UTV Pioneer Jon Crowley Jr in Episode 290

Big Rich sits down with UTV media pioneer and racer Jon Crowley Jr. to trace his unlikely path from water-ski kid and UCSB computer science grad to one of the most influential voices in the UTV world. Jon shares how a first ride at Sand Mountain hooked him on off-roading, the evolution from ATVs to sand cars to early Yamaha Rhinos and Polaris RZRs, and building DuneGuide and UTVGuide into trusted resources just as social media transformed the industry.

Jon’s career blends tech, storytelling, racing, and exploration—proof that passion and persistence can turn weekend rides into a lifelong off-road lifestyle. 

Transcript

[00:00:05.100] - 

Welcome to Conversations with Big Rich. This is an interview-style podcast. Those interviewed are all involved in the off-road industry. Being involved, like all of my guests are, is a lifestyle, not just a job. I talk to past, present, and future legends, as well as business owners, employees, media, and land use warriors, men and women who have found their way into this exciting and addictive lifestyle we call off-road. We discuss their personal history, struggles, successes, and reboots. We dive into what drives them to stay active and off-road. We all hope to shed some light on how to find a path into this world that we live and love and call off-road.

[00:00:46.460] - 

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[00:01:12.840] - Big Rich Klein

My next guest on Conversations with Big Rich, grew up as a water skier, became a computer science student, then working as a software writer, and moved on to technical sales. Then stand-up jet skis became his groove. He tripped a sand mountain in Nevada, turned John Crowley into an off-roader. The rest is history.

[00:01:37.060] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Are you there?

[00:01:38.140] - Big Rich Klein

Yep. Hello, John Crowley. How are we doing?

[00:01:40.960] - Jon Crowley Jr.

All right. How are you?

[00:01:42.020] - Big Rich Klein

Excellent. Let's go ahead and get started. If you're ready.

[00:01:46.280] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, sure.

[00:01:47.340] - Big Rich Klein

All right. Let's start with the first question I ask everybody, and where were you born and raised?

[00:01:53.600] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Born and raised? I was born Travis Air Force Base in California. Okay. Raised in San Diego through high school, and then my parents moved to Northern California after that, and that's where I spent most of my time. Now, I split my time between Hurricane, Utah, and Shingle Springs, California.

[00:02:15.220] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. Still got property out here in California then, huh?

[00:02:19.380] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yes, sir.

[00:02:20.380] - Big Rich Klein

So let's talk about the Travis Air Force base thing. Were you a military brat?

[00:02:27.940] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Well, so my dad was in Air Force, flew B-52s, got out of the Air Force right before the Vietnam War, kicked in the high speed, and moved on to becoming a commercial pilot and was based in San Diego with PSA.

[00:02:50.280] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. And so... No, go ahead.

[00:02:53.960] - Jon Crowley Jr.

No, so that's where I went to school and everything, moved there when we were two years old. So that's all I remember.

[00:03:00.100] - Big Rich Klein

That was going to be my next question is, when did you leave and head south? So two years old. Yeah, that's before most of our memories. Anything that we know from before that has just been told to us over and over and over again, and we imagine that we know it. So you went down to Southern California, outside of San Diego, I'm assuming? Yes. And if I read right- Lived in Bonita. Bonita. That's what I was going to say. That's a big Metropolitan area?

[00:03:32.200] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Well, it's east of Chula Vista, down towards the border a bit. A nice place to grow up, though.

[00:03:39.200] - Big Rich Klein

Right. But back then, it was still pretty rural. There wasn't a whole lot of houses built yet, correct?

[00:03:45.720] - Jon Crowley Jr.

It was much more rural than it is now. Right. But I graduated from high school 40 something years ago, so it's been a while.

[00:03:57.340] - Big Rich Klein

Right. No, I understand that fact. My 50th high school reunion should be next year.

[00:04:07.440] - Jon Crowley Jr.

There you go.

[00:04:08.640] - Big Rich Klein

Oh, Lord. Time moves on.

[00:04:12.540] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yes.

[00:04:13.720] - Big Rich Klein

So As a student down there, were you a good student or were you always one of those kids looking out the window?

[00:04:23.440] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I was a decent student. I graduated with a 3. 2 in some advanced placement classes and that stuff. So I was in with all the smart kids, and that drove my GPA down a bit. Yeah, it was enough to get in to... I went to College at UCSB, computer science.

[00:04:54.100] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. And your time at UCSB, well, while you were still In school and stuff, did you play sports? Did you have any other activities that you did?

