Carl Renezeder

This past weekend was Rounds 5 & 6 of the Lucas Oil Offroad Racing Series, out in Lake Elsinore, CA. Short course racing is always fun to shoot because unlike desert racing, you get a lot of chances to photograph each vehicle. It gives you more opportunities to try out different angles, techniques, and try out different spots on the course. In a desert race you may only see a trophy truck one or two times, but in a short course race you get to see all vehicles 30-40 times throughout a 3 day weekend.

Unlimited Lite Rollover

All weekend it was really hot out, and coupled with the fact that you have to wear pants while on the track, it led to a pretty miserable and sweaty weekend. The good thing about the LOORRS races is that they treat media with respect and make sure you are taken care of. We had the luxury of having a media skybox up in the grandstands, which was air conditioned, stocked with water, and even had catered food each day. Speaking of grandstands, to save money, rather then bring in huge seating that costs a lot of money to rent and setup, LOORRS just built the grandstands out of dirt and laid down thousands of fold up chairs. Not the prettiest thing to look at, but shows that they are being responsible with their money and trying to avoid the route CORR went last year. Still hoping to get paid by CORR, it’ll happen right?

Overall the weekend was a good time. The new track out in Lake Elsinore, while I think it lacks in technical areas was nice and fast, and the jumps they built really suited the vehicles. Even the UTV’s and Limited Buggies were catching air (sorry guys). The large table top is a nice addition to the track, but I think the two jumps after it are much better photo wise. They are both close to a 180 degree turn, so if you stand on the outside of the turn (within safety of course ) you can get some great shots. Also because of where you are, you get some nice clean backgrounds with the mountains. The jump after the large table top also produced some big crashes that weekend (ie. second photo of the blog) which naturally I only got one. Me and rollovers are like Kartman and the Mulisha, they just don’t get along.

Cameron Steele

Front view of first jump

Rear view of second jump

Kyle Leduc - 3/4 view of second jump

Another thing I don’t get along with is mud. Have you ever been walking and you saw something in the road and you just knew you were going to trip over it? Not only did I trip, I went ass first into mud. It went down like this…

Jason walks onto track near flagman station.
Jason stops at incline.
Jason looks down at incline.
Jason sees the incline is muddy, flat, and has no steps.
Jason thinks to himself, I’m going to fall on my ass.
Jason takes two steps.
Jason falls on his ass.
Jason sits in his own glory as all the course workers, media, and Unlimited 2 drivers stare at him.
Jason is still sitting on his ass.
Jason is glad that he fell during opening ceremonies, and not during practice when god forbid no one would see him fall on his ass.
Jason stands up.
Jason looks like he had diarrhea.
Jason doesn’t think Samys Camera will be too happy that he dropped their $5000 rental lens in the mud.
Jason laughs it off with his friends but is really crying inside.
Jason would like the thank Greg Adler for giving him a towel to wipe all the mud off his ass.
Jason would also like to thank all his media friends for taking photos of his ass. He would do the same to you.

This race marked the last for me until 2 months past. My wife and I are due to have our baby August 4th, so I’m taking some time off to make sure I’m in town when she goes into labor and spend some much needed time to relax with one another. Since the beginning of the year I think I’ve been home only about 25% of the weekends, and while I love photography, I love my family more.

Make sure to check out the blog every so often, while I won’t be away traveling I plan on doing some stuff around here I haven’t been able to do since I’m away, like some mountain bike photos, product stuff, etc. So stay tuned!

Here are some more photos from the weekend, and you can check out the rest on my main site!

www.highrevphoto.com