BAJA 1000: The Aussie Assault
The 55th running of one of the most prestigious off-road races on the planet, the Baja 1000 is set to kick off at 1am AEDT.
The Team Australia pairing of Toby Price and Paul Weel, along with navigators Kellon Walch and Preston Schmid, are bidding to become the first ever Aussies to take out the 4WD category.
The pair ran 5th overall in the Baja 400 in the lead up in a 2WD trophy truck, but have upgraded to a Mason 4WD Trophy Truck in order to compete at the front of the field in the gruelling conditions on the Mexican Californian Peninsula.
Weel and Price in their 2WD trophy truck tackled the Baja 400, achieving an outright p5
The other Aussie entrant is a Ford Raptor that was built and tested in Australia by Kelly Racing in Melbourne, alongside the USA based Lovell Racing.
The New Generation Ford Raptor Ranger will tackle one of the more gruelling endurance races on the planet: the Baja 1000.
The only Australian to succeed at the event was the late Daymon Stockie, who passed away in 2018 an Alice Springs Motocross event. The 2017 Finke Desert Champion took out the 49th Baja 1000 in 2016, racing for the OX Motorsports/American Honda team on a Honda CRF450X.
Weel and Price have been on a rigorous 10 day testing regime in the new vehicle with a new team in what’s been a quick turnaround.
“We’ve been pre running for 10 days, the track has changed a lot over that period, it’s a lot rougher with all the cars and people pre-running,” Weel explained.
“On Day 1 it was smooth, yesterday it was a mess, there’s a lot of rocks that will give out some flat tyres, but because we are running BFGoodrich’s we have the upper hand there. There’s some really tricky bits to the track, really slow passes, 4,000 foot drops off the side of hills, technical and fast spots so it will make for an interesting race.
Weel (L) and Price (R) have gone through 10 days of testing to prepare the new Mason 4WD trophy truck for the Baja 1000
“We may be a little on the back foot because the Mason Trophy Truck has only just been finished and we’ve only had 25miles each in it when we tested it last week, but I’ve got from Race Mile 1 – 360 to figure out how to drive it. My job is to get the car to Toby and we’ll be doing our best for everyone that’s supporting us.”
Price, who has pretty much tackled and won most of the biggest enduro events on the planet, also gave an insight into the testing.
“Pre-running has been really good, we’ve had a good solid 10 days of running over here and no issues, everything looks amazing on the brand new AWD Mason Trophy Truck and I’m looking forward to finally going racing,” Price said.
“We’ll see how it goes but I’ll be trying to keep a good consistent pace and not do anything crazy, then see where we are sitting towards the end. Paul is set and ready to go, we’re keen to get the Team Australia entry up the front and see what we can do.”
The experience of Toby Price will be a huge factor for Team Australia as he attempts to add the Baja 1000 to his legendary endurance racing exploits
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