With the AORC preparing to head to the Toyo Tires Riverland Enduro, we check in with hometown favourite Brad Gallard.
After being plagued by mechanical issues during a Finke that was tipped to see Brad Gallard returned to the King of the Desert throne, Brad and his team are now busy preparing the #454 truck for the Toyo Tires Riverland Enduro.
The track for the Riverland Enduro is located in Waikerie, just 10 minutes from where Gallard grew up on an orange orchard, spending much of his childhood watching renowned off-road racers attacking the red South Australian dirt.
Now residing about an hour away in Renmark, the track and the Riverland Enduro race remain close to Gallard’s heart.
“I used to go out there as a kid and see the big tyre teams, watching the likes of legends like Craig Martin and a young Mark Burrows and local hard charger Peter Walker. I remember that, knocking around there as a kid watching the race with my dad.”
Gallard has been competing at the Riverland Enduro for as long as he has been off road racing, and despite knowing the course backwards, it still challenges even the most experienced drivers.
“It’s a smooth track, but it does cut up really bad after the first lap; it’s probably one of the toughest tracks on gear and tyres.”
“The limestone pebbles can make it slippery. You can be drifting and pulling big power slides in narrow sections through mallee scrub. It keeps you on your toes and you need to concentrate. If you slip up, the trees aren’t forgiving, or the rocks, or the stumps; there is plenty of that just off the track.
“The first lap will always seem quite easy, and it will be fast, but when you come round the next lap, the track will just be torn apart and it will turn into a real off-road race. Waikerie is brutal like that.”
Despite big jumps, obstacles and shifting conditions, the Riverland round sees competitors pulling some incredible speeds.
“It’s super-fast, top gear, absolutely on the wood kind of racing. We are reaching speeds of well over 200km/h.”
It is these speeds and the abundance of vantage points (the start and finish line and a significant portion of the 80km track is visible from designated spectator areas) that makes the Riverland round a driver and spectator favourite.
“People always enjoy the trucks roaring around, and the Waikerie event is one of the loudest and showiest. On the prologue track you see the drivers start, and you see them four times during the prologue track just from the main spectator area.
“During the race you get to see the cars a lot, it’s really good that way and it’s definitely worth getting along to.”
Gallard intends to run his own race at the Riverland, and bring the truck home safe in a top-end position.
“We will try to avoid getting too caught up in racing against the buggies, but we will hopefully be right in the mix of things towards the end.
“You always want to do well at your local round and we are going to enjoy Waikerie as much as possible.”
The day prior to the race Gallard will be giving Toyo Club Day VIPs hot laps in the race-ready 680-horsepower Geiser Bros #454 Trophy Truck.
Gallard takes great pride in his ability to terrify his co-pilots:
“You will be looking at a jump thinking ‘there’s no way we should be hitting this’ and all of a sudden the truck will just float over it. We will be sliding into the corners like a rally car, and we’ll be hitting well over 150km/h on loose dirt.”
