SCORE Journal

SCORE-Journal-June-2021

SCORE Journal - The Official Publication of SCORE Off-Road Racing

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MOVING FORWARD, FAST Jordan Souza Price is determined to hurdle all obstacles in her way Story by Stuart Bourdon Jordan Souza Price is part of an off-road racing family that includes two sisters, her mother, and her father. It seemed only natural she would want to jump at the chance of getting into the family race car, but this was not the case. Price was reluctant at first, but her hesitancy didn’t last long. During the 2016 SCORE Baja 1000, the Price family racing team was interviewed for the film Dust 2 Glory, the follow-up to Dana Brown’s 2005 masterpiece Dust to Glory about the SCORE Baja 1000 off-road race. «After that, I kept bugging my dad (Kevin) about driving the off-road race car,» said Price. At 12 years old, she was co-driving in her sisters’ off-road race car at Glen Helen Raceway but had yet to take the wheel herself. To get Price some seat time, and gain car handling skills before she stepped into an off-road race car, Kevin decided to get her a dwarf dirt track car. Price was 14 years old when she began driving in local races, which she continues to do to this day, but also began enjoying success and accolades early on. During that time, Price continued co-driving with her sisters in a 1/2-1600 car. Her co-piloting and navigating skills grew. It wasn’t long before she was riding shotgun with her dad in the Class 10 car. The father-daughter team was successful and had a string of finishes that eventually put them in the Class 10 points chase during the 2018 SCORE World Desert Championship season. The Turning Point It was in that Class 10 car with her father that Price experienced what would likely turn many people away from the sport. “We were splitting the SCORE Baja 1000 with another driver and going to run the first 400 miles. We hit a big rock and bent the front end. We ‘babied’ the car and made it to our fuel stop, but there was a problem with the fuel tank,” said Price. “When they filled it up, some of the gasoline spilled on me. The chemical burns became so painful that after a while I could barely stand it. When my dad asked if I wanted to stop, I told him to keep going. I pushed the pain down because I wanted so badly for us to finish our section of the race. We got third in the Class 10 championship that year.” The incident only gave Price a greater desire to compete in off-road racing. It took time for the burns to heal, but soon she was competing in dirt-track oval events. By 2020, she was ready to try desert racing again and began participating in some SCORE Baja off-road races as well as some stateside off-road racing with success. That led Price to take on the 2021 SCORE World Desert Championship season. A Fourth Place Finish During the first race of the 2021 SCORE season Price got in the seat of a 1/2-1600 car. “I laid the car on its side at one point in the canyons, but we got it back on its wheels in about 10 minutes. After that, we were running at a good pace, in second place, when around mile 240 a rocker arm broke,” she said. “It took about three hours to fix, but we made it to the finish line in fourth place after almost 14 hours on the racecourse.” The future is bright for Jordan Price, and she made it clear there’s no slowing down anytime soon. “I plan on driving the rest of this year and going for the Class 1/2 1600 championship,” she said. Her plan for next year is even more ambitious. “We’re having a SCORE Trophy Truck Spec built by TSCO that should be ready for the 2022 season. I’ll co-drive for the first year, but the plan is for me to begin doing some driving in 2023. I have fallen in love with off-road racing and am determined to work hard and get the results I want. I want to do this for a living, I want to be a professional off-road racer.”SJ

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