Amber Slawson looked like she was going to be the first woman to overall at King of the Hammers when she was the first car to reach the Every Man Challenge’s physical finish. However, it would have been premature to immediately start printing the “Queen of the Hammers” and “Every Woman Challenge” merch.

Slawson missed three checkpoints at the Wrecking Ball, Outer Limits, and Spooners, resulting in roughly 45 minutes of penalties that relegated her from top of the leaderboard to second. Cody Young inherited first place for the class and overall.

“Just had to keep pushing forward,” commented Young. He finished sixth in the 2024 EMC. “There’s a lot of tough spots, got in a couple bottlenecks, but we got through without winching and kept pushing forward. We ended up coming in physical second, but first on corrected time. It’s awesome.”

A runner-up still earns Slawson some hardware, with her adjusted time beating Cameron Steele by six seconds and clearing Jeremy Jones by seven minutes.

“I feel like this car’s way faster than my Samurai, just a little bit. This is an amazing feeling,” Slawson noted. Her Bomber Fabrication-built machine had won last year with Randy Slawson.

“We had our share of issues. We got super stuck in Highway 20. Had to winch in Spooners once. We almost crashed three times in Lap 1. We went end over end at one point and we thought we were going to land on our side and it went back onto its wheels and we kept driving.”

Brad Lovell set the fastest time of all competitors in his Ford Bronco. His class, the production-based 4600, was a scramble between the Blue Ovals as he faced off against fellow Ultra4 factory drivers Bailey Cole and Loren Healy. Cole and Lovell traded the lead for what the former said “felt like 150 miles” before he “made a couple little mistakes here and there.”

As he passed Cole, Lovell briefly did a wheelie wherein he admitted “we got lucky.” Still, he kept the car clean from there and pulled away to win. Cole settled for second while John Williams followed to complete a Bronco podium sweep.

“That was such an intense race,” started Lovell. “We took off with Bailey, he got in front of us, we got him, Vaughn got us, we got him back, and then Bailey got us, and then finally we got by Bailey with a little bit of drama down there near Chocolate Thunder. Didn’t look back from there.

“[…] Last year we had a bit of a tough run. This year was some redemption.”

Healy was knocked out of contention by a left rear axle shaft failure. Vaughn Gittin Jr. began the race in the #2567 Bronco and enjoyed a “super clean desert run” with “no drama,” running second behind Lovell when he traded off with Healy. The team then worked to replace the axle, costing them half an hour.

The car eventually got stuck in Chocolate Thunder with the broken axle. Unlikely to drive through the rocks in three-wheel drive, Healy had to wait for a replacement to bring a replacement. The #2567 ultimately retired and was classified seventh in 4600. The DNF adds to a difficult King of the Hammers for Healy, who crashed out of the UTV Hammers‘ Youth 1000 race with his son earlier in the week.

“What a crazy friggin’ race,” Gittin remarked.

The Class 4800 Jeep of Shaun Rajski, the fastest overall qualifier for the EMC, was among the retirements. Lovell and Dan Wyrick’s 4500 Modified were quickest among their categories before winning from the pole.

Brandon Johnson finished 26th overall as the sole military vehicle in the race. As he does in UNLTD competition, he drove an SRTV-XL: a BC Customs-developed, Ultra4-based variation of the HDT Storm Search & Rescue Tactical Vehicle that is used for special operations and rescue missions.

Class winners

Class	Overall Finish	Number	Driver	Laps	Total Time
4500 Modified	16	218	Dan Wyrick	2	8:55:26.067
4600 Stock	1	4621	Brad Lovell	2	5:39:02.079
4800 Legends	2	4862	Cody Young	2	5:53:25.348
Military	26	M969	Brandon Johnson	2	9:48:5.004

Featured image credit: Youngblood Motorsports