The Factory racing turned the driving over to Laurie Chamlee for the 4th Annual Powder Puff: Race for the Cure on October 10, 2009. This has become a very popular event among the wives and friends of off-road racers to help raise money for Cedars Sinai Research Center for a cure for breast cancer. The totals are still being tallied but it looks like it will be around $80,000 that was raised from this event. Only women were allowed to compete. There were about 190 teams competing in 25 different classes.
Friday the team headed to Barstow to get in some practice time and have technical inspection. Dan drove Laurie around the 27-mile course to make sure the truck was running properly and to get her familiar with the course. Laurie commented “I almost backed out with Dan driving, I wasn’t sure I could do it.” When Laurie took the wheel she was more comfortable being in control and going the pace she was comfortable with gradually bringing it to race speed.
Saturday morning was spent checking the truck and getting ready for the 12:00 start time. Chamlee was given 3 hours to see how many laps she could complete. The first lap was very frustrating. They had started the girls 16 seconds apart and the factory racing was quite a ways back in the pack so the dust was thick it was really hard to see to pass. “I spent the first lap trying to pass people to get clear of the dust, as you would get close to them it was denser and harder to see. I had passed about 20 people and was leading my class when I came out of some dust and didn’t see a large rock in the road, as soon as I hit it I was afraid I was going to have a flat tire”. Sure enough the team had a flat. Though quite capable of changing the tire themselves they were grateful to a group of men along side the course waiting to help any team possible, who quickly changed the tire and had them on their way, allowing the girls to wait in there safety harnesses. Sadly about 6 people passed the team while the tire was being changed. She spent the rest of the lap passing those girls again. The third and fourth laps were much clearer and easier to pick the speed.
Laurie was really impressed with the new truck and how well it handled compared to the last truck and glad she didn’t blemish it’s winning streak extending it to four wins in a row. The Factory Racing has won 5 of the 6 races for the 2009 season.
Laurie completed 4 laps in 3:08:05 with an average speed of 35.7 mph. Laurie drove the whole race with Amy Tate her co-driver for the first 3 laps and Valerie Chamlee took over the co-driver spot for the last lap.