2011 Bajafest

I’ve been fortunate enough to have attended almost every major large-scale event in the United States. I’ve been everywhere from basher events in the desert to National events on both the East and West coasts. One gathering I’ve missed over the years, however, is Hostile Racing Products Bajafest in New York. This year, not only did Greg and I get to head out there to run but we also had a chance to race one of the industry’s newest big-scale bad-boys, the Losi 5IVE-T.

THE LOCATION
After landing and picking up my wonderful econo-box rental (actually, another word comes to mind), I entered the coordinates on my GPS and away I went. When I think of New York, I picture a concrete jungle filled with towering buildings, miles of sidewalks and people everywhere. I had no idea that this event was set in some of the most beautiful country I’ve seen in a long time. As I approached my destination, I thought for sure I was in the wrong place; a small, dirt road surrounded by trees was leading up the side of a mountain. Thankfully, the large, orange HPI Racing banner informed me I was in the correct place. As I progressed up the single-lane path, I emerged into a large clearing filled with RV’s, camping trailers and two enormous 1/5-scale tracks! People were hanging out around their tents with their bonfires a-blazin’, music playing and plenty of food and drink to keep a small army happy. It was like we were in our own little world up here. Oh, and did I mention a ba-zillion 1/5-scale cars everywhere???

THE TRACKS
Rob (the owner of Hostile Racing Products) and his crew set up two killer tracks for us to race and play on. The off road track had a few tight areas as well as some pretty major jumps. The surface was truly off road…rocks, loose dirt, elevation changes and grass patches dividing the lanes. A tall driver’s stand made seeing the track pretty easy to navigate the twisty dirt course. Next to the off road track was a huge, banked dirt oval. Hostile’s oval track was fast and fun, but it had an added feature to it; it was sloped downwards! The front straight was higher up the hill than the back straight, which means you had to really pay attention to your speed. Too fast down the hill and you were drilling the outside wall. To slow up the hill and you were being left behind down the front straight. Certainly an added challenge that made racing a lot more fun!

OVAL RACING
Both tracks offered multiple classed to run in, including buggy, truck and 4WD. The Oval saw its share of great racing in both the off road and EDM divisions. The power that some of these big-scalers have is really quite impressive considering they were all 2WD (except, of course, for the 4WD class). There was plenty of door-to-door action and some spectacular crashes, but not once did I see or hear any negative comments about the racing.

The top 3 for the Oval classes are as follows:
Oval 4WD
1. Jukka Steenari
2. Kevin Chase
3. Mark Hull

Oval EDM
1. Dave Zettlemoyer
2. Keith Coble
3. Steve Joslin Sr.

Oval Truck
1. Jeff Cisney
2. Steve Joslin Sr.
3. Trevor Ashline

Oval Buggy
1. Stanley Gibson
2. Ed Guancione
3. Steve Moor

2WD OFF ROAD RACING
On the twisty turns of the off road track, there was also plenty of racing action. Thanks to over 60 entries in each of the 2WD classes, the mains went 7 races deep! For an added bonus, Rob included bump-ups to each main event. Basically what this does is allow someone that didn’t have a good qualifier to bump-up to the next main event if he won it. So, you could have some bad qualifying rounds and end up in the D main, but if you win that race, you’d be able to race in the C main. If you win that, you could bump to the B and so on. A pretty cool option that had quite a few races scrambling after winning their mains (you know, because fueling and changing the receiver pack on a Baja ain’t all that easy!)

The top 3 in offroad truck and buggy are as follows:
Off Road Truck
1. Rodney Ketcham
2. Greg Arnone
3. Keith Coble

Off Road Buggy
1. Scott G.
2. Dave Zettlemoyer
3. Greg Arnone

4WD OFF ROAD RACING
The big news was, of course, Losi’s massive 5IVE-T. When this beast hit the track, everyone came a-runnin’! The Losi boys put on a great show and really highlighted the key points to this truck; speed, handling and durability. Plus, it was awesome seeing top dogs like Adam Drake, Jukka Steenari and Rich Trujillo out having some fun! Adam pretty much put on a clinic as he slid, jumped and powered his way to an easy victory.

The top 3 in 4WD are as follows:
Off Road Truck Open (4WD)
1. Adam Drake
2. Rich Trujillo
3. Greg Vogel

NEW GEAR SPOTTED
There were a few cool new things at this year’s event. The first was Losi’s new 5IVE-T truck. It made its first public showing and didn’t disappoint. Not only did the boys run it in its full stock trim, on Sunday they loaded it up with some BIG motor and wowed the crowd! Another prototype spotted was from HPI. While walking along the side of the track I noticed a 1/5-scale truck motoring around but, umm, it was quiet! HPI’s own Mr. Shultz was rocking the oval with an E-Powered 1/5-scale truck! Not much is known about it yet, but it didn’t appear to be based on the Baja platform. Guess we’ll have to wait and see what that’s all about.

BIG THANKS
A HUGE shout out goes to Rob and all his crew for putting together a fabulous event! He opened his house, garage and tracks to anyone with a large-scale vehicle to come out and have a good time. He made Greg and I feel like family, making it difficult to pack up and leave. We’ll be back next year, Rob, so have those yummy stuffed bell peppers ready again!

SPONSOR LINKS
Hostile Racing Products, www.hostileracingproducts.com
CD Grafix
DDM Racing, www.ddmracing.com
TGN, www.tgndistributing.com
HPI, www.hpiracing.com
HPI Baja Forum, www.hpibajaforum.com
Threshold
Baja Modifiers, www.bajamodifiers.com
Dogpile Racing, www.dogpileracing.com
OBR, www.oneilbrothers.com
Team Chase, www.teamchaseonline.com
Vertigo Racing, www.vertigoperformance.com
RC Large Scale, www.rclargescale.com
Large Scale RC, www.largescalerc.com
Baja Addicts, www.bajaaddicts.com
Duda Designs RC
Craftwerks RC, www.craftwerks-rc.com
Team Fast Eddy, www.teamfasteddy.com
Ronshop Racing,
Ramtech RC, www.ramtech-rc.com