Adrenaline junkies Nitrocross track action!

Article posted by Coliseum, November 6^th, 2023

Image: Nitrocross

Action sports star Travis Pastrana highlights the Nitrocross season finale race planned for this Spring (2024) in Las Vegas (US).

‘LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL’ stated that the race is scheduled to take place on March 1^st-2^nd, 2024 at a space located behind Paris Las Vegas and Planet Hollywood (both in Nevada). Nitrocross and Caesars entered into a multiyear agreement to host the race there.

Travis Alan Pastrana is an American professional motorsports competitor and stunt performer who has won championships and X Games gold medals in several disciplines, including supercross, motocross, freestyle motocross, rally racing, and offshore powerboat racing.

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The Nitrocross is a rallycross racing series in the United States. It was created in 2018 by the rallycross driver Travis Pastrana and the Nitro Circus production. The inaugural season began in 2021. The championship is sanctioned by the United States Auto Club.

The Nitro Circus is a global sports entertainment company that produces a variety of live events, docuseries, television programing, and digital content. The company was founded in 2003 by the action sports icon Travis Pastrana, Jeremy Rawle and Gregg Godfrey.

Indiana (US)-based the United States Auto Club is one of the sanctioning bodies of auto racing in the United States. From 1956 to 1979, the United States Auto Club sanctioned the United States National Championship and from 1956 to 1997 the organization sanctioned the Indianapolis 500 (an annual automobile race held at the 235,000-capacity Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana).

The Paris Las Vegas is a casino hotel on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada (US). It’s owned and operated by Caesars Entertainment.

The Planet Hollywood is a themed restaurant chain inspired by Hollywood. The chain was popular in the 1990s and was endorsed by Hollywood A-listers such as Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis. Planet Hollywood also has a casino hotel on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada (US).

Reno (US)-based the Caesars Entertainment is an American hotel and casino entertainment company that operates more than 50 properties. It is the largest casino-entertainment company in the United States and one of the world’s most diversified casino-entertainment providers.

‘LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL’ further stated that Nitrocross combines short-form racing and action sports on tracks that feature jumps and banked turns, to add an excitement level most race circuits can’t provide, according to Brett Clarke, Chief Revenue Officer of Thrill One Sports & Entertainment, the parent company of Nitrocross.

Costa Mesa (US)-based the Thrill One Sports & Entertainment is a next-generation content company that lives at the nexus of sports, entertainment and lifestyle. A multimedia platform, Thrill One is dedicated to creating mind-blowing action sports events and original content fueled by the most daring athletes, talent and brands in thrill-based entertainment.

Added Clarke, “It’s a really unique form of racing. It’s short-form racing. So every heat takes about five to six minutes. Every 15 minutes there’s a new race on the line. It’s a completely different experience to the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) or Formula One or anything else that most fans have seen.”

Daytona Beach (US)-based the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. It is considered to be one of the top ranked motorsports organizations in the world, and is one of the largest spectator sports in America.

London (UK)-based Formula One is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile. The FIA Formula One World Championship has been one of the premier forms of racing around the world since its inaugural season in 1950.

The event will have a festival-like feel, with Nitro Circus action sports demonstrations, activities for fans and live music throughout the weekend. Details about which musical acts and other details will be released at a later date.

The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) President Dana White and the Red Rock Resorts (a gaming, development and management company) Vice-Chairman Lorenzo Fertitta purchased Thrill One last year. They have since begun looking at adding events in Las Vegas where they’re based. Last year they held a Street League Skateboarding event at the UFC Apex (arena in Nevada).

Pastrana has a long history in Las Vegas, taking part in the first US Nitro Circus show held at the MGM Grand and successfully jumping the Caesars fountains in 2018.

Put in Pastrana, “Vegas is where you want to be as far as spectacle. You get a lot of crowd that comes out there from all over, not just the local audience… This is kind of a rebirth for Nitro in general, Nitro Circus and Nitrocross. So we’re really looking forward to making this a staple (event).”

Each event is part of a full standalone series featuring four racing classes, headlined by Group E, where the likes of Pastrana, Robin Larsson (Swedish motorsports racing driver), Tanner Foust (American motorsports racing driver) and Conor Daly (American motorsports racing driver) battle it out on the ground and in the air in the FC1-X electric race car. Those vehicles are custom-built by Nitrocross. They feature 1,000 horsepower and go from 0 to 60 mph in 1.4 seconds.

Added Pastrana, “For me it took me a few rounds, a few test sessions, before I could keep the wheels from spinning out. It was the first time I’ve been in a racing series where it wasn’t which team could make the more power, it’s completely up to the driver.”

Nitrocross is under the Thrill One Sports and Entertainment umbrella, which also includes Nitro Circus, Street League Skateboarding (an international skateboarding tournament series) and Superjacket Productions (all-media production company).

The other racing classes are the Next, which is a support class to Group E and is headlined by Lia Block, daughter of late rally driving legend Ken Block. The SXS (side-by-side) and the Baja Bug class round out the race classes.

With the multiyear agreement in place with Caesars Entertainment for the space, Nitrocross will build out and deconstruct their course and festival ground each year.

Said Clarke, “We’ll bring in dirt and bleachers and surfaces to build the track and bring in all the fan amenities and the fan elements. We’ll build that track and it will be a fully fledged racing circuit and event site. Within four or five days after the event we will return the parking lots as they currently are. … Unlike a Formula One (track) that takes months to build, we’ll be in-and-out in about 18 days.”

There will be different ticketing options for fans from general admission to VIP hospitality spaces, with tickets starting at around $30 each day.

To finally secure Las Vegas for the series’ season finale is a relief for all involved, including Pastrana, as he sees the City not just as the epicenter of racing, but professional sports in general.

Concluded Pastrana who founded the racing series in 2018, “For us it’s been a long time coming. We’ve really been trying to get Vegas as our final round… We wanted to show that we could take a full-scale Nitrocross track and put it in a City environment and still make it as spectacular, if not more spectacular than we can with dirt and hills.”

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