Valley View, PA - The fourth annual Maxxis 12 Hours of ATV America location was moved from its central Fort Dodge, IA location back east to Rausch Creek Motorsports Park in Valley View, PA in hopes of setting a new attendance record, but with fuel prices exceeding two dollars a gallon, attendance was down with only seventy teams entering compared to almost one hundred the previous year.
The Rausch Creek facility served as a perfect location with its extensive woods trail system and multiple motocross tracks, which were combined to form six mile long course with a mixture of tight woods, jumps, and high speed straight-aways.
The 12 hour event is split into two spit six-hour sessions with a two hour intermission in-between, and even with an early morning start, the race wouldn’t end till several hours after dark, which meant a lighting system is required.
Each session is started Le Mans Style with riders to sprinting to their quads on the sound of a shot gun blast. In session one, 2004 champions, Team Honda’s John Natalie Jr was the first off the line with the Holeshot aboard their electric start 2006 Honda TRX450R.
By the end lap one, Natalie Jr already created a several second lead over GT Thunder’s, Greg Trew in second. Lost Creek Cycle’s Jason Luburgh running in fifth immediately headed into the pits with an A-arm ripped out of the frame from hitting a rock, which sent them three laps down having the frame welded.
Three hours into the race, Team Honda’s lead would come to an end when Natalie Jr would clip a rock himself on a high speed section of the track sending him sailing over the bar. "The rock wasn't their earlier and I came through on the gas and couldn't react in time to avoid it, and I flew over the bars and might even got knocked out." said Natalie Jr. The wreck resulting in a broke off rear grab bar, damaged seat latch, and crushed light switch. An extended pit stop to access and fix the damage sent Team Honda back to the third spot with Team Polaris taking over the lead followed by Team Wahl as these two battled back and forth.
Chris Borich took over for Team Honda with the seat held on by bungee cords and regained the lead when Team Polaris transmission went south and Team Wahl headed into the pits to have their subframe bracket welded on their 450R in the fourth hour of the race.
By the end of session one, Team Honda held a seven minute lead over Hertz Racing in second overall followed by, A Class Team, Alba Action (Traci Cecco, Angela Bulter (Moore), Tyler Lenig) in the third overall position. Both Team Polaris and Team Wahl were back in the race, but several laps down.
In the final six hour session, Natalie Jr would once again start for Team Honda and grab yet another Holeshot and never look back as they lead the race till the checkered flag. Hertz Racing would maintain the runner up position and finish the race on the lead lap. Amazingly, Lost Creek Cycles Team was able to recover from an early three lap deficit to finish out the race only one lap down for the final podium position. “We knew it was a 12 hour race, and other teams were bound to have problems, so we kept riding hard the entire race,” said Jason Dunkelberger from Lost Creek Cycles.
I have posted photos to highlight the events of the 12 hour race and podium celebration.
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All the quads were lined up along pit row with the 2004 Champions (Chris Borich, John Natalie Jr, Cyle Chislock) staged at the front of the pack.
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