[00:05:06.900] - Jon Crowley Jr.

The peak of my athletic ability was my junior year in high school. It's been the downhill slope ever since. I was on the water polo team, soccer, and swimming. I played soccer all three years on the varsity team, but junior year, I did everything. I didn't know what I was doing, but I got out there and have fun.

[00:05:29.360] - Big Rich Klein

So the The swim team, or water polos, in fact, one of the things that I remember from high school was I was a swimmer. I swam before high school and then swam through high school. And I was a long distance swimmer. I swam the 500. And all of the rest of the kids, the guys that played football and basketball and baseball, I lettered early. And to get a letter, you had to win a varsity event in swimming. And so in my sophomore year, I want a letter because I want a swim meet. And everybody was like, oh, no, it must have been freshman year. And so because everybody came out and said, During the next year of football, sophomore year, you got your letter already? How did you do that? Went out swimming. So everybody went out for swimming, or a bunch of guys went out for swimming thinking, Oh, this will be easy. I can get my letter early before varsity football. And yeah, no. None of them lasted more than four or five days. The workouts were too hard.

[00:06:48.060] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, well, that was water polo. That workout was insane. I felt like it was underwater more than I was above water.

[00:06:55.880] - Big Rich Klein

You learned to appreciate swallowing chlorinated water.

[00:07:01.740] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, yeah. The good news is when soccer season rolled around in the winter, I was in really good shape for it, which normally you got to get in shape for soccer. And I didn't have to because I had been doing water polo for a couple of months.

[00:07:17.960] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah, your cardio from swimming in water polo is amazing. Yeah. I don't know. The sprinters in swimming, the sprinters don't have the cardio as much as the long distance swimmers. But, Okay, they're faster. What can you say? Until they have to swim the long distance. So then any other activities in high school? Do you band or get involved with plays or anything like that?

[00:07:46.840] - Jon Crowley Jr.

No, no. Mostly soccer was my big deal. I was on the varsity team for all three years. So that was it.

[00:07:59.380] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. Did you have the opportunity to be able to take any auto mechanics or anything like that?

[00:08:07.680] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I didn't. My family was never really... We didn't off-road, we didn't wrench on stuff, any of that. I didn't really have that passion early on through high school. We were water skiers. We'd go to the Colorado River to water ski for weekends. And I still remember driving past Glamis and looking at people going, what are those nuts doing out there?

[00:08:40.840] - Big Rich Klein

And now you know.

[00:08:45.500] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Years later, I would become an offroader, and now I understand.

[00:08:49.560] - Big Rich Klein

Yep, absolutely. So then you graduate high school, you go to Santa Barbara. What made you pick Santa Barbara?

[00:09:00.660] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I got accepted.

[00:09:02.020] - Big Rich Klein

Okay, that works.

[00:09:04.380] - Jon Crowley Jr.

If you've ever been to the campus in Santa Barbara, it is amazing. I think I visited in the springtime, and there was a bunch of pretty girls with not a ton of clothes on, and it's just like, wow, I got to go to here.

[00:09:23.680] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah, that's pretty convincing. I went to school, but a private school, a liberal arts college in Santa Barbara called Brooks Institute of Photography. But I had some classes at City College, and then, of course, had friends that went to UCSB. And then I actually lived, I can't even remember the name of the block, but it's one block off of the the Ocean block there in Ila Vista. So one It was probably like Sabat o'Tardi or something like that. Yeah, it was. All I know is it was a party every single night of the school year somewhere. Yeah. So then what did you study while you were at college? You said Computer Sciences?

[00:10:16.480] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Computer science, yeah. I actually signed up for the wrong major. I thought I had signed up for computer engineering, which is an electrical engineering with a computer background. Then found out I accidentally signed up for computer science like a dork. So I started to switch. But to do the engineering, you had to do chemistry. And I started off, I took one quarter of chemistry and I barely slid by. And the second one is like, oh, my God, I can't handle this. So I stuck with computer science and got my computer science degree, graduated with a 3. 00. Dead on. Way better than a 2. 99. Yes.

[00:11:09.220] - Big Rich Klein

So then what did that lead you to?

[00:11:12.340] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I got a... One of my jobs during summer school was over in the Bay Area with a software company, and I ended up taking a job with them. They had moved over closer to the Sacramento area, up in the foothills, and I took a job with them and worked for them for a couple of years doing custom software type stuff. And then I moved on to being a technical sales person covering Southern California.

[00:11:47.640] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. That wasn't Microsoft, was it?

