On September 30, Keith "Mango" Lopeman hosted the next event in the series of Supercrawl events.

This was not an ACW event,

but our members were invited as was anyone with wheels. We want to thank Mango for the invite and his great opportunity to see some very cool rock crawling.

The Report

by Tye Jones (CJ5DRIVER)

The sixth SuperCrawl was held this past Saturday (Sept 30th) at Keith Lopeman's premier rock crawling destination front yard.  The weather was amazing with a few clouds, a light breeze, and temperatures in the low 80s.   

Only two hours into the all-day event, 70 people had already gathered.  The blindfolded rock crawl consumed the first half of the event.  The driver wore goggles that were blacked-out with tape and took verbal guidance from his/her spotter.  Points were added if the vehicle drove out of bounds, which at the narrowest point, gave very little leeway for fullwidth trucks.  After one pass through the rocks, the spotter would instruct the driver around a multi-point turn to again pass through the rocks and exit on an alternate line.  Drivers reported losing all sense of situational awareness.  The ESPN2 cameraman took footage for about two hours of the competition with Keith 'Mango' Lopeman doing much of the narrating.

Like golf, fewer points were a good thing.  Here's a run down on the rules:

10 minute time limit to go through the course, turn around, and return... all in the blind
Spotter getting out:  3 points
Hitting course boundary or cone:  3 points each new time
Spotter can stack rocks without penalty points acruing, time keeps ticking though
36" or larger tires get 3 points but can be nulled by keeping the spotter inside the rig
Reversing course is allowed as many times as necessary with no penalty points acrued
Exceeding time limit or getting stuck which requires outside assistance is disqualifying.


After the blindfolded portion was over, the Open Crawl portion began.  This time allowed any driver with or without spotting to try as many hard or easy lines as they wish.  The competition course markers/cones were removed so as to permit anyone to approach the huge rock pile from any angle.  Lines could be found that went from mild to wild. 

A stock TJ and YJ tried the easier lines.  A clean full-bodied K5 with little more than a 4" lift and 33" all terrains made great progress until a sharp edge punctured a sidewall and the driver side front fender got pulled out by a rock.  He was only 3 feet from the exit at that point.  Winching was required to free the big beast.

Fred Pierce had his K5-based buggy out to play and competed in the competition.  One ton axles and 42" Swampers roll beneath a conglomeration of roll bar tubes and frame rails with a TBI 350, 700R, and 203/205 doubler beneath.  His heavy rig lifting a rear tire sky high during the competition caused a section of onlookers to leap back as it appeared to threaten a rollover in one of the more exciting passes in the blind crawling portion.

A guy named John brought out his Rubicon TJ outfitted with a mere 4" suspension and 33s in addition to skid plating and rock armor and set the record for the competition accumulating the least penalty points and fastest time.

Keith Lopeman, the event's host, acted as spotter while his girlfriend April drove the "Mango Bright" XJ.  It's outfitted with a 7" lift, 33" MTRs, ARB front, lunchbox locker out back in stock axles, long arm front and revolver shackles out back.  While spotting April through the only big turn in the course, a nice wheel stand was performed with an instruction from the spotter to keep it coming which was followed by a healthy romp on the go-pedal.  A loud (and painful) 'SNAP' was heard as both rear c-clips broke off the Dana 35.  The recovery of a rig in a huge rock pile is made more interesting by having rear tires/axle shafts that continually want to work their way to the outside.  The wide-track looking XJ was at minimum thought provoking.  It was cool to see the lady driving and getting involved. 

Gordon Dibble ran recovery duties all day with his TJ outfitted with the cool new synthetic winch rope.  Paul Gabbledon ran the judging and timing of the competition since his recent back surgery wouldn't allow him to take his own very capable and highly modified YJ through the rocks.  He runs a 4.3 Vortec powering high pinion D44F and a high pinion Ford 9" turning 37" MT/Rs. 

Our own Brian Letendre had the SilverBullet out sans fiberglass (i.e. open top!).  Brian got in on the blind crawl and was working around the very challenging corner obstacle which requires pivoting the vehicle around a corner on its rocker panel guard.  Meanwhile, opposite corner tires are trying to climb vertical steps in the 2-3 ft tall range (see first picture) ALL while having a rear bumper dragging on another rock.  It all equalled a nice hang up where the one tire that might could pull was the unwitting victim of Open-Differentialias, a rare and unfortunate disease of the lower front extremities causing temporary loss of motor skills! It was funny to hear Brian smack-talking (in an manner of course) another 4-Runner owner later in the day when he was asked snidely why he hadn't changed gears or swapped in a bigger motor yet (when the guy asking hadn't wheeled his rig in many months).  Something to the effect of "Why don't you give me your gears since you don't use 'em."  No further questioning was given from that peanut gallery attendee.

Chris made it out with Brutal and was working through the rocks in the competition.  As the XJ struggled to pull up over a huge boulder, the front end made that all-too-familiar 'SNAP' sound that elicits a universal group cringe.  The front Dana 30 broke a shaft or u-joint.  Maybe he can fill us in on where the carnage occurred.  He got helped out of the rocks and returned later with tools to remove the pieces. 

Andrew stopped by in that sweet ride known as a motor home in the afternoon.  He chose wisely to avoid the rocks.  But had he chosen to do so, plenty of rednecks would have cheered him on!

Dale Sims and his son Brandon and daughter Sedona took turns throughout the day wheeling his Bronco; that is ... a tube buggy with fiberglass Bronco fenders, hood, and grille.  This very nicely done rig sports a 302 from a 'stang, an Atlas twin stick, Dana 60s, and 39" IROKs suspended on coilovers.  Between the three of them (most significantly the 12 yr old daughter and 18 yr old son), most every line was sought out.  It was cool to watch and sounded real good too. 

I had the pleasure of bringing the Yellow Tractor out for its inaugural rock crawling event.  With computer programming and suspension settings still being fine tuned, I was pleased overall with how it ran.  The engine remained idling relatively well and it never felt like the suspension was going to lean so far that it would tip over.  I got some good tilting going on but with no sway bar and coils that are too soft, that was expected.  I broke a small tab off the rear axle's pinion yoke near the end of the day which allowed a u-joint cap to walk out, but it was found and returned to service. 

There was a radio-control rock course setup off to one side but I never got bored watching guys bash their rigs through the fullsize obstacles.  The little kids loved that stuff though.  Very cool idea.

A special thanks goes out to Keith and April for hosting the party.  Thank you God for a beautiful day to be outside!  This was expected to be the last SuperCrawl for his front yard.  I understood that he wanted to move the boulders to the back yard (good luck!). 

SuperCrawl 6 follows a series of residential rock crawling events that started in August of 2001 when Keith had a house on Gail Gardner Way in Prescott that had all-natural granite rock formations that were perfect for rock crawling.  The events continued once per month until November of that year (SuperCrawl 4).  A move to Prescott Valley halted the fun, but only for a while.  In 2005, Keith had three 18 wheeler side-dump trucks bring all the boulders in while he hand-loaded pickup load after pickup load of smaller rocks (50-200 pounders) to fill in gaps where necessary.  Using winches and long pry bars, the rocks were positioned and SuperCrawl 5, "The Reunion" was born, held November 5th, 2005.  It featured not only the rocks, but also the Index Ramp and a teeter-totter flatbed trailer option.  SuperCrawl 6 "The Final Chapter" was a huge success and was lots of fun.  I hope the pictures and other accounts do it justice. 

Sincerely, your SuperCrawl reporter,
Tye Jones