Yahoo Autos Menzies Wins Fourth Baja 400 in Close-Fought Battle of the Pickup Trucks
They’ve only ever had five Baja 400s and Las Vegas racer Bryce Menzies has now won four of them.
“To win four straight SCORE Baja 400s in the SCORE Trophy Truck class is just insane,” Menzies said at the finish. “I don’t know what it is about this race, it’s just good to us.”
Menzies drove his Ford Raptor across the finish line just south of the coastal resort city of Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico seven hours, 53 minutes and 57 seconds after starting the 424.96-mile race. Menzies beat second-place finisher and Ensenada hometown hero Alan Ampudia by just two minutes after a day-long battle on the giant loop course that began and ended in Ensenada.
“I think we were a little too conservative in the beach section (100 miles into the course) and that’s where Bryce put three or four minutes on us,” said Ampudia. “We were just playing the hunting game, we were just waiting to see where we were at in the second half and were still in the fight.”
Pole-sitter Toby Price, who won the Baja 500 earlier this year, finished third.
“Bryce pushed us all day,” said the Australian Price. “We had troubles at around mile 90 and it was pretty hard. He got by us in one of our pits and their guys did an awesome job. We pushed hard, but our steering wheel and our key box were really bad towards the end. At the end of the day, we finished. It was a pretty tight race between us, Bryce and Alan, all three teams did an awesome job. I got in (to start his driving stint) at around race mile 280 and my section was very tight. We were on Bryce’s dust and that made things really hard.”
Young Christopher Polvoorde, who seems destined to win something real soon, finished fourth.
“It just wasn’t our day,” said the 24-year-old Polvoorde. “We had a flat really early on and Bryce and Alan got by us when we were dealing with it. From there on, we just cruised. It seemed like every time we could get in the groove, we just had some other small issue. But overall, we’re still running up front and learning. We’ve learned a lot from this race and we’ll be back for the SCORE Baja 1000.”
On motorcycles, it was Americans Justin Morgan and Tyler Lynn sharing riding duties on a Honda CRF450X who took first place, finishing the bikes’ slightly longer 434.52-mile course an hour behind the trucks in 8:46.56.
“We kept it smooth all day, we had no issues and that’s how we got to the finish line first,” said Morgan, who rode the first stint on the Honda. “I handed the bike to Tyler in second place physically and a couple of minutes down on time and he did such a good job. He passed them for the lead and checked in here at the finish line in first place.
For his part, Lynn just had fun.
“I got on the bike a few minutes behind, so I just put my head down, went there and had fun,” Lynn said. “We had an awesome team and a great strategy and everything went down perfectly. The course changed a lot since we started pre-running. It got rougher each day, but it was still a lot of fun. Pretty brutal, but fun.”
The pair beat second-place finisher Arturo Slas Jr. and last year’s champion and veteran Dakar rider Juan Carlos Salvatierra, who finished third.
“SCORE races here in Baja are always very hard and making it to the finish line another time makes me happy,” Salvatierra said. “We’re always risking ourselves out there and making it to end safe is the most important thing.”
Salvatierra raced injured in last year’s season-ending Baja 1000, but won the championship.
Who will win it all this year? Find out at the BFGoodrich SCORE Baja 1000 Nov. 12-17.
