Doing 87 MPH in a Vehicle with No Windshield in Baja Ezra Dyer - Popular Mechanics
go to original January 4, 2017

Maverick X3 - In Depth (CAN-AM OFF-ROAD)

On specs alone, the new Can-Am Maverick X3 X RS is a car: a turbocharged and intercooled 154-hp engine, zero to 60 in less than five seconds, a base price of $26,699. The 102-inch wheelbase is the same as a Chevy Bolt's. And it's six feet wide - slightly broader than a BMW 3 Series. The only thing un-car-like about it is the suspension travel, which tops out at 24 inches, about twice what you get on a 2016 Ford Raptor. That's the spec that defines how much permission you have to try to catch air off a sand dune.

Over the years, ATVs have mutated from four-wheeled dirt bikes into increasingly outrageous utility task vehicles (UTVs, a.k.a. side-by-sides), machines that are closer to a modern pickup than the single-cylinder Kawasaki Mojave I grew up riding. Laws are changing to reflect this evolution, with at least 20 states allowing you to drive them on the street. In Utah, for example, you can drive a properly equipped UTV - horn, turn signals, and rearview mirror - on any two-lane road outside Salt Lake County.

And while I would love to roll into a suburban Walmart in the X3, I'm in Baja, Mexico, doing 87 mph in a vehicle with no windshield on a surface with no pavement.

It's dangerous out here. At one point, I stop to let the dust clear and find myself at a small memorial for Kurt Caselli, a motorcycle racer. He died three years ago when he hit some kind of large animal during the Baja 1000.

I thought my group's plan to reach Mike's Sky Ranch, an off-the-grid hotel where they kill the generator a half hour after last call, before sunset was mildly insane. Ten of these machines, driven by a bunch of testosterone-crazed lunatics, were setting out to cover 250 miles at high speed across a moonscape of razor-edged rocks, deep silt, and blind hills. The first day, on a flat, empty beach that would've been crowded by mansions were it a couple hundred miles north, two of our posse flipped their X3s. (Lesson: When you want to spin a donut, put it in two-wheel drive so that you don't have too much grip.) But the vehicles and drivers were unscathed. We heaved the vehicles right-side up and kept going.

Read the rest at Popular Mechanics

Related: Behind the Dust: BFGoodrich Shows Us the Insane Amount of Stuff It Takes to Survive the Baja 1000 (Car and Driver)

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