Desert Dingo Racing

Category: USA 500

  • Field trip to Rugged Radios (USA 500, also)

    Thanks to Chris (pictured here), Greg, and the entire Rugged Radios team for taking us into the 22nd Century.

    I departed Felton at 4 a.m. this morning, which sounds hardcore until I tell you that Crusty departed Soquel in his rat rod 1951 car carrier with 1107 on top around 8 p.m. Monday night. Both of us bound for San Luis Obispo. I have no idea where Crusty ended up, but I parked in a bar parking lot and started making phone calls around 7 a.m.

    By 9 a.m. Amanda had retrieved Crusty, we’d offloaded 1107 and Team Rugged Radios set to work. Greg, who designs and manufactures his own equipment, has taken us under his wing. Thanks to his team, we have a comm system that’s the envy of Trophy Truck teams, integrates smart phone and digital music players, and, for the first time, allows us to hear who’s talking to us when we’re outside the car trying the figure out how to get it unstuck.

    Here’s a shot of Jason and Kevin testing our new helmets.

    And here’s some photos from the trip. We depart for the USA 500 in a few hours. You can follow us on the Twitter at @desertdingo, the USA 500 festivities using the Twitter hashtag #USA500 and Rugged Radios on the Twitter at @ruggedradios.

  • Off to Rugged Radios

    My iPhone battery died immediately after this shot, so I didn’t get a shot of Crusty’s awesome rat rod tow truck.

    We still need a couple of fenders and need to sort out a short with our GPS., but otherwise we’re good to go.

    Big thanks to Bayside Oil II for being our fuel sponsor. Our chase team picks up a 55 gallon drum of 110 octane tomorrow.

    Crusty is already on the road to SLO for our meeting with Rugged Radios meeting. They’re supporting us with comm equipment. We’re looking forward to helping them raise their profile.

    Less than a week to the USA 500. It’s going to be great.

  • Countdown to the USA 500

    You need fenders? We got fenders.

    Busy day today. Started loading electronics and our giveaways on the front porch. Shawn and Bob showed up and we loaded up the Satellite Telework Centers truck with painted wheels and body parts. The off to the car where Bob and Crusty finessed the front skid plate, Shawn worked on sponsor logos and Emme Hall of Hall Ass Racing installed the GPS, Camelbaks and breather hoses.

    Emme and I decamped to DDR HQ and spent the afternoon painting spare wheels, bumpers, light bar and spare fenders.

    Tomorrow we finish car prep, load it on Crusty’s 1951 car hauler and head south to San Luis Obispo to Rugged Radios. On Wednesday 1107 departs for Reno for VORRA’s USA 500.

    We’ll be live updating the race events on the Twitter using the #USA500 hashttag.

    Photos from today’s work here.

  • Our pit bike reveal for the USA 500

    What’s this? We finally have a pit bike? And who’s the scruffy looking character who did desert testing at Fourth of Juplaya?

    Here’s what it’s looked like over the years (mostly from Burning Man). People love their ’87 Suzuki LT 230s, you betcha. Ours now has an electronic start.

  • Two weeks to VORRA’s USA 500 and 1107 is coming together

    I love that new car smell

    It’s that smell. That new car smell. Some day this race is gonna end.

    I sprayed the race seat rails this morning and drove them over to the car. Crusty worked on all the stuff he works on. With his help I got the seats installed and we mapped out the next week getting the car ready for the USA 500. He’s off to get his 1951 16-foot car hauler. I’ll be installing the GPS, dialing in the five point harnesses and repainting everything I scratched while shouting the seats into place. I came home and spray painted our new rims, courtesy of Bob Russell. They will sport the World Diabetes Day blue circle.

    I’m dropping off some new tires with the rims at Dixon & Son Tires tomorrow. They’ve supported us since Day One. An interesting meeting will happen in the next week.

    Here are our new rims.

    OSHA approved