Judge Defends Title with Win at WORCS Opening Round in Taft
Words & Photos: Activate Photography
Beautiful weather and great racing are all we need for the first round of Rocky Mountain ATV/MC at Honolulu Hills Raceway in Taft, California. Cold weather and a sprinkle of rain throughout the weekend kept the dust and dry track to a minimum, allowing the battles to be much closer than your average race. Beau Judge looks to go for his 3-peat as he brings home the first win of the season, with Cruz Worley starting where he left off last season, winning in the Pro Stock class.
On Saturday, Pro Production lined up with ten entries to compete against the best of the best. Judge could grab clean air as he led after the first lap. His fastest lap came on his 4th lap, where he put down a heater of 8:41.651, almost ten seconds faster than his closest competitor, Beau Baron. He would hold onto second place for the entire race, keeping Wagner in a close third place. In 4th place, Karsen Sandberg raced his brand new Polaris RS1 build, coming from 8th place to 4th, passing some very established competitors. After having some navigation issues on the first lap, Tyson Leaver was able to settle down and bring his Polaris machine in the top 5 as the checkered flag flew as the sun set behind the hills.
The weekend’s final race was the Pro Stock class on Sunday afternoon; most of the field was made up of fresh faces moving up from the 1000 ranks. Worley and Paxton Schendel battled from start to finish, putting up almost identical lap times lap after lap; they separated by less than a second at .585 in front of Schendel. Behind this battle was another with Deegan Gonzalez and Sebastian Marquez. They would battle each other, swapping positions multiple times throughout this race. On lap three, Marquez suffered a flat tire, having to pull into the pit to get a new tire, allowing Gonzalez and Hannah Mclain to pass, leaving him in with 5th place. Marquez was able to get around Mclain to regain his fourth position with one lap to go. Marquez finished in 4th with Mclain rounding out the top 5 at round 1.
Rocky Mountain ATV/MC WORCS wants to thank all of the racers, volunteers, and staff who put together an awesome event every single time, and can’t wait to see everyone after the short break at Glen Helen on January 26th-28th.
