SPARKS, NV — Winning a championship in racing is never easy. It takes commitment, a whole lot of effort and support from people that help the driver as well as sponsors. And even then winning a title can be illusive.
Dave Schneider stands in the shop at Trent Fabrication and by the car he drove to the Legends Ultra 4 championship is being refreshed. The car was loaned to him by owner John Herrick.
Dave Schneider, along with co-driver Aaron Robinson, get some big air at Wild West Motorsport Park during their Ultra 4 main.
Coming down the rock face during the Legends main at the recent Ultra 4 event, driver Dave Schneider and co-driver Aaron Robinson keep a sharp eye for any obstacles in their path.
However when the recent Nitto Tire Ultra 4 Nationals ended at Wild West Motorsport Park, one local, Dave Schneider, achieved this goal and won the Legends class championship.
And he probably had the shortest commute home, Spanish Springs, as most of his fellow competitors towed in from other states.
His involvement with off road sports began 15-years ago when he lived on the east coast.
“I actually got started in 1999 as I had a Toyota 4 Runner at the time and was looking around on the Internet for some upgrades and modifications,” he said.
After doing that he moved to the west coast and started doing recreational and competitive rock crawling.
“The first time I did that was in 2001 and been hooked since,” he said. “Rock crawling is slow speed, technical competition and it’s similar to trials bikes. It’s an obstacle built into the side of a hill with rocks and natural terrain obstacles with cones placed through them.
“You have a set amount of time to get from your start to your finish. Every time you stop it’s a penalty, every time you back up, you get bonus points for going through the gates without touching them and at the end of the day it’s scored similar to golf, the lowest score wins.”
From there he followed the evolution of the sport until he got an invitation to attend a new event staged in 2007 at Johnson Valley, California.
“It was for the first King of the Hammers, the first unofficial and impromptu race and 13 people showed up,” he said. “Afterwards they told everybody, ‘hey, what if we did this?’ And everybody said, ‘you can’t do that,’ then they said we did it two weeks ago and here’s the results.”
The response was so great the race continued.
Reflecting on that first time he said, “We didn’t really know what to expect, they didn’t let us know what the course was until the day we got there two days in advance and it was only 49-miles and we went out with a vehicle that was less equipped than what we should have had,” he said. “But it was about even with what the rest of the field showed up with equipment wise and we had mechanical failure halfway through the day. Then we went down as a passenger in 2008 and had my own vehicle in 2009 and it’s just grown from there.”
His first time driving his own car at the Hammers wasn’t exactly a success.
“We finished putting it together in the tech line before the race. We starting building it about two and a half months in advance,” he said. “Then the electrical fan on the radiator failed, it was a $100 dollar part that took us out of the whole thing. We could only go for so long, stop, wait then keep going and we ran out of time.”
A couple of years earlier in 2007, a former employer gave him the opportunity to race with a team at the Baja 1000. He started as the co-driver, then drove for a small section and later joined the chase crew as they went all the way down to Cabo San Lucas.
“I had no idea what to expect, it was an experience of a lifetime that it’s still one of the most memorable things I’ve ever done,” he said. “I’ve been back three more times since then and I’ve actually raced a UTV last year, the first quarter of it.”
Ever since the Hammers event began Schneider has either been there as a competitor or on a team supporting someone else.
Heading into the 2014 season his plans hit a snag then changed completely. He had planned to campaign his unlimited car but chose to race an older car he had in his garage.
His reason was a new class the series introduced called the Legends for older cars that weren’t as competitive as they once had been.
“I dug out my 2009 car, blew the cobwebs off it, didn’t even check the fluids in it,” he said. “It had a mismatched ring and pinion from a failure two years ago that’s been on the ‘someday I’ll get to it repair list,’ hosed it off, blessed it and onto the trailer it went.”
And it was an adventure that began when the green flag waved.
“We started almost 80th off the line and we were the last car in our group and only the stock class was behind us. It over heated instantly and I decided the computer has a shut off point when it gets to a certain temperature so we just went for it.
“It never shut off, never shut down, I put two and a half gallons of water in it the next morning as it was completely dry, it burnt two quarts of oil so we had a 2003 air cooled motor with 150,000 miles on it,” he said.
Schneider finished third in his class and seventh over all but it took about four hours for the motor to cool down from the 270 degrees it had run the race at. He said it was a cheap, junkyard motor and this car has never failed to finish a race it started.
After he returned home another local, John Herrick, who had a new car, approached Schneider and asked if he wanted to pursue the championship in it.
“So of course I jumped at the opportunity, getting into something with a lot more power, a lot more suspension and was a lot more comfortable to drive for long periods of time,” he said.
Before racing the new car Schneider did some testing at a track he has in back of his house.
