MONSTER JAM UNLEASHED
Canadian drivers rise up for the challenge of defeating January’s shivers, jitters,
Monster Jam season is on.
There’s something unnatural about speeding 3- 1⁄ high, 4,500-kilogram
2 plus pickup trucks performing acrobatic leaps, flips and car and bus crushing feats in an arena packed with cheering kids and adults. But it sure is fun. With 16 monster trucks competing next weekend (Jan. 16 and 17) in the dirt and stone stirring, high-flying freestyle stunt and obstacle course racing event, the Rogers Centre will be rocking, rolling and roaring.
And two of those thundering, motorized monsters will be driven by Canadian drivers, Calgary’s Cam McQueen and Scott Liddycoat, from Burlington, Ont.
Mounted on tires bigger than Smart cars, the drivers of these towering behemoths, bearing names such as Grave Digger, Dragon, Monster Mutt, Zombie, Iron Outlaw, Hurricane Force and Northern Nightmare, will be competing for points to become series champs when the best of them square off at the Monster Jam World Finals in Las Vegas in March.
Piloting Northern Nightmare, McQueen won the 2012 Monster Jam championship and was the first MJ driver to complete a backflip in a freestyle competition in front of 72,000 fans in Jacksonville, Fla., in 2010.
Riding dirt bikes since he was 5 and racing in motocross by the age of 11, McQueen built his first monster truck using an old1956 Willys pickup when he was in high school. He’s rebuilt, restored and raced everything from cars to snowmobiles and worked as a stunt driver before hitting the monster truck big league.
And while Liddycoat is a relative newcomer to the Monster Jam circuit, his fire-spewing rig, Dragon, has quickly become a fan favourite on both sides of the border.
He started competing in Monster Jam in 2013 after more than two decades of racing on water and racking up numerous championships and three world hydroplane speed records.
“I was the recovery driver at many of the Monster Jam events during the 2013 season and then got to compete in Monster Mutt (his first monster truck),” said Liddycoat explaining how he got into the Monster Jam series.
Where McQueen’s pre-show custom is to wear a pair of mismatched socks for good luck, Liddycoat doesn’t have a ritual before the event begins.
“I just try to stay relaxed and give the fans a good show,” he said.
Reaching speeds of160 km/h, these gargantuan trucks put out 1,500 to 2,000 horsepower enabling them to leap up to 11 metres in the air and 40 metres across more than a dozen cars parked side to side.
Once considered a freakish fourwheel side show that began in the 1970s at tractor pulls and other motorsport events in the U.S., Monster Jam became a major organized North American venture in 2000 and its popularity has spread around the globe with arena and stadium shows having attracted more than four million fans in nearly 40 countries.
International Monster Jam shows are held throughout the year in Europe, Australia, Mexico, Costa Rica and recently the Philippines. Monster Jam season starts with about100 shows in the North American tour, beginning in the winter, and leading up to the World finals in Las Vegas in late March.
The two Toronto shows feature a “Party in the Pits” in which fans of all ages can buy a special $10 pit pass to get up close to the monster trucks, meet the drivers, take pictures and get autographs prior to Saturday’s evening show and the afternoon event on Sunday.
Find admission prices and where to get tickets at monsterjamcanada.ca.