The good news is that Bill Caswell actually made it to the Baja 1000 and started the race. The bad news is that the desert jumped up and bit the BMW, cutting the trip far short of the finish line. The odyssey of him actually getting to the race was nuts and even included a last minute public appeal for a truck and trailer to get themselves to the race! The crazy BMW buggy received a great welcome in Mexico and by all accounts Bill’s launch was met with some great fanfare.
Things started going badly when the motor was running hot, causing Caswell to slow in order to save the car. The death blow came when the steering rack was ripped off the car in the middle of nowhere. Caswell and his co-driver were able to install another on using their tools and a couple of rocks, seriously. After cobbling the car back together, and smashing the crap out of his hand with said rock, Caswell called, “No Mas!” and parked the car at the next checkpoint.
Bill had realistic expectations about how hard Baja would be and we’re really impressed he made the start of the race and was able to lay the lumber to the car for a few days in some of the harshest racing terrain on Earth. While speaking with him at SEMA we agreed that making it to the start line would be a victory, and he pulled that off.
Bill’s next adventure will be moving to Germany to build a car and compete in the 24 hours of the Nurburgring. As always, we’ll keep you posted!
