Photos by Wes Kibble and Ken Sherret
More photos available at the Off Road Action Webshots page.

Each round of the 2002 Ontario Off Road Racing Association (OORA) season has been a totally different style of race, with the only common denominator being lots of action. While the first round in Brockville featured a track that is geared towards the high horsepower rigs, and the second round near Havelock had a mud filled track that was suited for 44" Super Swamper Boggers, the third round near Oshweken defiantly had a technical track. A drivers track, if you will. The track was basically an H shape with some nice jumps on the two long legs. Although hampered by dusty conditions during Saturday's race, the staff at the Mohawk Motorsports Park put together an excellent program, especially when you consider this was the first event for the brand new facility.


The weekends events consisted of mud races as well as the OORA short course racing. The mud racers, covered else where on the site, were low in numbers, but made up for it in enthusiasm. Saturdays short course event left the racers and spectators feeling like they survived a desert dust storm. The brand new wheel to wheel track had a little dust control problem. It seems that the main problem is that there was no dust control! After running the buggy heat race, the drivers voted to run just one race for the trucks and one for the buggies in total for the day due to the dangers of racing in the dust. Basically, the winners were whoever started on the pole position, as there was very little passing in the heavy dust.



The results of Saturday's races are as follows:

Class 1/2-1600 Buggy
1st Ray Jennings #66
2nd JP Atkinson #611
3rd Bob Joseph #33
4th Randy Guenther #612

Class 4
1st Kevin Kern #403
2nd Ed Sanderson #400
3rd Jason Mackenzie #488
4th Neil Martel #747
5th Ric Ticbourne #447
6th Steve Martel #483

There was also a few other vehicles out there such as Paul Robertson's Class 10 buggy and the Class 7 Anger Management's S10. They ran with the buggy and truck classes respectively, but were awarded individual points.




Sundays race was definitely a lot better due to the efforts of a small group of OORA members such as Ed "Pacman" Sanderson and JP Atkinson, who spent a good part of the night reworking and watering the track to provide a good base. The dust was at a minimum and the track was watered between rounds.

Class 1/2-1600 Buggy Qualifier
1st Ray Jennings #66
2nd Bob Joseph #33
3rd Randy Guenther #612
4th JP Atkinson #611
5th Ross McMaster #608
6th Jeff Zoskey #600

Class 4 Trucks Qualifier
1st Neil Martel #747
2nd Ed Sanderson #400
3rd Jason McKenzie #488
4th Steve Martel #483
5th Ric Ticbourne #447
6th Kevin Kern #403

Class 1/2-1600 Final
1st Ray Jennings #66
2nd Bob Joseph #33
3rd JP Atkinson #611
4th Jeff Zoskey #600
5th Randy Guenther #612

Class 4 Trucks Final
1st Neil Martel #747
2nd Jason McKenzie #488
3rd Ed Sanderson #400
4th Steve Martel #483
5th Kevin Kern #403

Neil Martel's excellent showing this race proves how technical the track was. Neil's very light and nimble four cylinder #747 Ranger spanked the larger and heavier V8 powered rigs. Another interesting note is that buggy driver JP Atkinson (#611) finished in an impressive 2nd place on Saturday, but dropped to 4th and 3rd on Sunday. This, I am afraid, is all my fault. It seems that JP does extremely well when I am not around, but as soon as I show up to take photos for the website, the buggy has mechanical difficulties. I was unable to make it to Saturday's event, hence his second place finish. The congenial driver managed to make his buggy run well enough on Sunday so that I could muster a few pictures for him. I even managed to get one with air under the front tires! We are working hard to find another alternative than "never showing up at another one of our races!"




Overall, I think everyone had fun. The event went well, considering it was the first time for a brand new facility. The Mohawk Motorsports Park people have received some good suggestions for improvements and you can bet that they will be working hard to implement them. The next OORA race is at the Mohawk Motorsports Park on the August long weekend. If you are interested in attending as a spectator or participant, send me an Email and I can give you more information on the event.



The season points are as follows:

Class 1/2-1600
1st Ray Jennings-211
2nd Bob Joseph-210
3rd Jeff Zoskey-182
4th JP Atkinson-172
5th Ross Mcmaster 171
6th Randy Guenther 164

Class 4 Trucks
1st Jason Mckenzie-196
2nd Ed Sanderson-174
3rd Neil Martel-126
4th Steve Martel-102
5th Rob Purcell-96
6th Kevin Kern-89
7th Bill O'Hara-66
8th John McCrossan-44
9th Dave Guignard-39
10th Ric Tichbourne-31

Class 7 Trucks
1st Kevin Aube-

As you can see, the points race is very close as the halfway point looms near. The series is action packed and has some of the friendliest people that I have met in Ontario. It is definatly worth popping out to one of the races and seeing for yourself!





Tough Truck racing is gaining popularity in the OORA. If you are interested in seeing if your truck is the toughest around, Email me for more info.