[00:11:50.940] - Jon Crowley Jr.

No, no, no, no. Small, small company. It's called Telt Watch. So, yeah, I lived in Huntington Beach, had a jet ski, and in the wintertime, you could launch your jet ski right off 100 beach and go out in the waves and everything. And that was my deal.

[00:12:14.300] - Big Rich Klein

And that time up in the foothills, your primary job was more sales, or what did you do to begin with?

[00:12:26.260] - Jon Crowley Jr.

No. At first, I was a custom software programmer. Okay.

[00:12:30.400] - Big Rich Klein

All right. Writing code? Yep. How fun?

[00:12:36.080] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, it was okay. I switched to technical sales and then a couple of years later went to another company from some of the primaries that worked at that first company, and they had started a new company, and I went back to programming. And then as that company grew, I I took on more management type stuff. At one point, I had 75 people working for me, and that was a pain.

[00:13:09.060] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah. Making sure they were doing all their work and you still had yours to do.

[00:13:14.020] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Too many people bitching and moaning and whining.

[00:13:17.600] - Big Rich Klein

Right. And are you still involved in the computer world at all besides using one?

[00:13:27.140] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Using one, the most technical I get is looking at website code sometimes.

[00:13:34.660] - Big Rich Klein

Okay.

[00:13:35.240] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I don't want to have to code. Well, coding these days is way different. It's way higher level than it was back then.

[00:13:42.800] - Big Rich Klein

All right.

[00:13:43.420] - Jon Crowley Jr.

So I don't want to do that anymore.

[00:13:45.250] - Big Rich Klein

All of it was above my head. There was no way. I came from a generation, even though we're fairly close in age, where there's a big void between... Most people did not jump into it. So it's like photography. When the digital age hit, I even walked away from photography as my job. It was like, anybody can be a photographer now. Forget it. I'm gone. Yeah.

[00:14:18.080] - Jon Crowley Jr.

And now we all have phones.

[00:14:19.720] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah, exactly. So cameras are like- It can take pretty damn good pictures. Yes, they can. They can, with that. So then you're You're on the beach at Huntington Beach, and you're doing the computer sales or sales thing, and then riding Waverunners or jet skis?

[00:14:42.960] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Were they stand-up? Yes, stand-up jet ski, yeah.

[00:14:45.580] - Big Rich Klein

Wow. Did you ever compete?

[00:14:48.800] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Actually, my wife and I, she was my girlfriend back there, we both did a couple of races. One of them was in Long Beach. We went out and watched a race, and we were like, Oh, my God, we could totally do that. And then we got out there and tried it, and it was like, holy smoke. After the first lap, you're dying. I'm not even close to good enough or in shape enough to do this.

[00:15:14.180] - Big Rich Klein

So one and done on the racing?

[00:15:16.560] - Jon Crowley Jr.

We did a couple, but that wasn't much of a thing.

[00:15:22.680] - Big Rich Klein

And how did you meet Theresa?

[00:15:26.180] - Jon Crowley Jr.

She was at the The company I worked in out of College, and she was in shipping and receiving.

[00:15:36.340] - Big Rich Klein

Okay.

[00:15:37.620] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I was just a dweeb programmer.

[00:15:43.080] - Big Rich Klein

There was this hot girl in shipping and receiving.

[00:15:46.480] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, well, I was pretty shy back then, so it took a while. I think her boss set us up, and that was the end of it. She followed me down to Hunting Beach. She took a job down there. She was going to college at the time. Then a couple of years, a year and a half later, I think it was, I took another job back up in Folsom. She moved back up. We moved in together and got married probably a year later.

[00:16:22.100] - Big Rich Klein

Oh, wow. Okay. So she was hooked or you were hooked.

[00:16:25.980] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. Well, she had the persistence to follow me to Southern California, and she knew that if she didn't, it probably wouldn't last. And she was pretty smart. There you go. Thankfully, she did that because we've been married now 35 years.

[00:16:42.520] - Big Rich Klein

Wow. Congratulations. Women have a better sense of that than men do sometimes.

[00:16:47.630] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, we have no sense.

[00:16:50.200] - Big Rich Klein

None at all. So then how did you go when you came back and came back up to Northern California? What job were you doing then?

[00:17:03.240] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Well, I went back to programming. It was a small startup company. I was employee number two. Oh, wow. And so you had to do everything. I mean, from empty and trash cans to run an Ethernet cable in the ceilings, to programming, to jumping on a red eye and flying to Canada to talk to Bell Canada about your stuff. I mean, it was everything. So you wear a lot of hats, and the company grew from there. I just took on more and more responsibility, and grew with the company.

