The next day at the track we get our duties over with a lot quicker than we’d like, then go for a walk to see the sights. As you can imagine with the size of an Indy Car event, there are loads and loads of different trucks and vehicles. Race teams the world over use high spec, top quality trucks and Indy Car is of course no different, some may even say these are better than the rest! Big trucks, big paint jobs but still a few oddments. Just when you think you have seen an amazing cross section of US trucks, you come across a Ford Cargo!
The day cabbed Ford Cargo may be a rarity but not unique. What I am sure is unique in North America is a fully liveried in Liverpool Football Club colors, Volvo VN. Soccerball is not my sport, but some of your are football crazy, so if you move to the United States and want to personalize your truck…….well, paint it red and add some famous Scouse names and phrases and Robert is your mothers brother!
So the next day it’s onto the racetrack to repeat the whole process again in St Louis. We did manage to get one afternoon off though where we went to visit the Gateway to the west a 630ft arch that you catch a carriage to the top of and can get a view of the city.
Eventually once the torture is over, the race is cancelled 30 laps before the finish due to the weather, so it is time to pack away ready to head off for the next race. The next drive is 877 miles which is do-able on a double drive but not necessary so we are stopping in Indiana where most of the other teams are based. We are taken out for the night by Geoff, a former truckie for Carlin Motorsport who now works at a different team based in Indiana. Geoff takes us to a place called the 1911 grill which is a really cool sports bar and includes a ski ball alley, a shuffle board table and a go kart track… yes that’s right a go kart track!! Believe it or not, the best meal of the whole trip, a steak to die for!
The next morning (05/09/19) we set off at 0800hrs to finish the last bit of the drive to the track. We spend the next few days setting up and working at the track which if I’m honest wasn’t very interesting. The time management at the team isn’t very good, so there’s a lot of time standing around with nothing to do and by a lot I mean around 9 hours a day, so there’s plenty of time to wander about and see what else is going on between duties.
We set off on September 4th and it’s 1240 miles from the workshop. We are double manning in two Freightliner Cascadia’s. I drive a Mercedes-Benz Actros at home so there are some familiar sights and sounds right away as Mercedes have some steak in Freightliner (Both owned by Daimler – TB) as the gearbox is the same, albeit hooked up better than it is in the Merc and the steering wheel and a lot of the buttons and dashboard are the same. Our first destination is Kenly 95 a truck stop in North Carolina. Some of you will know the truck stop shop in Lymm and some of you will know the one in Brescia est (Italy)… well if those two had a baby then put it on steroids you’d get this place! There’s so much in there it’s hard to know what to look for in there. It’s so big it has a Peterbilt truck on a turntable in the window and a Kenworth with a trailer on the shop floor. The highlight was the aisle of stack exhausts that from the other side of the room looked like a church organ!
Hey Ben. Here is another instalment. Having started the trip in Cuba where there was a fuel crisis due to dealings with Venezuela, there wasn’t much traffic on the roads. As we all know or should know, the United States of America have put a lot of sanctions on Cuba, leaving the people with very little and their government doesn’t help. I came across this Liaz while walking the streets of Havana. Notice how clean it is and the tanks are immaculate. No mean feat when you live in a country that still uses ration books for food. Clearly the driver has a lot of pride in what he does. I have also attached for you one of the local buses in Santiago de Cuba and for the old car enthusiast who read your blog a very iconic photo of Havana.
On the 3rd of September we go to the workshop to meet our new rides and load them ready for the first race in Pocono. Two amazing Freightliner Cascadia’s will be our steeds for the trip. We get everything ready and of course help get all the equipment loaded up.
I’ve been saving these blogs for a while but they make for great reading! Increasingly regular blog contributor Luke Power-Hippisley, the big boss down at Tudor Services in Bristol, did the road trip of a life time at the back end of the summer. This trip would be a bucket list trip for most of us in a car or camper van, but to do it in a brand new Freightliner pulling a race trailer across the USA…….well some people get all the luck……or do we make our own?! The rest of these blogs will be in Luke’s own words.
6 weeks ago I was sitting in Altafulla (Spain) thinking about who to call to drum up a bit of work for September and before I could get started ringing around the call came to me. To see if I was available to go to America to work as a truckie on the Indy Car Series for the British team Carlin Motorsport and take the truck from track to track and help setting up and packing down. They also asked if I could bring a second driver so I called on of my best friends Matthew Campbell and asked if he was up for it and as you can imagine we ripped their arm off!
We flew to Orlando on September the 2nd and were told upon arrival one of our new colleagues would be picking us up from the airport in a blue pick up truck. What I didn’t expect was the beast in the picture with a total length of 40ft!
We will be flying to Orlando then making our way to Boca Ranton to the workshop, then we will be driving for the next three races. First Pocono, Pennsylvania next St Louis, Missouri then lastly Portland, Oregon before flying home.
I always love to hear from my bloggers, especially when you’re on your holibobs and thinking of me! A good pal is currently out and about in South America. As we all do, and you all know it, we all take at least one photo of a truck on our holiday travels, in this blog we are in Peru and Chile. Knowing this particular blogger we should see another couple of countries and what camion’s they have to offer;
“Hey Ben how are you doing. As you may of noticed on my Instagram: katterjokk. I’m traveling around South America at the moment. Volvo is truely king over here and there are loads of F10’s and F12’s and V1’s as well. We started in Cuba and have so far worked our way down to Chile. Here is a selection of trucks from Peru and Chile as we are in a port town at the moment. There’s loads of ex European trucks here and plenty of Scandinavians too. Enjoy the selection.“
Off on holiday yourself? Feel free to email me your findings: ben@truckblog.co.uk
I do have another holiday blog to publish from a certain Simon Wilson, but I’ve waiting til now-ish to publish it, as a bit of a winter warmer!
WHHHoOOOOOoo-HHHooooOOooo!!! I am some what pleased about this announcement yesterday evening, but then i am somewhat bias towards the three pointed star. Having spent much time with the New Actros and driving them here and on the continent, they just get better and better and do make driving easy, relaxing and almost pleasurable! As it stands there isn’t a truck close to the Actros with all the new technology that i have no doubt will creep into all 7 manufacturers in the next few years. The massive talking point that is MirrorCam will be totally accepted by the time the seventh manufacturer launches their own version. Anyway, well done Mercedes-Benz Trucks, a very worthy winner. Here is the official press release from MBUK;
Specialist commercial vehicle journalists from 24 European countries voted last night (20 November) for the Mercedes-Benz Actros to be crowned Truck of the Year for the fifth time.
The truck’s success story began back in 1997 when the first Actros was released, and the subsequent vehicle generation also brought home the award. With a total of nine victories, Mercedes-Benz is now the most successful brand in the fight for the Truck of the Year accolade.
The International Truck of the Year (ITotY) jury based their decision on the fifth-generation model’s host of innovative technological developments. Professor Dr. Uwe Baake, Head of Development at Mercedes-Benz Trucks, received the award at the Solutrans international commercial vehicle show for road and urban transport in Lyon.
The industry’s most coveted annual accolade is presented to the truck which makes the biggest contribution towards road transport innovations that are advantageous to the economy, emissions, safety, driveability and comfort of vehicles.
Most of the innovations incorporated within the new Mercedes-Benz Actros range were developed with the precise aim of delivering palpable improvements for drivers, operators, and society as a whole. The Actros offers major advances in safety, efficiency and comfort. Its multitude of new features includes the Multimedia Cockpit, MirrorCam instead of external mirrors, and partially automated driving with Active Drive Assist, as well as ground-breaking safety systems such as Active Brake Assist 5, and the improved Sideguard Assist.
The International Truck of the Year journalists had plenty of praise for the extended functionality of the forward-looking Predictive Powertrain Control (PPC) cruise control system, which can now be used on winding arterial routes. Also commended was the digital Multimedia Cockpit, which replaces the conventional instrument cluster.
The President of the international jury, Gianenrico Griffini, commented: “With the introduction of the new Actros, Mercedes-Benz has brought onto our roads a highly modern truck which smooths the path to achieving automated driving in the future.”
Speaking at the awards ceremony in Lyon, Professor Dr. Uwe Baake said: “We are very pleased and proud that the Truck of the Year jury has recognised our efforts of the past months and years with this distinction.
“Thank you on behalf of the company and the entire team. This will really spur us on to continue giving our all and fulfilling the highest developmental standards for our trucks, especially when it comes to the future-oriented topics of electromobility, automated driving and digitalisation within our sector.”
Mercedes-Benz Trucks UK Managing Director Mike Belk added: “As the International Truck of the Year judges clearly recognised, new Actros is a genuine game-changer. With cutting-edge technology such as MirrorCam, Active Brake Assist 5 and the latest version of Predictive Powertrain Control, this remarkable vehicle offers major advances in terms of safety and operational efficiency.
“Meanwhile, not only does the Multimedia Cockpit provide drivers with completely new control options and a much improved, more comfortable working environment, but it also offers greatly enhanced fleet visibility and connectivity for managers.”
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