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Written by Rowan Horncastle
You join us in Ensenada, Mexico. Where, tomorrow morning, 200-ish cars, trucks, buggies, truggies, UTVs, bikes and pretty much anything else that wants to scramble over Baja"s boulderous terrain will point their wheels southbound and blast down the peninsula.But this isn"t the famously unforgiving Baja 1000. We"ve been there and done that. It hurt. And those deep-tissue scars have only just healed. So this time we"re taking it a bit easier, by covering a potential hidden gem of the motorsport world: the NORRA Mexico 1000.The Mexico 1000 was actually the original race down Baja. Conceived by a chap named Ed Pearlman back in the late Sixties, he wanted to show that four wheels were better than two at smashing it from the tip to the toe of this estranged finger of land.In 1967, Ed set up the National Off-Road Racing Association (NORRA) in order to sanction a race that allowed him and 60 of his mates to race from Ensenada to La Paz. There was one stipulation: each entrant had to throw one hundred bucks into a pot to be spent on the mother of all parties at the finish.This happened annually for a few years, until SCORE (another race organizer), took control of the event in 1973 and made it into what we now call the Baja 1000.As we found out, the Baja 1000 is now a very serious event. With around 1.5 million coming out to watch it, it"s the biggest single sporting event in the country. The racing is also incredibly cutthroat which can be a fun sponge of sorts.See, chasing every last tenth, beefing with other competitors and trying to sniff out cheaters can take the enjoyment out of off-roading. That"s why in 2010, Mike Pearlman son of Ed put some sticky defibrillator pads on his Dad"s NORRA Mexico 1000 and brought it back to life.He had one goal: fun. So instead of being a flat-out point-to-point race, the NORRA breaks the 1,400-mile route up into four legs in order to celebrate the history of off-roading.
Date written: 23 Apr 2016
More of this article on the Top gear website
ID: 3111
You join us in Ensenada, Mexico. Where, tomorrow morning, 200-ish cars, trucks, buggies, truggies, UTVs, bikes and pretty much anything else that wants to scramble over Baja"s boulderous terrain will point their wheels southbound and blast down the peninsula.But this isn"t the famously unforgiving Baja 1000. We"ve been there and done that. It hurt. And those deep-tissue scars have only just healed. So this time we"re taking it a bit easier, by covering a potential hidden gem of the motorsport world: the NORRA Mexico 1000.The Mexico 1000 was actually the original race down Baja. Conceived by a chap named Ed Pearlman back in the late Sixties, he wanted to show that four wheels were better than two at smashing it from the tip to the toe of this estranged finger of land.In 1967, Ed set up the National Off-Road Racing Association (NORRA) in order to sanction a race that allowed him and 60 of his mates to race from Ensenada to La Paz. There was one stipulation: each entrant had to throw one hundred bucks into a pot to be spent on the mother of all parties at the finish.This happened annually for a few years, until SCORE (another race organizer), took control of the event in 1973 and made it into what we now call the Baja 1000.As we found out, the Baja 1000 is now a very serious event. With around 1.5 million coming out to watch it, it"s the biggest single sporting event in the country. The racing is also incredibly cutthroat which can be a fun sponge of sorts.See, chasing every last tenth, beefing with other competitors and trying to sniff out cheaters can take the enjoyment out of off-roading. That"s why in 2010, Mike Pearlman son of Ed put some sticky defibrillator pads on his Dad"s NORRA Mexico 1000 and brought it back to life.He had one goal: fun. So instead of being a flat-out point-to-point race, the NORRA breaks the 1,400-mile route up into four legs in order to celebrate the history of off-roading.
Date written: 23 Apr 2016
More of this article on the Top gear website
ID: 3111