[00:17:44.060] - Big Rich Klein

Do you guys have kids?

[00:17:47.300] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yes. Okay. Two.

[00:17:48.820] - Big Rich Klein

Two kids?

[00:17:50.080] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. Any John Crolley, the thirds? Not any thirds, but I do have a A grandson. My daughter and her husband just had a baby last January. That's our first grandkid.

[00:18:07.560] - Big Rich Klein

Awesome. And you had two kids, you said? Yep. One boy, one girl?

[00:18:13.540] - Jon Crowley Jr.

.

[00:18:14.140] - Big Rich Klein

Awesome. And where are they positioned in the United States?

[00:18:20.420] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Dawner is in South Dakota, Custer. Okay. A really cool area, but long ways away. And Sun's actually up in Shingles Springs as well.

[00:18:31.200] - Big Rich Klein

Okay, cool. And was it while you were up in Shingle Springs that, obviously, you probably weren't jet skiing as much unless you were out at Folsom?

[00:18:43.420] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, we had jet skis for quite a while, but there was one point where some lifelong friends of Teresa's had a Honda 250 R, and they were going to Sand Mountain, and I had never off it at all. Other than when I graduated from college, I got a 4x4 ranger and thought I was pretty cool. But we went out to Sand Mountain and camped in a tent and rode a 250R for the first time. Sitting there at the bottom of that mountain, I was terrified, looking at that thing going, Holy smokes, I got to ride to the top of that thing?

[00:19:25.800] - Big Rich Klein

And then what do I do once I get to the top?

[00:19:28.340] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, from that point I was hooked. I've been an off-roader ever since.

[00:19:34.100] - Big Rich Klein

And what age were you about then?

[00:19:39.860] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Probably 23, 24.

[00:19:44.340] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. And that bug, when it bit, what did you purchase first to start off-roading?

[00:19:57.400] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I ended up buying a Honda 250 R as well, and I got Theresa a Honda 250X. That was a four-stroke that would barely get to the top if you were light enough.

[00:20:10.100] - Big Rich Klein

Okay.

[00:20:11.860] - Jon Crowley Jr.

But the 250 R was a two-stroke, and We thought we were pretty cool.

[00:20:17.700] - Big Rich Klein

And how long did the two-wheel addiction last?

[00:20:23.020] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Four-wheel.

[00:20:23.700] - Big Rich Klein

Four-wheel? Oh, okay.

[00:20:24.940] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Those are ATVs. Oh, the ATVs. Okay. That It lasted a while, and then a bunch of my friends had sand cars, so I felt like in order to play with them better, I needed a sand car and ended up getting a sand car. Then another sand car and another sand car, keep trying to chase a better one. And then back in 2006, I tried a Yamaha Rhino. A friend of mine had one at Sand Mountain. I'm like, Wow, these are pretty cool. You could do trail riding and stuff with these. And that's when I got into the UTV world.

[00:21:08.340] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. And did you... Yamaha Rhino was the very first one, wasn't it?

[00:21:14.680] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Of the UTVs? It was the first sporty one out there. There were Kawasaki Niels and Polaris Rangers before that, but nothing as sporty as a Yamaha Rhino. We come a hell of a long way since then. I mean, that was a single-cylinder 32 horsepower.

[00:21:37.260] - Big Rich Klein

Wow.

[00:21:38.620] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, maybe 10 inches of wheel travel.

[00:21:42.500] - Big Rich Klein

And what size, what CC was that?

[00:21:45.760] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Was that- That was, I think, a 660 at that point.

[00:21:50.820] - Big Rich Klein

660, okay.

[00:21:51.800] - Jon Crowley Jr.

But single-cylinder.

[00:21:53.180] - Big Rich Klein

All right. Wow. And from the Yamaha Rhino, what was your next step?

[00:22:03.600] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I ended up getting a Polaris Razor when they came out and put long travel on it. That was a twin-cylinder 800 back then or a 760. It was like, wow, this is incredible compared to the Rhino. From there, I had started a website called Dune Guide I did my own UTV Guide back then, and then I started UTV Guide, and I started writing reviews and stuff, and it got to the point where I was going to manufacture press events and writing reviews, getting demo units, all that stuff from the manufacturers.

[00:22:50.380] - Big Rich Klein

And what was that feeling when you went from creating your own website and doing UTV and then all of a sudden, taking the notice of the... Or getting the notice, or I should say, the manufacturer is taking notice that you're doing what you're doing.

