(Words by David Whealon/ Photos by David Whealon and Laini Pound)   In recent years the mud racing world’s spotlight has been shined on the tricked out awesomeness of Mega trucks which are purpose built to fly through the air and do tricks at tracks designed that entice and sometimes encourage mass carnage. But what some may regard as old school “Hill n’ Hole” mud racing is still alive and well.

Founded in 2006 by Darryl and Deborah Jones, the Lee County Mud Motorsports Complex in Sanford N.C. has been hosting some of the fastest kick butt straight line mud racers in recent history. The track is comprised of two separate mud pits with a 200’ track with a 4’ hill smack dab in the middle for the stock bodied trucks and a 250’ track for which is the Super Modified Unlimited classes’ track that consists two 4’ hills separated by three mud pits. Both tracks are frosted with about 3’ of sticky tenacious North Carolina red clay mud that has the viscosity of peanut butter. It’s so adhesive that when it dries you will need a hammer and chisel to knock it off. Unlike the latest trend of the Mega Truck tracks that are full of launch pad flattops , turns and whoop-de-dos, this track is built for pure horsepower, torque and shock setups to power through the slop at record times where being airborne is not as beneficial to a winning pass. Although, a good launch off the first hill will get up and over and headed to a mud skimming blast to the finish line. If all the mud you have collected was just a 6” ring around your 44” cut boggers you know you have had a pretty good day.

These Unlimited racers have made several passes in the 3-4 second range on several occasions. Mud prep is vital to making those kinds of banzi runs and Darryl Jones is a master of mud manipulation.  A mud racer himself, Jones knows exactly what needs to be done to the track to crank up the speeds. As driver of the rear engine blown 572 KB Olds “Scooby Doo” Ford Ranger mud truck, Jones has always brought the crowd to their feet with blistering wheels totin’ passes in the three second mark. Over the years as speeds skyrocketed Darryl felt the need to give the track a few more safety upgrades by moving the spectators up and back away from the track and adding more catch fencing so he could groom his mud for a show built for nothing but lightning fast passes through the 250’ track. Now he was ready for the main event.

The “Fastest of the Fast” event was now upon us. An open invitation was sent out across the country to anyone that was bold enough to challenge the world record on a standard 250’ Hill n’ Hole track of 3.643 and the track record of 3.649.

Scheduled for the first weekend in October this showcase of speed was pushed back due to the fury of Mother Nature when Hurricane Joaquin dumped literally several feet of water in the southeast. Not good for mud racing and not good for speed. Re-scheduled for the first weekend in November but as luck would have it I think Joaquin made a 30 day U-turn and doused the area with another tremendous rainfall. But the show must go on.

Set to do battle were racers from several states to take on our crop of North Carolina home state regulars. Virginia, Michigan, Mississippi, Indiana and Florida to name a few.  The two ultra-fast classes of “Unlimited” and “Tractor Tire” filled the pit area with mud racing superstars. The packed house of avid mud racing fans browsed through an extensive display of the big ol’ gnarly mud vehicles equipped with 1000’s of horsepower.   Unknown to many fans a behind the scenes 2000+ HP blown Hemi grudge match in Tractor Tire class was set between the Lee County track record holder and North Carolina’s own Larry Pierce driver of the “Resurrection” and Mississippi’s Randy Roberts piloting the “Blown Satisfaction” Mega truck owned by Jamie Hewett.  Along with these beasts a small army of mudders from Michigan showed up including the fastest female in the country, Amanda Harris, in her “Dirty Fantasy” nitrous injected 632 BB Ford, wildman Kody LaPoint in his ratted out “Back in Black” C10 Chevy and Racin’ Jason Schmidt with his 632 Jon Konkle powered Jeep. The lone diesel in the field belonging to the South Bend, Indiana clutch builder Manseil Washburn was a sight that I for one wanted to see blasting through the pit with that four cylinder nitrous injected Cummins billowing that ever popular thick black cloud of heavenly smoke. Unfortunately for Manseil the nitrous demons reared their ugly head and suffered a catastrophic failure on the starting line.

But let’s not forget our own North Carolina racers as to what this challenge was all about. The homeboys were here to race and keep that sweet trophy here at home. As well as the prize money.  Along with track owner Darryl Jones’ “Scooby Doo” and his Doo Crew teammate John Stephens’ BB Ford powered “Daphne”, the team trucks of Chad Sexton’s narrowed up Chevy 1500 “Lacking Sanity” sporting a Lizzard Race Engines NOS injected 632 BB Chevy and Denny Kerley’s 1986 D50 “Snoot” equipped with an all Mopar 572 had something to say about this out of town invasion. These guys have been laying down the numbers for many years at the track that boasts to have the fastest mud trucks in the world pass through the gates.

As stated earlier we had a several inches of water dropped on us for the days leading up to this long awaited event so the times were a little off compared to a more optimum fair weather condition where record setting passes would have been contested.   Nonetheless the competition and excitement was still wicked with the top nine Unlimited trucks separated by just a few tenths running in the 4 second bracket.

Bringing the Unlimited Fastest of the Fast trophy back to his Pittsboro, NC home was Chad Sexton with a field blistering pass of 4.038 and teammate Denny Kerley’s 4.103 claimed second. On a side note Amanda Harris retained her title of the fastest woman laying down a 4.368 over Sheila Wooten’s 6.368.

The Tractor Tire class grudge match certainly brought all the excitement as one could anticipate. The “Blown Satisfaction” crew with Hemi master tuner Jon Pickett on board, worked feverishly trying to stave of the Hemi gremlins that showed up on raceday.  With the tune up set on kill to do battle with track record holder Larry Pierce’s “Resurrection”, Randy Roberts could only muster up an impressive but only a 2^nd place pass of 4.465. Larry was on his game and not to be denied. He had those massive V tread tractor tires churning through the muck with an all over the place run of 4.282 claiming the top spot and the hardware.

With all the drama and excitement of this year’s main event, I sure can’t wait until the “Fastest of the Fast II” in 2016. It ought to be a barnburner of epic proportions.

CLICK THE IMAGES BELOW TO EXPAND THEM AND THEN SCROLL THROUGH –