KING OF THE HAMMERS

Once a year, 100,000+ people from all over the world flock to a lakebed in the Southern California desert for an event that has changed industry, racing, and offroad culture.

- WORDS AND PHOTOS BY EVAN WALSH

Often a culture will dictate and control it's events, but in the case of The King of The Hammers, a single event has created a culture of its own and influenced the industry around it.

Back in 2007 Dave Cole had a dream and with the help of Jeff Knoll, they invited roughly 50 of their rock crawling competitor friends out to Johnson Valley California for a “race”. 12 guys showed up and 18 years later, we have one of the largest offroad events and races in the world with classes of offroad vehicles specifically designed and built to tackle the tough terrain and rock sections of this now notorious racecourse.

I personally have been attending King of The Hammers the past 7 years and have been absolutely stoked to see how it has grown and created its own culture within the offroad market.