KR4 Performance – GNCC UTV Round 2 Race Report
Team: KR4 Arrive-N-Ride 591
Class: XC1
Result: 7th
The Big Buck Raceway, located in Union, South Carolina held round 2 of the GNCC UTV action. Thousands of spectators were in attendance, and hundreds of racers. The red clay track was extremely dusty at the beginning of the race, making visibility a real issue, but thanks to our Fly helmets and goggles the KR4 drivers eyes were protected from the dust. The weather was awesome for this race; sunny and 80. The track was challenging and very rough but thankfully all 4 of our machines are equipped with Summers Brothers Axles, broken axles were not an issue for the KR4 Team unlike many other race buggies.
As the green flag dropped, the KR4 backed 591 car darted to the front of the 3rd row, held up by a Polaris 1000, for a few miles, the 591 pilot and co-pilot Steven from Seat-Time (online magazine), made the pass, setting their sites on the Top 10 XC1 veterans. The 591 car pilot made a rookie mistake of resting a foot on the brake pedal, which boiled the brake fluid, but with the superior quality of DP Brakes, we were able to still have stellar stopping power. The conditions couldnât get much better, there were some good field sections with several whoops where the 591 was able to make passes, thanks to the extra power that the VP fuel was able to provide, along with the optimal suspension from our Custom Axis Shocks made that part of the challenging track a breeze!
The woods were pretty tight in places and ended up damaging a lot of the other entries, breaking suspension parts like twigs, and crumpling bumpers like tin foil. The RT Pro backed KR4 cars didn’t have any worries, because of the high quality RT Pro products, we have on our fleet of 4, they were able to withstand the bumps and bruises and didn’t even tweak at all. The 591 had lost the front differential/4-wheel drive, early on, this didn’t seem to slow down the 591 much, thanks to the grip that our Kenda Tires with Tireballs provided, mounted on zero offset Keizer wheels.
At the checkered flag the 591 buggy ended up 7th overall, and was pretty pleased with that considering there were over 70 entries for the UTV race and the entire team has first year rookies behind the wheel. Thank you, all of our sponsors. KR4, Tireballs, RacerTech, AWRCS, Summers Bros. Racing, Custom Axis, Vp Racing Fuels, DP Brakes, Kenda Tires, Stickman, FLY, Moodyâs Polaris, Amsoil, Offroadmotorsports, Keizer Wheels, Spider Graphics. There are 2 KR4 Arrive-n-Ride UTVs available for the remaining GNCC and AWRCS events. Contact the UTV team manager (Pat McGuire), to get your ride reserved! 740-238-1940
Team: KR4 Arrive-N-Ride 555
Class: Novice
Result: 1st
The Triple Nickel piloted by Robert Van De Mark with co-pilot Ronnie Rusch started the race on the last row. With the drop of the green flag the âTriple Nickelâ got the holeshot and was first into the woods. The track had several long and fast high speed straight away’s ending with sharp turns back into the woods. We were leading our class after the first lap by only five seconds. The dry and dusty conditions made the race challenging.
By the second lap we had extended our lead to over a minute. On the third lap we were battling for a pass in the open area of the racetrack and rolled the car on its side coming out of the turn. Thank you to the spectators for quickly getting us back on four tires. We didnât break anything and were able to get back into the race and still keep the lead in our class. On our final lap we ran into some traffic but still finished 1st in the novice limited class and 30th overall out of 70 entries.
