LIVE UPDATE: King of The Hammers Morning Update

February 7, 2014
Story By
Kristin Cline

Ultra4 King of The Hammers Presented by Nitto Tire is currently underway in Johnson Valley, California. The 156 starting cars began leaving the line at 8:00am. Leaving in pairs every thirty seconds, it took until 8:39 for the last car to leave. During today's 184.8 mile course, competitors will make three laps. A 52 mile first lap which includes a lot of fast desert section and then two almost identical laps 2 and 3 of 63 and 63 miles respectively. The one strategy section is the Back Door trail, a tough waterfall section of rocks - teams must can pass through the Back Door once, on any of the three laps.

Nick Nelson #4404 was the pole position in today's 2014 King of The Hammers, he the following two teams (Tom Wayes #321 and Erik Miller #4421) passed by Back Door on Lap 1, with Shannon Campbell #5 and fourth from the start line to be the first to take and complete Back Door. The benefit to Campbell will be avoiding any line that tends to build up later in the course, but he sacrificed his lap placement for the time being.

Exactly one hour after leaving the line, at 9:00 am Nick Nelson was the first to crest the mountain headed towards the finish line. He made a very short stop and was headed out to Lap 2 within less than a minute, passing Back Door again meaning he'll have to take that during Lap 3 with the possibility of there being a large backup.

Next through the line was Tom Wayes about four minutes later. Wayes started at 8:00am next to Nick Nelson. Wayes also pay passed Back Door for his second lap.

Surprising everyone, the next to crest the mountain and come into the pits by the finish was Jason Scherer #76. Starting in 16th position, Jason picked up a lot of spots out in the desert during Lap 1.

By 9:30am a lot of competitors had passed through and into their second lap - with a small line forming at Back Door with JP Gomez #4482 flipping over there and needed to be rolled over by another competitors winch. Randy Slawson #4448 and defending King was the first top competitor to pass through Back Door during Lap 2.

By 10:00 am it was confirmed that Shannon Campbell is out of the race due to mechanical issues, we'll get more details on this as they come in.

At the time of this writing, Tom Wayes is in the physical lead - but due to him illegally bypassing a couple of checkpoints during Lap 2, the official leader is Nick Nelson, with Chicky Barton #144 believed to be in third place. For now, here's the first 15 competitors who came through the finish line completing Lap 1, see their official starting positions in our earlier article.

Order completing Lap #1

1 | Nick Nelson #4404

2 | Tom Wayes #321

3 | Jason Scherer #76

4 | Chicky Barton #144

5 | Randy Slawson #448

6 | Wayland Campbell #3

7 | Loren Healy # 67

8 | Gary Ferravnti, Jr #64

9 | Derek West #4420

10 | Bill Baird #5252

11 | Alex Hardaway #4481