The 22nd Running of the Lucerna Hotels & Resorts Tijuana SCORE Desert Challenge is in the books and Cameron Steele came away with top honors in the Trophy Truck category.
This is Steele’s first career SCORE Trophy Race win, captured by finishing the course with a time of 3 hours, 21 minutes and 36 seconds. Steele averaged 40.12 MPH during the race over the total distance of 134.8 miles.
The Desert Challenge was held over two days, and competitors did two laps of the course each day. A total of three groups were split up between the classes, with each running one session each day.
In the Pro Moto Unlimited class, Justin Morgan came home with the win, putting up a time of 3 hours, 34 minutes and 13 seconds with an average speed of 37.76 mph.
“It was dirty out there, but we are sitting pretty right now. We started in the back of the pack today so it was very hard to pass SCORE Trophy Trucks because of the dust,” said Cameron Steele after the race.
Justin Morgan faced a unique challenge with his group: fog. “The wet fog during our group this morning was a game changer from yesterday. It was 80 percent fog and dust which was like floating mud. I had to try to clean my goggles with my shirt, but it was only good for about 50 feet,” said Morgan.
The Pro UTV FI (forced induction) class had 19 starters off the line and was won by Wes Miller in his Polaris RZR XP Turbo. In the Pro UTV NA class, 19-year old rookie Kaden Wells took the win, also in an XP Turbo.
A total of 161 started began the race and 96 of those finished. This was the third in the four race season that will conclude with the 51st SCORE Baja 1000. That event will be held Nov. 14-18, starting and finishing in Ensenada, Mexico.
