Many Hands make Light Work: KOH UTV Racing
Story by Donnie Kehlenbeck, Photos by Edventure Photography – Eddie Martinez
I told Alex (my wife), I’m taking 2022 King of the Hammers off. I had raced our #4659 DKA Motorsports Jeep Comanche in the Stock 4600 class for two years and was moving up to the Stock Mod 4500 class. The car’s not ready yet, so I was looking forward to spectating and volunteering this year. And then things changed. My good friend, Arthur Yankilevich, asked me to co-drive with his 13-year-old son @Ruslan_Greasehandz. I met Ruslan’s parents in 2019 when I raced the UTV at KOH. Both of them are profoundly deaf; I am also profoundly deaf but can hear and speak well with the help of a cochlear implant.
Dave Cole, founder of Hammerking Productions, had granted Ruslan an age waiver due to his extensive racing experience at Best in the Desert, including Top 10 finishes at Vegas to Reno and the Mint 400. His social media popularity didn’t hurt either! I co-drove with Ruslan in his Pro Turbo Polaris Pro XP 4-seater that is heavily modified for BITD racing in the Toyo Tires Desert Challenge presented by Monster Energy on the first Saturday of Hammers week. Then on the following Thursday, we raced the Polaris Turbo S RZR in Stock Turbo for the Can-Am UTV Hammers Championship.
We pre-ran the rock trails in my 2007 Jeep Wrangler JK that’s been mildly modified with 37s, built Rubicon Axles, Rubicon Transfer case, and RockKrawler suspension. Alex drove most of the trails while I coached Ruslan on UTV rock crawling skills. Besides some superficial body damage, the Jeep did great for a “weekend warrior” on some gnarly trails, including Spooners, Outer Limits, Resolution, and more.
Ruslan is known for hucking some seriously massive jumps (like the Glamis Canal), but he was still nervous going down the infamous Backdoor for the first time. I guided him down an untraditional line to the right with no issues. Pre-running is one of the most critical components of offroad racing.
The Toyo Tires Desert Challenge presented by Monster Energy started well with the Prologue; although the dust was pretty heavy, Ruslan was carrying a good and fast pace, roughly 4 minutes off the leader on the 34-mile loop. 
We came back to main pit, checked the car over, and got ready for the main race. We took the green flag and immediately started passing cars, but the dust was some of the heaviest that I’ve ever experienced with absolutely zero visibility. As Pistol Pete always said, “The dust separates the men from the boys.” Our race was going great – until it wasn’t. That’s what off-road racing is like. Roughly a mile from Remote Pit 1B, our race got cut short after 131 miles (out of 240 miles) due to a broken front driveshaft and finding multiple Chromoly chassis failures. After evaluating the damage, we determined that it wouldn’t be safe to continue. It was still a blast to ride in the car going 70+ mph over some massive whoops that I would have gone 20-30 mph in the Comanche.
We reset and got ready to race the Can-Am UTV Hammers Championship race in the Turbo S, which is still relatively stock other than safety equipment/cage and HCR suspension on 33” GBC Dirt Commanders. Lap one went smoothly, but the trophy trucks had severely beaten up the desert, making for an extremely rough ride. With our stock Polaris RZR shocks, we realized that we were better off slowing down and ensuring that we completed the first lap. After coming back through main pit for fuel and some minor fixes, we went out for lap two. Going through Spooners, our battery box broke and shifted; shorting the car out when the terminals hit the frame. We hopped out of the car and quickly found the issue, but it took a while, swapping fuses around and doing some creative wiring to get the RZR to fire back up. I wrapped the winch cable around the battery and the frame, had Ruslan winch in to secure the battery, and hoped we wouldn’t need to winch before Pit 2A. Luckily, we cruised through Outer Limits, Hell to Pay, and Aftershock without needing to winch, thanks to good lines and smooth driving by Ruslan. Ruslan and I used sign language to communicate when I was outside the car, spotting him down some of the trails.
Our pit crew rushed into action at Pit 2A, fixing the battery box and making sure Ruslan and I had some snacks and water. Off we went past Fissure Mountain and down into SledgeHammer. 
When we got to Plaque Rock, another UTV was stuck there, so we chose to winch him to safety before trying the obstacle ourselves. We came extremely close to flopping, but we were able to right the rig and continue with some careful winching. We waited a while in Jackhammer for some broken cars to winch out of the way, then Ruslan drove right up without any issues. In the four years that I have raced King of the Hammers, the most terrifying part is the section between Jack Hammer and Jack North, which consists of an extremely steep single-lane trail up the ridge of a mountain with massive drop offs on both sides. After passing that scary part, we cruised down through Jack North, Her Problem, and Idle Issues. We came up to Chocolate Thunder and almost immediately broke a front passenger axle shaft. After seeing the broken axle, I elected to winch up the main obstacle rather than risk more breakage. We continued in 3wd into Wrecking Ball, where we cut the passenger front tire. At this point, we realized we didn’t have any lights due to our electrical issues earlier in Spooners, and we had officially timed out. We called it a day and limped back to Hammertown from Mile 128 ½.
It was a bittersweet decision, as we were only 17 miles from the finish line. I am incredibly proud of the effort that Ruslan put into these two races. People who have never raced this race don’t understand the amount of time, effort, and money required to prepare race cars and equipment for what is arguably the hardest offroad race in the United States, possibly the world. Big thanks to the Goodalls (Goodall Offroad Motorsports out of AZ) for their Pit Support in both races, Arthur and Amanda for trusting me to co-drive with their son, and my wonderful wife Alex, who’s always been my number one supporter (and is also a heck of a racer and wheeler herself). In 2022, Ruslan became the youngest driver ever to race the Ultra4 King of the Hammers.
