Thursday, November 13 was the start of one of the most challenging off-road races in history, the 2014 SCORE Tecate Baja 1000, and around noon today (Friday) the first Trophy Truck drivers began crossing the finish line after a 1,275-mile, 24-hour long battle with their competitors and the rugged terrain of the Baja California Peninsula. First among those Trophy Trucks was the Number 11 Trophy Truck piloted by a three man team consisting of Rob MacCachren, Andy McMillen, and Jason Voss.
Team leader MacCachren drove what was essentially the first third of the course, mostly during daylight; Andy McMillen took the truck through most of the night; and Jason Voss took it to the finish line this morning. The world’s most famous desert race was a full peninsula run this year, starting in Ensenada, Baja California Norte and finishing in La Paz, Baja California Sur, making drivers criss-cross the rugged Baja peninsula a number of times as they made their way down to the finish line. This was the longest course in race history for the full-peninsula run, the 40th time the iconic race has started in Ensenada, and the 20th time it finished in La Paz.
While the fastest vehicles in the elapsed-time race were expected to complete the course in approximately 24 hours, the time limit to become an official finisher in the prestigious race is 49 hours, so drivers in various classes will continue to cross the finish line well into tomorrow morning. We don’t have an official elapsed-time yet, as SCORE-International has not released it, but our contacts in La Paz confirmed just a few hours ago that the MacCachren team was the first Trophy Truck to finish. Stay tuned for the full race report story soon on OffRoadXtreme.