BITD: Vildosola Racing Parker 435 summary

Vildosola Racing finishes strong at season opener
Tavo Vildosola and Bryan Freeman had a long day at the Best in the Desert Parker 425 race.

Mexicali Baja California, February 15 - After a grueling endurance race, the defending series champions, Tavo Vildosola, Bryan "Wonderboy" Freeman and Jimmy Davidson had a good finish in the first double points event of the Baja Protruck series at the Best in the Desert Parker 425 race last weekend.

Jimmy Davidson riding mechanic of the team commented: "On Thursday we had a good qualifying session and ended up 2nd place out of the eleven trucks that qualified, this put us second off the line for Saturday's race. We felt confident with our race preparation and plan, the red and white Toyota Tundra was ready to take on a very competitive field of sixteen trucks. The plan was for Tavo to drive the first two laps and Bryan to close out the race driving the last lap, this formula worked last year and we were willing to try it again."

At the completion of the first lap, Tavo and Jimmy found themselves in second place physically after suffering a flat tire and a small complication at their first pit stop. The second lap started off on the wrong foot, midway through the famous python the Vildosola Racing Baja Protruck lost a power steering belt forcing Tavo to head back to the pit and replace the belt. This dropped the team back to seventh place physically. At race mile 35 of the second lap they lost a second power steering belt putting them further back and to aggravate the situation after another flat tire Jimmy started to feel nauseous. This caused the team to change riding mechanics at the midway pit and Javier "Showtime" Valenzuela, the regular mechanic for the Trophy Truck finished out the second lap with Tavo.

Only minutes behind the main pack and running eighth place physically Tavo handed Bryan the controls of the Toyota Tundra. Bryan did his best to catch back up and retake some of the positions lost during the day but more troubles loomed ahead for Baja Protruck #1204. Just before pit #1, the truck started to run hot in some of the treacherous washes that the Blue Water Parker 425 offers. At this point Bryan and Javi had to stop at every pit and fill the radiator back with water, plus taking dozens of water bottles with them in the truck for unscheduled stops. The team now went into "limp" mode with their sights set on just finishing and obtaining precious points for the larger goal, the 2007 Baja Protruck Championship.

"We had a very nerve racking third lap, this was no different than last year but we were running up-front in 2006 as opposed to this year where we were just looking to finish," stated Tavo. "We did not have the day we were looking for, we had things go wrong with the truck and mishaps at a couple of pits, we also had issues with the overall handling of the truck, to say the least I was very frustrated and hope to put this day behind the team soon."

The next race for the Baja Protruck will be the SCORE Baja 500 in Ensenada, Baja California, this will also be the second double points race of the Baja Protruck Championship. The next race for the shop and the crew though will be the SCORE San Felipe 250 March 9th - 11th where Tavo will debut in the #4 Trophy Truck along with his father. The father-son duo drew the 7th starting position out of a field of thirty-five premier Trophy Trucks; this is the largest field ever for a San Felipe 250. Stay tuned for more updates on the upcoming SCORE San Felipe 250 and Tavo's debut in desert racings' premier class, Trophy Truck.

-credit: www.vildosolaracing.com