Tire-smoking Ford-Red Bull Showrun roars into Dearborn
· Yahoo Sports
The Red Bull Showrun circus is bringing Ford Racing’s biggest thrills to Dearborn streets.
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Headlined by a 1,000-horsepower Oracle Red Bull Racing RB21 Formula One car and Dakar Rally-ready Raptor T1+, the Red Bull Showrun Presented by Ford Racing showcases Ford’s global motorsports to local communities. The event is free to attend and offers epic demonstrations by pro drivers of high-speed driving, drifting, and tire-shredding burnouts.
The event takes place Saturday from 1p.m.- 4 p.m. at the Parklane Towers, 3 Parklane Blvd., on a custom-built street course. Organizers recommend arriving early to reserve a spot. Originally scheduled for Saturday, July 20, Showrun was postponed due to air quality concerns.
It’s the third stop of four on a U.S. tour that kicked off with a wild, airborne demonstration on San Francisco’s hills last winter. On February 21st at the intersection of Broadway and Divisadero, American off-road racer Mitch Guthrie Jr. raced up Broadway’s 11-degree incline and launched the Raptor T1 at 45 mph off a 5-degree ramp — soaring over the Red Bull F1 car that was performing smokey donuts on Divisadero.
Don’t expect similar jumps on the flat Dearborn terrain off Hubbard Road north of Ford headquarters. But Guthrie says it will still be wild.
“I saw the map. It looks really cool,” the motorsports veteran said as the venue was being prepped Friday. “The cool thing about the Showruns is we're on public streets and each one is different. (This one) looks really cool, especially down by the hospitality areas. We have two different donut areas right next to each other. Should be really cool for the fans.”
While the F1 car can be seen at the U.S. Grand Prix, including in Miami, Austin, and Las Vegas, Showrun is an opportunity to see the off-road T1+, which carries the Raptor flag internationally in the World Rally Championship’s biggest race, the Dakar Rally in Saudi Arabia.
The ferocious, dirt-chewing T1+ racer will compete on U.S. soil for the first time August 15-19 at the 500-mile Vegas-to-Reno Rally with American drivers Guthrie and Kellon Walch at the wheel.
Guthre will be driving the T1+ in Dearborn Saturday, too.
“I'm excited to be here, especially in the T1+, where Ford was born,” said Guthrie. “It'll be cool for the fans and also all the Ford employees and people coming out. It’s an iconic area to do it in.”
Guthrie finished 10th this year at Dakar — the Indy 500 of off-road racing — as part of a Ford Racing-backed, four-car T1+ onslaught that also netted second, third, and fifth place finishes. He welcomed the Showrun tour as an opportunity to showcase a race car that is making Ford’s off-road performance Raptor badge an international name.
“In San Francisco it was just insane the amount of people and support (we got),” he said. “It’s free for everyone to come, so they're able to see all these vehicles. I race internationally — in the middle of the desert in Saudi Arabia. Now people have a chance to see the T1.
“It's the same thing with F1 and all the other vehicles. You can see them on a track, of course, but you have to travel to find that. (With Showrun) you're able to see all these vehicles in one place, which is unheard of. What I love about Showrun is — away from the high stress of racing — we're able to just have fun, enjoy the fans, and have a good time driving these vehicles.”
A broad lineup of Ford Racing vehicles that compete at every corner of the globe will be on hand, including ex-F1 driver Patrick Friesacher in the Oracle Red Bull Racing and Visa Cash App Red Bull Racing F1 cars and Raptor T1+ ace Guthrie, who competes in the World Rally Championship and Dakar Rally.
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Other beasts include a Ford F-150 Lightning Supertruck piloted by Mustang GT4 racer Marco Signoretti, Myers Riley Motorsports IMSA racer Jenson Altzman in a Mustang GT3, and Red Bull motorcycle stunt driver Aaron Colton. Ahead of the events, some fans will have access to the vehicles with paddock tours starting at 11 a.m.
Red Bull Showrun was conceived as a way to bring the sights, sounds, and speed of global Formula 1 series to fans who may not have access to the series’ 24 races in venues like Miami, Monaco, and Mexico City.
But off-road fans will also get a chance to see Guthrie and his team race the T1s in Las Vegas next month for the first time in the U.S.
The famed race, which will race in reverse from Reno to Vegas this year for the first time in its 30-year history, is sanctioned by the UNLTD series and joins, for the first time, the internationally licensed, Ultimate-class Dakar Rally Ford T1s with the Trophy Trucks that race in North America’s Baja 1000.
Guthrie hails as the defending Vegas-to-Reno champion in the UTV Pro class, piloting a Polaris RZR, and is excited to bring the Ultimate class to the States.
“It’s a first-of-its-kind thing,” said Guthrie. “We’ll be basically in our Dakar spec. We're going to go out there and see how we stack up against the (Ultimate) trucks. I think it’s going to be the start of something big for the United States, where we finally have an international truck coming to race here, especially a Ford. It’s the beginning of a journey merging the international and USA racing and seeing where it goes."
The second Showrun stop took place March 14 in Phoenix with the final event schedule for Atlanta August 1st.
Ford Racing has ramped up its motorsports program to touch every major series in the world: F1, NASCAR, IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship. World Rally Championship. It has partnered with Oracle Red Bull Racing’s hybrid power units in F1 while racing its own V8 engines in everything from Raptor T1s to Mustangs in multiple GT series. For 2027 it will enter Le Mans with a V8-powered Hypercar.
Henry Payne is auto critic for The Detroit News. Find him at [email protected] or Twitter @HenryEPayne
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Tire-smoking Ford-Red Bull Showrun roars into Dearborn