My initial plans leading up to Lima had called for me and two friends to split the fuel and lodging costs to get to Lima and stay for a night. The plan called for us to set off for Lima early on Saturday morning, making it to the fairgrounds with barely an hour to spare before the first racing program kicked off just past the noon hour. The best laid plans are destined for failure it seems, as both of my would-be travel companions suffered last-minute complications that would essentially forbid them from being able to split the trip with me. Fortunately, I had engineered my plans with a scenario like this in mind, so after re-arranging my hotel bookings, I set off for Lima Friday afternoon on my own.
My route to Lima took me across I-74 to Indianapolis, where I subtracted four and found myself on I-70, which I often describe as being a modern-day “mother road”. Less than two hours on I-70 found me merging onto I-75 north, and at that point it was maybe an hour or so up the road to Lima. I ended up calling it a night just south of Lima in the town of Wapakoneta (Wapak, for short) at a cheap hotel I had booked in lieu of the surrounding area being booked already far in advance. My good buddy (and fellow Hall Bros Racing alumni) Travis Howard met me there not long after I checked in, and we spent a good deal of the night channel surfing and discussing the weekend’s event.
Photo: "The Barbecutioner", Mr. Travis Howard.
Morning came, and with it a mass exodus of Jamboree fans attempting to leave the hotel at a bout the same time as Travis and I, in an effort to arrive at the Allen County Fairgrounds in a timely manner. This exodus must have exceeded the hotel’s hot water heating capability, evidence of this being the cold showers that greeted both of us as we attempted to start our day. “A fitting way to begin a Lima weekend,” I commented at some point between freezing my ass off in the shower and walking out the hotel room to head north ten miles to the track.
Getting into the event was a piece of cake thanks to Russ and Jessica at Family Events, and before I knew it I was running into old friends (hell, they are practically family to me) and having a great time. My good friend Scott and his daughter Katelin joined us in the Bigfoot pits along with driver Dan Runte and crew member John Peterson. I’ve been friends with Scott and Dan since I was 16 or 17 in high school, and it was really nice to spend a weekend hanging out with them at the track, which I haven’t done in…well…a very long time, I suppose. Before I knew it, it was time to hit the track.
Photo: (Left to right) My good friends Scott and Katelin along with myself.
The infield at Lima is littered with light poles, power boxes, and all manner of other distractions so quality photography at Lima can be a bit of a trick. Those distractions, coupled with the wind, dust, and occasional (read: frequent) rain and mud, makes Lima hard on man and camera alike. In lieu of a strong wind blowing away from the grandstands all weekend, I chose to shoot from various positions on the front stretch of the horse track, between the crowd and the main part of the infield track. This would net some acceptable results, and provide a great spot to soak up the action from.
Special Events has been bemoaned by the “hard-core” monster truck fan base for its lack of creativity in track design, both in freestyle and racing. My initial impression was that that would be the case in Lima upon hearing that the track was a straight-line drag, but after inspecting the track before the 12:30 show on Saturday, I realized that this wouldn’t be an average drag race track. Long by any standards (coming in well over 350’ I believe), the Greg Fuchs-built track featured a small dirt roller at the start, and a massively long run up to the final jump, which led up to three cars. But the kicker to this track (pun intended) would be a dug-out at half track in between the roller hills and the final ramps. The trucks would dip into the ground a few feet, and then be launched into the air in the upswing. This setup not only chopped away mercilessly at the momentum the drivers were attempting to carry down the track, but also produced some chilling side-by-side racing moments all weekend long. It certainly was not a track that could be attacked full-throttle at all times, and by the end of the weekend I’m not sure that even the most dominant drivers of the weekend, HBR’s Mark Hall and Geremie Dishman, had a complete handle on it. Although the HBR team pretty well dominated racing, they faced stiff competition from veteran racers like Charlie Paukens, Doug Noelke, and Dan Runte.
