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Bi-Polar's
Arctic Cat Prowler XT UTV Desert Race Team
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Cat Bi-Polar's Links |
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Lake Havasu, Arizona (7/17/2008) - Arctic
Cat has long been known for their outstanding snow
machines and durable utility ATV’s, that have
won many racing championships, but Arctic Cat’s
drive to be the best and passion for developing
new products, has led them to explore the path of
side-by-side vehicles. In order to pursue the racing
end of the ever-popular SxS market, Arctic Cat teamed
up with Bi-Polar Extreme Racing based out of Woodland,
WA. Bi-Polar was given the task of taking an Arctic
Cat Prowler XT 650 4x4 and turning it into a top
of the line desert racer that is able to endure
the likes of the SCORE series, including the legendary
Baja 1000.
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Racing the
SCORE series requires a fleet a vehicles
for pre-running, chase trucks, and ofcourse
the actual race machines. The Bi-Polar
Team not only races the Arctic Cat Prowler
UTV, but they also race a Pro Truck, which
won 2008 SCORE Baja 500
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Bi-Polar's
Dave Creagan (above) runs the Pro Truck
team & his brother Jim Creagon runs
the UTV race team |
The Creagan family's Bi-Polar has an extensive history
in both snow and desert racing, including Pro Trucks,
which makes their pairing with Arctic Cat ideal
in preparing the Prowler for the rigors of the SCORE
series. Bi-Polar’s experience in desert racing
is top notch and they have not one, but two Pro
Truck teams to prove it.
The Prowler frames are shipped right off the
Arctic Cat assembly line to Bi-Polar, where the
crew builds the Prowler to the specific needs
of desert racing. Having the bare frames shipped
directly to the company allows the crew to save
time and money as a lot of optional parts on a
fully assembled stock machine would have to be
stripped down for racing.
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Bi-Polar's
Arctic Cat Prowler XT 650 UTV Race machine
are assembled from the frame up instead
of buying a stock unit and stripping it
down, which saves time & money
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The Prowler’s durability has allowed the
Bi-Polar crew to use many stock parts, which helps
keep costs down by eliminating many higher priced
aftermarket products, and the Bi-polar team swears
by the reliability of the stock Arctic Cat parts.
“We’ve found that when running stock
parts, very rarely does a part fail,” stated
Jim Creagan. “And if it does, it’s
usually something simple like a bolt.”
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utilizes the stock A-arms & tie-rod.
The frame shock mounts are reinforced and
King Shocks are installed to handle the
abuse of desert racing |
Included in that list of stock parts are the
a-arms and the tie rods. “All we do is reinforce
the a-arms and add some support along the shock
towers,” said Creagan. All though after
market King shocks are used, there is still the
same amount of travel as the stock machine as
the width is kept at about 61 inches (stock width).
“We’ve found that by keeping the Prowler
at stock width that we can sometimes get around
stalled vehicles and other obstacles much easier
where as some of the wider UTV’s have trouble
getting around in some of the tighter spots,”
said Jim.
The narrow stance also allows the Prowler to
straddle ruts made by the truck classes, which
can sometimes reach three feet deep. “It’s
easier to just straddle the ruts instead of running
with one wheel in and one out. You just can’t
maintain a decent speed that way,” stated
Creagan. The Prowler also comes equipped with
4-wheel drive, which allows the Prowler to get
through the toughest desert terrain, even the
notorious silt beds of Baja.
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