10 Ford Trucks that Raced at Baja
When most folks think about Ford trucks racing at Baja, the Raptor is the first to come to mind. Ford has been at the front at the finish line numerous times with other trucks in their lineup. Here are some notable Baja racers from Ford.
1. Bill Stroppe Prepared Ford Broncos
The original Ford Bronco virtually owned the Baja in the late 60's and early 70's with impressive overall wins in 1968, 1969, 1971 and 1972. Champion drivers from other forms of racing were often behind the wheels, like Parnelli Jones, or Al Unser, but Bill Stroppe was building them and often occupying the co-driver/navigator seat. The red, white and blue Stroppe Bronco that won at Baja inspired a special edition street truck which is highly sought after today. You can watch a short but very impressive video of the Bronco's 1968 run at Baja on YouTube.
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2. Walker Evans 6th Generation F-100 Flareside
Walker Evans custom built his own F100 Flaresides that put him in the Baja 1000 winners' circles an astonishing 5 times in the late 1970s. His 6th win came in a Trophy Truck to maintain his reign of King of the Baja race, and was the first overall win for a truck ever. For more information on Walker Evans and his prolific off road racing career, click here.
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3. Robby Gordon 1966 Ford F-100
This beautiful 1966 F100 started life as an ordinary 2WD farm truck. It found new life as Robby Gordon's truck of choice for the 1987 running of the Baja 1000 as a class 8 2WD truck. You can read more about this beauty of a truck here.
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4. Simon and Simon Racing 1992 Ford Ranger
Brothers Paul and David Simon, of the Simon and Simon racing team, took this Ford Ranger to the limit during the 1992 running of the Baja 1000. You can read more about their adventure, and the rest of the Ford B.F. Goodrich Rough Riders here.
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5. Enduro Racing 1998 Ford F-150 Trophy Truck
At the close of the 20th century, Ford continued to be a front runner with this 1998 F-150 Trophy Truck, which won at Baja in 2002. Even after the Rough Riders team broke up, Dan Smith and David Ashley continued racing as Enduro Racing, with Dick Landfield running the team. Sure, these are purpose built trucks which share nothing with the F-150 sold in stores, but some of the body is stock, and that's a Ford motor under the hood.
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6. PCI Race Radios 2000 Ford F-150 Trophy Truck
The F-series continues to dominate the Baja scene in most of the classes it runs in. At the top of the heap is this Trophy Truck driven by Scott Steinberger for PCI Radios. Under the model year 2000 body work, is a chassis that was built up from scratch in 1993. The provenance on the chassis is impressive, having been first built and raced by Jimmy Smith, then updated and run by the Terrible Herbst team for years, before the current owners bought it. You can see this remarkable transformation here.
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7. Holmes Racing 2001 Ford Ranger
In 2001, Ford continued to have much success at Baja with this Ford Ranger driven by the Holmes racing team of John Holmes and Scot Jones. This Class 7 mini truck competes against purpose built Toyota Tacoma and Chevy S10 trucks, in what has become a smaller version of the Trophy Truck class. Some relation to the factory truck remains though, with power coming from a stock based V6 motor.
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8. Riviera Racing 2007 Ford F-150 Trophy Truck
In 2007, Ford made a very loud statement with this F-150 when it broke the average speed record during that year's Baja 1000, on its way to becoming the first Trophy Truck to win it outright. That year the Baja 1000 was closer to 1300 miles, of all sorts of terrain, so you can imagine how impressive it was for Mark Post to average 53+ mph, over the course of the entire race, and not break anything. You can read about this incredible feat here.
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9. EcoBoost 2010 Ford F-150
Ford once again shocked the Baja racing scene with two teams running the EcoBoost turbo V6 engine inside what is essentially a Class 8 F-150 race truck. The faster of the two trucks finished in an incredible 38 hours and 20 minutes, and averaged 8.5 mpg the whole race. This particular truck used an engine that was not only stock, but had been subject to a barrage of Ford torture tests. First it was run on a dyno for over 150,000 miles, then it was installed in a truck and used at a jobsite day in and day out for a week, before that truck was hitched to a trailer and made to tow 2 racecars around a track for 24 hours straight. You can read the inside story here.
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10. Ford Performance 2017 Ford Raptor
Never to be out-done, Ford once again set a precedent at the Baja 1000 in 2016. That year, Ford entered the first ever pre-production truck into the fray, a mostly stock 2017 F-150 Raptor. Learn how this wicked truck performed in it's first test here. But perhaps most impressive, after the race they drove the truck the 400 miles back to the race shop in Arizona!
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For help with servicing your truck, see the how to sections of Ford-Trucks.com