truck to be pushed over did the trick. The team gave me high fives and commenced to getting back in to finish their race. We took off and a few miles later they caught back up and passed us with respect and avoided roosting our faces off. As I recall I think they finished 5th in class.
About 4 or 5 miles from Pit A in the wash we seen UTV #1999 pulled over to the side In the middle of nowhere. The Co-Dawg was out with a towstrap and hook in hand, I seen his eyes through his flipped up Visor and seen the desperation. I couldn’t let them wait out there like that. So we hooked up and off we went down the sand wash singing Prince, gonna party like it's 1999; I almost hate myself for those few minutes. Did I mention how spot on the new clutch weight adjustment Travis gave us over the phone from Sparks. We were in 4 Hi going 30 miles an hour pulling another RZR and the belt temp never got over 151! Later I found out that was the UTV Underground Sponsored Car of Chad Ragland. Pretty cool in my book! Anyhow this is getting a bit long, but we dropped them off at Pit A and went on to complete the lap finishing our Mint 400 adventure.
Thank you to all of our families that put up with our racing addiction, the volunteers that work without pay and the Teams that helped us get the car to the finish line!!!
Team Owner : Scott Yancey
Driver: Scott Yancey
Alt Drivers/ Navigators: Matt Jaskol, Casey Wiesel & Derryke Rich
Prep/Fab: Derryke
Logistics/Prep: Casey
Logistics/Photos: Rexy
How do we submit this to Warfighter Made? We're coming for that Perseverance Award!
Attachments
Last edited:
