Justin: What's up guys?
Justin with americantrucks.com.
Just outside of Salt Lake City, Utah to take part in the Ford Performance Racing School
or Driving School.
More specifically the Raptor Assault.
Now, why am I here?
Well as you may or may not know, I recently traded in my 2015 Lariat for a 2017 Raptor.
The truck is completely bad ass.
But I wanna see what this thing is capable of, man.
So what better place than the deserts of Utah?
Now one very cool thing about Ford in general with the purchase of any of these specialty
vehicles, whether it be the Raptor, the GT350, the Focus RS, they actually include a free
day of driving school.
You just pay your way out here, and you get to take part in the class.
So very cool on Ford's behalf and I'm happy to be taking part in it here today.
Now guys, you're gonna wanna subscribe to see more great content from us here at americantrucks.com.
Including builds, product overviews and me thrashing on my new Raptor.
But for now guys, we have classroom session before we hit the trail so, let's get to it.
But that was a very informative class.
A lot of stuff I didn't know as a novice truck enthusiast.
I'll be the first to admit, tire pressure, driving position, thumb position, weight transfer.
A lot of stuff that goes into off road driving situations that a lot of people including
myself don't typically think about.
So looking forward to putting some of the stuff we learned into the terrain that we're
about to encounter.
So we're about to take a walk around the Raptor learn about some of the driving modes, and
then go have some fun.
Guys, we're here with John, driving instructor at the Ford performance driving school.
And probably the creator of the Raptor assault program.
So talk about how you kinda got Ford performance behind the Raptor program.
John: I always wanted a Raptor, and it was kinda one of those things I was like, "What
am I gonna do with it?
How am I gonna use it?"
You know, for desert up here in Utah.
And I thought, "We are the Ford racing school.
And there's an awful lot of things, you know, technology in the Raptor that people don't
know how to use."
And thought, "What can I put together that would showcase all the awesome stuff that
the engineers at Ford put in that Raptor?
And how do I teach people how to use it?
How do I get them right up to the breaking point, let them understand what it feels like
getting there but not go beyond it?"
Justin: I can't thank you guys enough for getting Raptor owners like myself, out of
traffic and off-road and actually see what these things are capable of.
And honestly I cannot wait.
So John thanks so much again...
John: It is going to be a great day, looking forward to it.
Justin: Can't wait.
Thanks, brother.
All right.
Classroom session is over.
We had a quick little walk through the truck.
Now our steeds await us.
So we are gonna go gear up, have some fun.
Let's do it.
[00:02:50] [Silence]
[00:03:00]
Justin: So we're approaching our first obstacle the day here.
It's a side hill kind of obstacle.
Practice our left foot braking, and just get us comfortable with the truck at a pretty
steep angle.
This is looks pretty fun.
It's a good way to kick things off.
Unfortunately, back east where we're located we don't have this kinda terrain to deal with.
So this is a real treat for me today.
John, the instructor at one point said, "There is a time where the truck would be at 31 degrees
when you can almost touch the ground."
That's how much of an angle here on these things.
We really start puckering and see if we can get this thing to 30 again.
John: [inaudible 00:03:38]
Justin: Okay.
John: Looking really good.
Justin: 30 degrees right there.
John: Keep going and stop.
And the important thing for you to remember is anytime you're driving off road once you
get to about 25 degrees of side-hill angle, you may hit a four-inch tall rock with your
back tire and you're on your lid.
Justin: Gotcha.
And the last thing you wanna do probably here John, is just cut the wheel right.
Right?
John: Yeah.
Why we do this is to showcase, the tires, the suspension, the track width, how balanced
the truck is.
And...just you know, will make you more appreciative of what Ford gave you.
Justin: Oh I appreciate it.
A little bit more right now already and it's only just getting started.
Holy shit.
This gnarly dude.
I thought for sure we were gonna flip over back there.
So on our second obstacle here, our first hill climb of the day.
This just to show the truck's articulation, getting up a pretty steep hill.
And then from there we're gonna do our hill descent mode.
And just the truck will do all the work for you.
[00:04:34] [Silence]
[00:04:44]
John: Oh yeah.
Lock her off.
Justin: Lock her off.
John: Hill descent control on.
And you caught that.
So hill descent control works between 2 and 20 miles an hour.
When we use it today, we'll always be using it to drop into a descent.
Justin: All right.
Here we go.
[crosstalk] Drop in, foot off the brakes.
Yeah.
My feet are completely off the pedals right now.
And the truck is doing all the work with the hill descent feature.
And the first time you use this, it's a little sketchy.
Because it kinda goes against everything you always thought you should not do.
But here we go, so we're good now, and we're off.
[00:05:33] [Silence]
[00:05:43]
Justin: For this point guys, it's high-speed handling trails.
So basically this will give us a better idea what this thing can do.
Loose gravel, sand, things like that.
So let's hammer on it.
And we're gonna come out to a panic stop break right about here.
So there we go, we're hard on the brakes.
And obviously we slid through a little bit.
But to be expected on some loose gravel.
So we just did normal mode.
Now we're gonna do a different mode and see the differences between the two.
I got to roll.
All right mud and sand mode, we're getting to our first cone here.
And we're stomping on it.
So noticeable difference in power coming off that first cone.
Eyes up, hammer on to a little bit, get the truck sideways counter-steer.
The trucks getting out a little bit.
And we got our panic stop mode.
Here we go.
Oh yeah.
Noticeable increase in stopping over the "normal mode," . Do one more mode and then kick it
back to normal just to see the differences.
And man this is fun.
Not a bad day at work.
All right.
The Baja mode.
Thee one I've been waiting for.
Let's hit it.
This thing is like shot out of a cannon here.
So we're are gonna rotate the truck a little bit.
Oh yeah.
And we're rotating.
Stabbing the brakes with their left foot and panic stop.
Here we go hard on the brakes.
The Baja mode is awesome.
So we're just leaving the Ford performance campus.
And now we're actually heading out to the trails, the mountains, and essentially all
the fun stuff in Tooele, Utah, is how they pronounce it.
Just as good as this thing is off-road so far we've noticed equally as good as on road,
right?
Because even as one of the instructors said, you can go out, you know, run Baja in this
thing show up to a red carpet event in your tux.
It really can do it all.
It's a great daily driver as I can attest to.
But once you wanna take this thing out and off road and stretch your legs a little bit,
it's certainly up for the task.
So we're heading to the fun stuff now, and can't wait to show you guys that.
My buddy here Blake saying he's glad he took his Dramamine, because it is not necessarily
a smooth ride.
But as one would expect that's kinda what you're in for.
But we're getting to some cooler stuff.
We're actually leading up to some of our bigger trails.
Bigger rock climbers from what I understand.
So and as the guys from Ford performance keep telling us, "The day's only gonna get cooler."
It's like a little roller coaster.
You guys put your hands up?
You really have to keep your eyes forward.
That's one of the big lessons the guys in the classroom kept telling you.
Not only is it just dusty as all hell from the truck in front of me, but there's jagged
rocks kinda jutting out from the side of the trail.
It's definitely not a leisurely laid back trail to say the least.
It's certainly a lot of work to making sure you don't hit anything you shouldn't.
Through the [inaudible 00:08:36].
Just making sure you get the full experience out here.
That's all.
We're climbing elevations here in Utah.
We're starting at around 4000 feet above sea level at the Ford performance camp.
On our way up to about 7,100 feet above sea level.
Which brings us to our rock crawling mode.
Now to get up the mountain, you got to crawl.
Right?
So that's what we're doing.
We had a little bit of a hint of the Baja mode through some of the faster trails.
But obviously, as you can see now we're slowing things down.
We're in rock crawl mode.
So we're low or slow for low.
And I will say, man, I am completely blown away as someone who has admittedly for all
the wrong reasons kept mind on-road most of the time so far to see what this thing can
really do off-road, it's pretty damn impressive.
So how those those BGF KO2 really digging in.
There we go.
Looks like we're about to take off.
So the instructor Brendan just kind of reiterated the importance of left foot braking especially
in this kind of situation.
As fun as it would be to just bomb up this hill, that's not proper technique according
to these guys.
So we're dragging our left foot on the brake right now ever so slightly.
Like hardly zero pressure on it.
And we're just kinda crawling up and it's definitely a skill that takes a little get
used to it first.
Because you're just not used to, especially as a guy who has a manual my whole life.I'm
used to just down in that left foot to the floor and shifting gears.
This when you have to be a little bit more delicate.
It's been pretty cool so far.
We're definitely learning a little bit more about some of the finer techniques about off
roading these Raptors.
We've come up to our first kinda like real obstacle of the day.
It's about to get a little crazy.
So we're gonna see how this thing really does climb in these hills.
All right.
Guys so we've given the truck in front of us a good five six lengths.
We're using our left foot break in here.
We're gonna hug this left side because we got a nice big ledge right in the middle of
this trail.
Kinda climb up the front now with our front right..
taking it slow.
There we go, getting the back end up.
A lot of loose boulders on the left.
Again just applying pressure to the brake and gas at the same time.
As the guys from Ford performance taught us, this is some crazy terrain here, gang.
The truck is just literally not even breaking a sweat.
I mean, I don't for a minute feel like this thing is ever in danger of losing traction
or getting stuck.
It's pretty impressive.
All with the AC and our seat coolers on.
Off-roading in luxury.
That last climb without a doubt was the craziest kind of obstacle we encountered here today
so far.
But what goes up must come down.
And we've got to descend down this monster right here.
So needless to say I'll be giving that hill descent button a thorough workout.
[00:11:45] [Silence]
[00:11:59]
Justin: Well the caravan made it down in one piece.
So as you can see, that's where we came from.
Now we're on the flat ground, the trucks are about to take off.
Our final exercise of the day, Baja mode.
This is the one I've been looking forward to.
[00:12:12] [Silence]
[00:12:22]
Justin: So we're at 40 right now.
Definitely going to use my left foot braking technique here.
42, we're up to 50.
This...does not feel right.
I'm speechless right now guys.
This is incredible.
[inaudible 00:12:37] Got a little out for me on that one.
Stay to the right, watch the rock.
It's great when you can see these big ass holes.
That was awesome.
So there we go, Baja mode in the books.
That was amazing.
I mean we were only going about 50-55 ish, but it felt like we were going at least double
that because of the terrain.
Because you're trying to digest everything that's coming at you a lot quicker.
You're trying to look out for every single obstacle that might ruin your day, without
a doubt the most exciting thing of the day is the Baja mode.
The truck just handles it so well.
All right.
Guys, we're getting ready to head back the other way now.
My adrenaline's still pumping from the first one.
All right.
Line up through here.
All right.
Left foot break.
Dodge the big rock.
Oh yeah.
Here we go there's 50.
Oh my goodness.
Oh my god.
Holy smokes.
That is a white knuckle ride.
Well, guys check it out.
I got a very cool trophy complete with my own BFG KO2.
That means we pass.
We didn't flip any trucks over.
We had an absolute blast on the Ford performance Raptor assault today.
Thanks to the guys, the instructors, we couldn't have done without them.
John, Brandon, of course, Todd.
It was a lot of fun and hats off to these trucks, man.
The guys at Ford knew what they were doing when they were building the new Raptor.
This thing is absolutely incredible both on and of course, off-road.
So we had a great time today here in Utah we hope you enjoyed it.
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