VOL. 53 ISSUE 22 JUNE 7, 2016 P27
2013 Baja 1000.)
All of those incidents cost time
and forward motion, which the
Samuels/Udall duo maintained
better than any other bike entry.
As the miles clicked off, the
race for the lead came down
to defending SCORE champs
Samuels/Udall and the 45X bike
captained by Arredondo.
"We had a little bit of a cat-
and-mouse game with [Morgan
on] the 45X," Samuels said. "It
was a fun ride and by the time
we got to Borrego about halfway
through the race and got off the
bikes, he was pretty worked and
I was pretty worked."
After Samuels handed off their
Monster Energy/Michelin/Lava
Propane CRF450X to his part-
ner, Udall reported, "I was three
minutes behind when I got back
on the bike down at race mile
220 and I reeled in the 45X bike
and it was Ryan Penhall [on it].
We were side by side [in some
whoops] and he clipped a rock
and it kicked him up way high in
my peripheral [view]. He came
down off the bike; he was side-
saddling it and ended up tack-
ling the thing, but I think he hit
his head on the way down and
he was going 50. You can't side-
saddle in three-foot whoops!
"I turned around and stopped,
and Kendall was in the helicop-
ter. Ryan crashed literally right
in front of some spectators. I'm
going, 'Pour water on him!' be-
cause it's 115 and he's out! I go,
'Don't move him! Just pour water
on his shoulders.' And then I
told them, 'Get your awning over
here and get him out of the sun!'
"By that time Kendall had
landed the helicopter and ran
over and I figured there was
nothing [further] I could do."
From that point, Udall re-
mained in front until checkpoint
four (race mile 440) where
officials told him the race would
essentially finish since some
stragglers were still outbound on
the common start/finish course
used between Ensenada and
Ojos Negros.
"There was a lot of talk that
people were going to compete
with us," Udall said. "Baja is
scary. You have to respect it."
Lurking in third was the SRT
Husqvarna team of Jordan
Brandt/Morgan Crawford/Cory
Between the intense
heat and unrelenting
whoops, this was a
brutal year to solo
the 500, but Carlin
Dunne survived to
win the Pro Moto
Ironman division.
PHOTOGRAPHY
BY
MARK
KARIYA