“We got the car a little bit before the first race so got familiar with it, made a couple of modifications that fit me a little bit better. Then we took some parts off my unlimited car to make it more competitive and more comfortable for me to drive,” he said.
Comfort is necessary for any competitor in this type of racing due to the physical strain as the cars go over all types of terrain. For Schneider it’s even more important because he has a handicap.
Around 18-years ago he was involved in a freeway wreck that left him with a spinal cord injury. While he uses a cane to walk once in a car he’s as fast as anyone.
Looking back over this past season Schneider explained he raced in all five events, starting with King of the Hammers. With the last four being in the new car.
“Our second race, which was the first western regional was in early June at Prairie City outside of Sacramento and it was only 109 degrees that day,” he said.
In that event the Legends were combined with the Spec class as there weren’t enough cars. Still he managed to finish third, which put him in the points lead.
Next up was the Glen Helen race outside of San Bernardino, California where it was only in the mid 90’s.
‘We ended up fifth there as we had an electrical problem,” he said. “The third western regional was at Tooele, Utah and it rained all night before our preliminary races so there was knee deep standing water between the jumps and the rock sections.”
He added that it’s been his luck this year to always start at the back and he did then. He won his class in the preliminary races and in the main his class was combined with the stock class.
“Our main event was in the afternoon, after the track had dried up, it was a 10-lap main event and they started us by our finishing order thankfully,” he said. “We were the only car to complete all 10-laps while second in our class only did eight and the stock class winner only did seven laps.”
After that he headed home to the Ultra 4 Nationals at Wild West. It was a challenging time for this local team.
During Friday practice sessions he found a joint in an axel broke so the car was actually “3-wheel drive.”
“The start of our prelim race in the morning did not go well,” he said. “We made half a lap then got in a group of cars at the top of that natural section up high. As we were driving forward our right front and right rear tires were driven over by other vehicles at the same time so we broke two axel shafts and it left us stuck.”
After recovering the car the crew spent the next three hours hustling to complete the repairs. Due to not completing a lap Schneider and his co-driver started in the back for their main.
His co-driver Aaron Robinson is a fabricator at Trent Fabrications.
“He’s most along for comic relief,” Schneider said. “Very low key, very calm, good with one liners, jokes and comments.”
In this type of racing co-driver isn’t just a passenger. They help pointing out hazards, watch the gauges, help pick lines to drive over obstacles and if necessary will get out to attach a winch line all racers have to help pull a car either back on its wheels or over an obstacle.
Going into that final race there were two competitors that had a shot at the title. One was Richard Fenton, from the Bay Area and Jimmy Brown, who hails from the Northern California coast.
Either of them, if they finished a few places ahead of Schneider could have taken the title. But the main went well for him.
“The rock section at the start was fun, very frustrating being second to the last car to cross the start line. Luckily with the corrected time and transponders it actually worked out in my favor,” he said.
A driver’s time started when the crossed the transponder sensor that was buried in the dirt at the starters stand. So the first lap started after the front stretch rock section.
This year the series used cumulative laps that counted those in the preliminary and main events. As a result Schneider, who actually won his main on corrected time, finished fifth as he didn’t complete a lap in his preliminary race.
Despite this he ended the season with enough points to earn the class championship.
Ultra 4 racing is a combination of slow speed rock sections and high-speed desert sections. And competitors pride themselves in handling any challenge thrown at them.
“Yes, more rocks, more desert, more go fast, bigger jumpers, we’re all tougher than that. Of course we can’t get off the couch the next week and with my spinal cord injury I don’t move so good anymore,” he said with a laugh.
Asked about the course at Wild West he said, “It was great, they did an amazing job, brought in real rocks and it was a real challenge. I haven’t heard anybody I’ve talked to say this course didn’t deliver what everybody has wanted all year long.”
And like any driver he appreciated the support he’s gotten
He gave special thanks to his employer, Trent Fabrication as they kept the car maintained and ready to go. He also appreciated Crawl Magazine’s Editor-in-Chief John Herrick for the use of the car.
He added that Crawl Magazine even did an article on his championship effort.
For Schneider it’s his sixth championship. He explained that every year in off road racing he’s either been on a winning team or drove to a title.
“The 2007 SCORE series championship, being part of that team was an amazing effort but this one was definitely the most hard fought,” he said. “I lost more sleep over this one, more time worrying and wondering than any of the other ones.”
Now he’s savoring this title and back at his day job at Trent where he runs the front office, does most of the book work, sales, purchasing as well as keeps their social media up to date.
As to the future Schneider said, “It’s in the works as we finally got my unlimited car put back together but I need to sell that first.”
With some luck and a lot of effort Schneider might claim another Ultra 4 title next season.
