ARCTIC CAT WILDCAT FLEXES ITS MUSCLE IN ITS FIRST-EVER ENDURANCE RACE

D&P Performance Races to 1st Place Finish at King of the Hammers in 900-1000 Production Class

Thief River Falls, Minn. (Feb. 15, 2012) – If there ever was a question as to the durability, speed and pure-sport capabilities of the all-new Arctic Cat Wildcat, those doubts were laid to rest at the toughest one-day off-road race on the planet – King of the Hammers (KOH).

ARCTIC CAT WILDCAT FLEXES ITS MUSCLE IN ITS FIRST-EVER ENDURANCE RACE Arctic10

Driver, Todd Stephensen from D&P Performance, an Arctic Cat dealer based out of Cedar City, Utah, worked his way through 39 UTV entries to a first place finish in the 900-1000 Production class, and a second place finish overall, in a near stock 2012 Arctic Cat Wildcat. The King of the Hammers series challenges drivers to compete in a wide variety of terrain from endurance desert racing to competition-style rock crawls to short course racing in Johnson Valley, Ca.

Stephensen said, “We had a very limited amount of time to test this Wildcat for the event as it was just pulled off our showroom floor weeks ago. The capability of the Wildcat’s suspension through the severity of this terrain is truly amazing for a stock production vehicle!”

Arctic Cat CEO, Claude Jordan stated, “We are extremely proud of the team at D&P Performance. With an industry-first, 5-Link rear suspension, 13-inches of ground clearance and whopping 18-inches of suspension travel, tough terrain racing is where the Wildcat shines. And D&P proved that!”

For more information on the King of the Hammers race, please visit www.ultra4racing.com. To learn more about D&P Performance, please visit their Arctic Cat dealership in Cedar City, UT or log on to www.dandpperformance.net or www.arcticcat.com for in-depth information on the all-new Wildcat.

That is not possible. I heard it is slow and has no power..... Laughing

Last edited by Foxfire on Sun Feb 19, 2012 8:53 am; edited 1 time in total

I had thought about posting this, but decided against it as nobody cares since it's not a Rzr.

I did not say that fox. lol!

Is that a fairlead and a winch coming out of the top of the hood on that Cat? Is that where the winch mounts?

wvyankee2 wrote:: Is that a fairlead and a winch coming out of the top of the hood on that Cat? Is that where the winch mounts?

That is what it looks like.

SSXSRider Member Number of posts : 1861 Registration date : 2008-01-22

1st place finish in it's class, 900-1000. How many were in it's class? Rolling Eyes

Clayboy wrote:: 1st place finish in it's class, 900-1000. How many were in it's class?

That reminds me of something..... I have only lost one fight in my life!!!!!

SSXSRider Member Number of posts : 1861 Registration date : 2008-01-22

Big-R wrote:

Clayboy wrote:: 1st place finish in it's class, 900-1000. How many were in it's class?

That reminds me of something..... I have only lost one fight in my life!!!!!

I hope you are not talking about that time when there was only 1 Bud Light left in the cooler! Sorry man,,, I was thirsty.

wvyankee2 wrote:: Is that a fairlead and a winch coming out of the top of the hood on that Cat? Is that where the winch mounts?

Yes it is a fairlead....no, that is NOT where the winch is mounted stock.

The Xp started around 4 th position....the Cat was back by like 35.....looking at just this situation, had the Cat started say 7...or 8....
the XP would not have been 1st.

But....it's a Arctic Cat, so no one really gives a shit.

pit dog wrote:: I did not say that fox.

Nope Pit.....you are one of the few.

The Wildcat went into limp mode and cost them the race win:

Race recap for Ontrack Racing Todd Stephensen:

My co driver Devin Jones and myself had a very good game plan for the KOH UTV race. Our main goal was to take the overall and not to just win our class. We wanted to put on a great show for the new Arctic Cat wildcat. We recieved the wildcat three weeks before the race so we had a lot to do before the race. We raced in the main event at KOH last year so we knew what to expect out there. The wildcat is bone stock except the cage,radios,seats,wheels and tires. We drew the 24th spot which sucked for us but i love challenges. We pre ran the course twice in the wildcat and once on fourwheelers, so we knew the course. We decided that we were going to run about 3/4 speed and see where it put us in the field. We started off and started battling the dust. I wanted to try to get ahead of as many people as possible before we hit elvis. We had excellent lines layed out the first 10 miles and it payed off big. We passed about 12 cars in the first 10 miles. We got to the first lakebed and we could not see anything. We knew we werent going to be the fasted car so were going to have to make it up in the rocks and the rough. We got through the first lake bed and i could not see anything it was really hard to drive by my co driver telling me where to go but we did it. When we hit martel we had clicked off a couple more cars so i knew we were setting good. We were headed towards the first pit and i could only see about three dust trails in front of us and i knew we could catch them in the whoops. Dean Bulloch was pitting for me in the first pit and he told me that there was three cars ahead of us. We blew threw the first pit and pushed a little bit harder to get to elvis. I wanted to be threw elvis first but i knew they had some time on us. We smoked threw elvis and then we hit the super rough area in front of us. We were talking to Cary on the repeater on the mountain and we knew we had one car in front of us and she said we were gaining fast. We decided to chill a little bit and save the car for the last whoop sections where we knew we could make up some time. We had to stop in pit two to get fuel and my great pit crew from Ontrack Racing had us out of there in seconds. I barely had time so get a drink. We started to head up to fisher mountain and we knew we had to be careful cause of all the sharp rocks. When we got on top Cary at the repeater said the helicopter was going to be with us in a second and my co driver freaked out. He started to yell and me and told me to not even try to give them a show(he knows me pretty good). The helicopter stayed with us all the way threw fisher and they where close, i could see the white in the eyes of the pilot. It was really cool having them there and i think i did a good job controlling myself. We started done the sand hill and the wildcat started to go into limp mode. It kept coming out of gear so the computer didnt know what gear we were in. I had my co driver hold it in low range all the way done jack north. It helped but we could only go about half speed because it kept going into limp mode. We got down the canyon with out a problem. We knew we could make it home from there so we tried hard to make up time. We got passed pit 2a and i told my co driver to hold on because i was going to hold it full throttle to the finish. The fastest we went from pit 2a to the finish was about 45 and it sucked. I knew if we could get to the finish in under 4 min after the leader we could take the win. We got to back door and we couldnt get it to stay in gear and i was praying we could make it up the steep hill to the finish. We started up the last hill and we were in low in full limp mode. From the bottom to the top i think we hit about 5mph. The last 10 feet i thought we were going to have to push, my co driver was ready because he was almost out of the car. We made it to the top and i figured we could coast from there. We got to the bottom of the hill and it wouldnt go into any gear. I finally got into reverse and started to turn around when it went into high. We made it across the finish line and i knew we probably didnt make it in time. We ended up being 1 min 30 sec behind the leader. We had a great time and would like to thank everyone from Ontrack Racing and D & P Performance for the help. I would also like to thank mastercraft safety,walker evans racing,trail gear and warn winches for there help. Thanks to everyone in the UTV community for being so nice to us and we loved meeting a bunch of new people. Thanks to Joey from UTV Underground for the pictures and write ups on us. See ya all soon.

Official results of King of the Hammers UTV race:

Overall Time:
Driver Name Car # Elapsed Time

Mitch Guthrie 55 2 : 20 : 46

Todd Stephensen 1944 2 : 23 : 29

Jarred Newman 2436 2 : 45 : 14

Jon Crowley 1965 2 : 58 : 01

Johnny Ford 120 2 : 59 : 56

Rod Roach 134 3 : 03 : 17

Joseph Murphy 130 3 : 12 : 27

Bill Barnett 711 3 : 14 : 36

Matt Enochs 1524 3 : 14 : 46

Damon Cardone 615 3 : 19 : 47

Frank Walsh 3493 3 : 20 : 37

Zane Znamenacek 712 3 : 21 : 29

Ivan VanOrtwick 466 3 : 28 : 44

Mark Eulberg 3646 3 : 46 : 06

Lanse Chournos 413 4 : 03 : 56

Derek Stewart 987 4 : 11 : 32

Rob Usnick 1999 6 : 03 : 32

SSXSRider Member Number of posts : 1861 Registration date : 2008-01-22

Finishing 2nd in that field is very respectable. I'm sure it will own those types of races when the big race teams learn a little more about the Cat.

Taking nothing away from the Cat....its moreso the driver than the machine in races like this.

Saw the Wildcat in Indy this weekend.....those tie rods concern me.