Desert Dingo Racing

Category: World Diabetes Day

  • Ramping up for the 1000

    Spanish language version of our hero card

    The 1000 is staring at us and we’re ramping up. We’ll be working Saturday and Sunday on the car, taking care of details here so we can focus on pre-running and final tweaking in Mexico.

    I’ll have more info on this in a future post, but we’re working with the Federacion Mexicana de Diabetes to have a booth on Contingency Row on Thursday and Friday of Race Week distributing information on diabetes. One of the things we’re working on now, thanks to support from the International Diabetes Federation, is distributing hero cards in Spanish, that have the warning signs of diabetes printed on the back.

    Alex Nicholson, PR professional extraordinaire, has been working behind the scenes to help us. So has her mother, Carmen, who was kind enough to translate our hero cars into Spanish. We’ll be distributing Spanish and English versions of the cards down in Ensenada. Thank you, Carmen.

    Here’s the Spanish version of the text on the back of our hero cards, courtesy of Carmen:

    Desert Dingo Racing :: Día Mundial de la Diabetes
    www.desertdingo.com – www.worlddiabetesday.org

    El equipo: Desert Dingo Racing es un equipo conformado por profesionales del ámbito de la alta tecnología, radicados en Silicon Valley, California, que respaldan la participación de un VW Escarabajo Clase 11 en carreras por el desierto en México y en EE UU y que anualmente culminan con la carrera Baja 1000.

    El automóvil:     La clase 11 está limitada a automóviles VW Escarabajo fabricados antes de 1983. Esta clase permite ciertas modificaciones menores del motor así como de la transmisión y de la suspensión. La velocidad promedio típica de la carrera es de aproximadamente 25 mph.

    La carrera    : Baja 1000 es la carrera todo terreno, sin paradas, más larga en el mundo, que incluye a cuadrillas de más de doce países y en exceso de 300.000 espectadores. Coincide con el Día Mundial de la Diabetes, el 14 de noviembre de 2008.

    La meta: Nuestro compromiso con el servicio comunitario va de la mano con nuestro deseo de ganar la carrera Baja 1000. Nos asociamos con la Federación Internacional de la Diabetes (FID) para recaudar fondos y crear conciencia sobre la epidemia creciente de diabetes, que afecta particularmente a la población infantil. El lema de la campaña del Día Mundial de la Diabetes 2008 es “Ningún niño debería morir de diabetes”. Si desea hacer una donación para nuestra carrera de recaudación de fondos, sírvase visitar el sitio web de Desert Dingo. El 100% del dinero recaudado irá directamente a la FID y será utilizado en sus programas de educación y de concientización.

    Las Señales de Alarma de la Diabetes son: Micción frecuente. Sed excesiva. Aumento del apetito. Pérdida de peso. Cansancio. Pérdida del interés o de la concentración. Visión borrosa. Vómitos y dolores estomacales (confundidos frecuentemente con los síntomas gripales). Si usted o algún conocido padece de estos síntomas, sírvase consultar un doctor. Para mayor información sobre la diabetes, visite: www.worlddiabetesday.org.

    You can download a PDF version of our Spanish hero card here.

  • We’re officially 1102 for the 1000

    SCORE International lists Desert Dingo Racing as 1102 for the 2008 Baja 1000

    Flew to LA and then drove 90 miles down to the Off Road Warehouse in Temecula on Saturday for the SCORE live drawing party for positions for the 2008 Baja 1000. Great BBQ courtesy of Baja Pits. Lots of booths. A couple hundred people. Hooters girls with a very affable chihuahua.

    Tire changing one of the Class 1s

    I twittered the juicy bits (check out the Twitter stream in the column on the right), but in a nutshell Sal Fish said security is much enhanced in Baja. Still not smart to drive at night and best to pre-run in groups. Tourism is way down.

    Placement picking started at 2 p.m. and they got to Class 11 by 3. Only two have registered so far. We both went for front starts and Eric got the first, so he’ll be 1101 and we’ll most likely be 1102.

    Update: it looks like Brown snuck in under the wire as 1103. I figure there will be 8-10 Class 11s this year.

    After the event, Dave Hendrickson, known on the Class 11 Coalition board as DaveCo11, invited me over to his place to check out some of his projects. I had no idea he’d been involved in building as many of the prominent Class 11s throughout the years. Here’s a shot of him with his project car for the Primm 300.

    Dave Hendrickson of Class 11 Coalition fame.

    He had the Autism car in his yard. It looks like they put puzzle piece decals on the car with the names of people who donated. I think that’s a great idea and will brainstorm something similar for us. The hero cards and boxes of World Diabetes Day crayons were a hit with the kids at the event.

  • International Diabetes Federation cites Desert Dingo Racing in new press release On World Diabetes Day

    51 days until World Diabetes Day

    Bringing Diabetes to Light: International Diabetes Federation Encouraging Citizens to Raise Awareness and Protect Future Generations

    BRUSSELS, Belgium, September 24, 2008 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ — Theme for 2008 World Diabetes Day – November 14 – is “Diabetes in Children and Adolescents”

    The International Diabetes Federation announced today that it is calling on groups and individuals worldwide to get involved in activities to raise awareness of diabetes in the 50 days leading up to World Diabetes Day on November 14. The theme for this year’s campaign is “Diabetes in Children and Adolescents.”

    Read the entire press release here.

  • Front start, bay-bee

    Desert Dingo registration for 2008 Baja 1000

    I just faxed off our down payment for the registration fees for this year’s Baja 1000: $200 to SCORE and mailed a check for $500 for pit support to Baja Pits. (I can’t say enough great things about how well Carlos and his folks took care of us last year).

    We get asked a lot how much it costs to do this race. Here’s a breakdown of the major expenses:

    SCORE International registration fee: $2,075.00

    Baja Pits registration: $500.00

    110 Octane race fuel – 150 gallons @ $8.95 a gallon): $1,342.50

    Then you have individual expenses –

    SCORE membership: $75

    Mexico Tourist visa: $40 (If you want to pay a guy to go to the bank and handle the paperwork for you – which you do.)

    International Driving Permit: $15 (You can get this at AAA).

    Then add to that fuel for the RVs, chase and passenger vehicles that go down. That’s several thousand simoleans.

    But other than that, that’s pretty much it. Granted, that’s not counting construction of the car, spare parts and tires. Our sponsors, like Bilstein and Skips Tire’s, have been great and their support has been invaluable.

    We’re getting together next weekend to start final prep on the car. We’ll be looking at the shift linkage bushings, it needs to be painted, we need to get going on skid plates and Richard will be putting together a checklist that we’ll use to prep the car once we’re down in Mexico.

    Last year we went for a “rear start” – meaning you start at the back of the pack of the cars in your class. Since there were only eight of us in 2007, that mean we got an extra 3 minutes of prep time from when the first Class 11 went off the starting line. This year I’ve decided we’re going out first. We’ll just have to be ready to go three minutes earlier.

  • 1101 in new IDF booklet on World Diabetes Day

    World Diabetes Day booklet

    The International Diabetes Federation folks have included a shot of 1101 in their new 30-page booklet promoting the World Diabetes Day 2008 campaign. The booklet is available to download as a pdf file in English, French, and Spanish. Click on the image above to download the version of your choice.