Team Nitto Tire Looks to Continue Its Dominance at 2021 King of the Hammers
After sweeping the podium in 2020, Team Nitto looks to repeat its success at Ultra4’s 2021 King of the Hammers off-road race.
The 2021 King of the Hammers off-road race kicks off this week, when we’ll see a bevy of drivers and their wicked machines take to the tough terrain of the Southern California desert and the Johnson Valley’s rocky trails in one epic showdown. But while the winners of Ultra4’s premier event tend to change frequently, Nitto’s Trail Grappler tire continues to be a staple among those who wind up on the podium each year.
That includes last year, when Team Nitto drivers Josh Blyler, Erik Miller, and Marcos Gomez swept the podium at the 2020 Nitto King of the Hammers race in a dominant effort. It was the second time Team Nitto pulled off such a feat, previously sweeping the podium back in 2017. Each of the trio was running Nitto’s Trail Grappler M/T tire as well, a mud-terrain radial that’s not just designed to dominate off-road trails, but also offer up plenty of on-road comfort.
Thus, it’s no surprise that Team Nitto will once again be running Trail Grapplers in the 2021 King of the Hammers race. In the rocky, Johnson Valley portion of the event, the tire’s aggressive leading edges have proven to provide consistent grip, while also ejecting debris from in between the treads quite easily. The Trail Grappler’s 3-ply radial-banded sidewall with additional sidewall lugs has also proven capable of standing up to a lot of punishment, even with lower air pressures.
That’s great for rock crawling, but when King of the Hammers participants are navigating muddy terrain, the Trail Grappler also proves capable there thanks to its mud evacuation components located in between the outer lugs of the tire. While primarily designed to deal with mud, this design also just so happens to be effective in the desert sand, too.
This week, over 300 teams will be competing for the ultimate bragging rights at the 2021 King of the Hammers race, and hundreds of thousands of people will be watching it all unfold online. And while each year brings about a series of changes in conditions and names atop the leaderboard, at least we know one thing will remain consistent – those winners will most likely be running Nitto tires on their rigs.
Photos: Nitto Tire
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