Freestyle proved to be fairly tame all weekend long; noticeably absent from the Lima infield was the “big stack” that usually catapults trucks high into the Ohio air. At best, the drivers had a trio of matted down car-van-car pyramids, two sets of cars from the racing lanes, and a moderately-sized dirt jump in the shut-down area to work with in freestyle. Charlie Paukens, behind the wheel of Live Nation’s brown Monster Mutt, was probably the most impressive freestyler of the weekend. Big air and quality momentum were phrases that could be used to describe each of his run, although at least two of his passes were cut (if only slightly) short by mechanical woes. Geremie Dishman in Rammunition took a wild ride during the freestyle portion of Saturday’s 5:30pm event; after hitting the backside of one of the racing lanes, the cars threw the truck hard over onto its right side. As the right front tire stuffed into the ground, a lower four-link bar bent, allowing the tire to impact the frame and body in that area. The truck was tossed violently back over to the left hand side, creating a vicious side-slap movement may have left Dishman in a bit of pain. The damage, which included some minor cracks in the frame tubing and some cracked lexan and body panels in addition to the four-link bar, would end up being more than the HBR team had time to fix, so the black Dodge would sit out the 8:30pm freestyle-only show.
Dishman’s wild ride would prove to be only an appetizer for the destruction that would follow, as Jim Koehler took Avenger over the exact same set of cars that had scolded Dishman, only this time the cars would bite back harder. Koehler’s was subjected to a similar side-slap movement, albeit more violent, as the truck was tossed onto its roof and went through a strange sort of crash that left it facing the direction it had came from. Ultimately, the damage would prove to be mainly cosmetic, as Koehler took to the track quite hard on Sunday, minus the front clip of the body. Dan Runte in the Summit Bigfoot turned in some impressive moves in freestyle as well, including some sizeable leaps off of the larger dirt jump and some outstanding wheelies. Doug Noelke in Tailgator, and crew member-come-driver Dale Gerding in Big Dawg also checked in with some fine wheelies; Gerding is definitely showing an increased comfort level in the yellow Ford, no doubt a product of his increased seat time over the last several months.
While I think that Special Events does need to put a good deal of additional effort into the track layouts for the monster trucks, I think that the teams they have chosen to perform at their events have all done the best with what they’ve had presented to them. I hope that the next couple of Jamborees that I’m planning on stopping by end up as enjoyable as Lima was.
I never have given much interest to much else at the Jamborees, aside from the occasional stroll through the show truck area or a glimpse of the burn-out contest. Its not that I’ve never been able to get a spare minute here or there; rather, I’ve simply chose not to sit down and watch mud drags or tough trucks. However, there is one event that has eluded me at the Jamborees for years, and finally in Lima, I was able to enjoy it start to finish: the Miss 4-Wheel Jamboree contest! Girls in bikinis on a stage, enough said. Apparently I wasn’t the only one with this mindset, as a strong contingent of male show-goers stopped by the MSD Main Stage on Sunday to soak up some action. I was happily asked to be the “official” photographer for this contest, so as you can imagine I had no problem fulfilling those duties.
Sunday seemed to come and go, which is unusual for the last day at a Jamboree, at least for me anyways. I had a mellow and somewhat somber lunch with Travis before heading to the track, the two of us discussing our ever-changing future plans, and the various hardships we’ve been dealing with in our lives since October of last year. I admire Travis’ “just keep on keepin’ on” attitude…he always seems to make something work out for himself. After the event was over on Sunday, I bid a quick farewell to some friends in the pits, and then hit the road with one thing on my mind: getting home, and getting home quick. I’ve realized over the last few months that while I enjoy being in new (or familiar) places often, I still really don’t like driving long distances all that much. Although it is a great way to sit on my hindquarters and listen to some music, it does get terribly boring after awhile.
I stopped at a BP gas station outside of Richmond, IN to grab some overpriced gas, which I justified paying for because there was a Dairy Queen inside. That sounded like a pretty good “on the go” dinner, so I figured the overpriced fuel was the trade off. It turns out that I run out of patience after waiting in line for ten minutes just to order a damn Blizzard and a cheeseburger, so I got back on the road and ended up finding a typical fast-foot burger joint just outside of Indianapolis. I ordered a vanilla shake and a couple “base model” cheeseburgers, figuring that something simple would hit the spot. It was then that the drive-thru staff member informed me that they were out of my favorite cheeseburger topping: pickles. “A fitting way to end a Lima weekend,” I said out loud to myself.
-KD
PS: Thanks to Katelin for the last shot!
