Bronco Retains Crown in Ultra4 Stock Racing Class at King Of The Hammers 2023 w/ 1-2-3 Podium Sweep

[Shifts And Grins Fab]

I was out there and Bronco was represented well everywhere (Race Vehicles, Parking Lots, Trails, Vendor Areas). It was great to see all of the Broncos and everything people are doing with them.

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[Tex]

KOH really needs a separate class with much more restrictions to get professional drivers backed by an endless stream of money and resources from a multi-billion dollar manufacturer (FORD) out of the class. I know FORD likes to showcase these wins to show how good the Bronco is but it's kinda embarrassing to be beating up on class of 1 or 2 man garage built vehicles meant for "everyman" to compete in.

There's a whole lot of competitors in 4600 spending a whole lot of money on their rigs. You ever tally up what kind of money these guys are putting into a modestly competitive 4600 rig? Probably more money than most people make in a year. It's not like every single racer in 4600 showed up with a backyard bolt-on build the past three years. There will always be a few underdogs that actually do show up with their amateur "every man" build that everyone roots for because they could probably build something like that with their budget, but it's exceedingly rare for them to finish the course within the time limit, much less win. The days of the 4600 class being solely populated with nobodies on a budget ended just about as soon as they started. There's always going to be someone with a lot of money willing to spend it all to win, and unless you put a dollar limit in the rules and add a whole bunch of other stipulations, it's always going to be that way.

The real trick would be to start a new class, unlimited in what kind of mods you want to do...whatever works best...but you have a target value for the entire rig, no freebies or discounted stuff allowed. Go under budget and your final score increases by so many percent, go over and your score decreases by a certain percent. It'll still allow people to run new vehicles that start off close to budget as-is and be competitive, but it'll also prevent throwing money into the rig with reckless abandon. The entire premise would be to make innovation on a budget for "every man" to benefit from, and penalize the excessive spending that takes racing outside the means of "every man".

I don't think there should be a differentiation between pro and amateur drivers though. The first time you win KOH and receive money for your driving, you're technically a pro driver. Some of the guys winning with the 4600 Broncos weren't pro drivers when they started KOH. I'd kind of prefer to see pros out there bashing the hell of out of their vehicles anyway, because it shows what they're capable of in the right hands. Don't want to see grandma winching her badass rig up a simple obstacle when everyone else is idling by. I want to see what those tires or wheels or a-arms or steering rack I'm looking at buying are capable of handling when they get launched straight into a car sized boulder...