Desert Stormers

I decided to head off deep into the sandy stuff, to the Liwa Festival, a few hundred klicks south of Abu Dhabi. Now, any UAE guidebook will tell you that danger lurks in the desert - take plenty of water with you, don’t stay out in the sun for too long, don't finger any scorpion-type thingies, yadda yadda. Well I’ve read a few of these so-called guidebooks, and absolutely nowhere was there any mention of these bonkers monster trucks that go around tearing up the side of sand dunes the size of mountains!

Some of them boosted to hell and back by the biggest turbos known to man, some of them packing nitrous-guzzling, 14-litre (!) V8 engines – some of them making over 3000bhp! I mean come on, if this isn’t danger in the desert, I don’t know what is? I know for a fact that I’d rather have a randy camel come after me than one of these super-psycho desert-draggers. Well I just about managed to get all you RubberDuck fans some truly killer video and pics of these mega-monsters in action, before I had to run off home and change my undies.

In the picture above you can see a few of them lined-up in the pits, huge turbos sprouting out of what would’ve been the bonnets, and what’s left of the early 80’s Nissan Patrol chrome front ends. Nearly all the racers use the old skool (and too cool) Patrols; it’s all about tradition with these boys, and it was with these ol' Nissans that the mental desert fun really started all those years ago. The big, straight-6 original Patrol engine was strong and tuneable, lapped up a bit of big-turbo-tuning, and it just kinda snowballed (fireballed?!) from there. The beasties pictured with the huge blowers on top of the blocks are from the ‘V8’ class, which is basically unlimited; all that must remain from the stock Patrol is the chassis and firewall – other than that you can go as crazy as cash will allow. That means full fibreglass bodywork, top fuel V8 engines and a seat to sit in. Job done.

Then the drivers rip and snort their way to the top of a 300-metre sand dune, with a climb angle of over 50-degrees. It’s hard enough to walk up the legendary Moreeb Dune (it means ‘scary mountain’), let alone pilot a 3000bhp rocket up the face of it. But hey, I guess that’s the fun.

I was right on the start line. This car, in the video below, makes a good start, but then halfway up there’s a fairly big explosion. Not to be put off, he rolls back down the dune and canes his still smouldering engine. The deafening thunder-crack and shooting flames nearly gave me a heart attack. Put that in your guidebook! Check out more at www.rubberduckmag.com