02/17/2026
Now that we are home and feeling normal-ish, it's time for a KOH Race recap!
Qualifying day: We qualified 26th out of 56 4800 class qualifiers and 28th out of 92 overall. I was surprised we qualified as well as we did.
We had an amazing race day at King of The Hammers 2026. We passed several cars in the first half of the desert lap in the rocks or cars that were pulled over in the desert. Halfway through the desert lap, I made a mental mistake and tried to switch lines in a corner to catch a VCP and endo'd over a berm. We got out quickly and rigged up and tow strap in hopes of someone stopping to flip us back over. Luckly, car 4874 driven by Gavin Andreoni stopped and flipped us over and we only lost 10 minutes. What an incredible sportsman! We damaged our starlink/starstream during the roll, so it was unfortunately spotty for the remainder of the race. (Sorry!)
Lap 2 was insane. Cars stuck/broken everywhere. We had a great pace through the rocks. We passed a bunch of cars that were either stuck, broken, or just on slower lines. We made up all lost spots from the desert flip in the first two rock trails (spooners/outer limits). made it through remote pit for a fuel top off and tire check before the big rocks. Still no tire issues. I had been worried about jackhammer trail since our experience at rookie week. We picked a much better line this time and planned to winch from the beginning. Jon was incredible on the winch and spotting. We navigated through the traffic jam and winched the high-right line and passed 6-7 cars in jackhammer. We were through in 30-45 minutes. I believe this made our race. Jon was exhausted. The only other spots that gave us trouble were two loose/sandy steep climbs that I had to hit several times each to make it. The rest of the rock trails were mostly smooth sailing, slow and steady. Once we made it back to remote pit for the final stop, i could see the light at the end of the tunnel. (Still no flats!) We made it back through aftershock, check me in/out, and 1920 and were out of the rocks! We took it slightly slower in the desert loop because I knew we had beat on the car all day and definitely had some new vibrations. It all started to feel real the lest few miles before getting back into hammertown. Once we came through the bronco arch into the short course we realized we had just finished our first ever King of the Hammers!!! Not only did we finish, we came in 9th in 4800 class (out of 61 starters, only 16 official finishers) and 12th overall (Out of 110 starters, only 24 official finishers) in the 2026 KOH Every Man Challenge!!!!
None of this could have been done without the support and help from our crew/friends/family. The pit crews did amazing all day and the days prior making sure everything was organized and ready to go for race day. This whole idea would never have been a reality without the support of my awesome wife, Rebecca, my codriver, Jon Moore and his wife Shelli. This dream took an insane amount of work and money to prep this car and make sure it was ready to handle the abuse. Thank you from the bottom of my heart to anyone and everyone who helped and supported our team in any way. We look forward to seeing you all again at our next race!
-Joe Craig
Photo credit: DirtNation