[00:23:15.340] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, it felt pretty cool. At the time, I was the only publication that was website only. I didn't have a print magazine. I I freelance for a couple print magazines back in the day, Sand Addiction magazine, Sand Sports magazine. I did some print, but I was the only guy at these things that only had a website. Some of them had websites, too, but it was primarily print. This is back 2007 time frame. So it was early, and the Internet was kicking in the gear pretty hard, really before Facebook was even a thing. Certainly before Instagram. But when Facebook kicked in, I embraced that pretty heavily. And all the print guys were having a hard time seeing the value of social media, where I embraced it pretty heavily.

[00:24:32.100] - Big Rich Klein

Right. And that was a good call. That's for sure.

[00:24:35.700] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Turned out to be okay.

[00:24:37.100] - Big Rich Klein

So when the Razors first came out, the Polaris, we were trying to get Polaris on as a sponsor because we thought, what a great little rock crawling platform. And the engineer and the engineering assistant or the other engineer that helped with that Razor program and the A marketing person, a lady, came out and they shipped out, I think it was five vehicles to us. And they said, okay, nobody can see these except for the people you're going to have test driving them. And we put them from the semi truck into our race trailer in the middle of the night on a back street. And then the next day, they flew in and And we picked them up and we went out to a little test area that we knew, not on the Rubicon, but a rock area. And it was... I had my son, little Rich. We had Dustin Webster, Jesse Haynes, Bob Rogui, and I think Josh England was there with us, too. And we took these vehicles out there. We wind and dined them with lunch and all that. But we put them through the paces because Polaris was like, well, we don't even know if these things can rock, roll.

[00:26:05.160] - Big Rich Klein

Right. And so I had this big grand plan of this this UTV event I wanted to do. And I think I talked to you about it back in the day. That was that multiple stage or venue type event that would have where you could sandrag and race and drift and do all sorts of things. The They were really amazed at how well they rock-crawled once we realized that you had to keep momentum going. You couldn't stop on a big climb because once you tried to start over again, the torque lift would be too much, at least at that time. But it did better than the other vehicles that all of us had tried before that. Balance was really pretty good on those things. And remember that they were like, okay, we really want to make this happen, all the stuff that we wanted to do. And the lady that was in the marketing that was pushing it, she was pregnant. Well, she goes on a leave of absence to have maternity leave. And when she comes back, they had put somebody else in charge of the UTVs that wouldn't even return my calls. And-typical Polaris.

[00:27:25.080] - Big Rich Klein

Oh, yeah. And instead of her getting her job back, they send her over to Sleds Our program never went anywhere. And I was just like, so close, so close. Yeah.

[00:27:39.220] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Typical Polaris. They switch people around a lot. They never stay in the same position for... It seems like more than a year would be very abnormal.

[00:27:53.600] - Big Rich Klein

And I think that's a detriment.

[00:27:57.120] - Jon Crowley Jr.

They miss some consistency for sure. I think it's good to have some fresh ideas that circulate, but they need some consistency. And the relationship building is so tough. You think you're okay with the manufacturer, and then all of a sudden, they swap somebody else in that you've got to start from scratch all over again. And they might not even re-return your call like you've experienced. And that's pretty frustrating.

[00:28:28.540] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah. What I found Is it that most companies, when they switch people out, when somebody leaves and somebody else steps in, that new person is like, okay, I don't want anything to do with what that guy was doing or that person was doing, because I need to make my own mark.

[00:28:43.580] - Jon Crowley Jr.

So it's They just cut everybody off. They've got their own relationships. Yeah.

[00:28:48.620] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah. It's too bad. It's like when BLM hires a new resource person in their office, all of a sudden, it doesn't matter what resource. It can be the plant people. It can be the archivists or whatever they call them, your archeologist. And they all come in and got to make their own mark on the office. And it's like, Jesus, people, quit rewriting history.

[00:29:17.980] - Jon Crowley Jr.

So then I remember we first met then, right around then, 2006, 2007, if I remember right.

[00:29:29.540] - Big Rich Klein

In fact, was Rogi that said, Hey, if you're going to get into UTVs, you need to talk to John Crowley. And I was like, Huh? What? Okay. And so we did that. And I think you actually came out and ran with us, didn't you? Didn't you compete either with Rock Crawl or racing?

[00:29:50.980] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I can't remember that. The first race I did was actually with Bob Roghe. We raced the first inaugural King of the Hammers for UTVs. It wasn't the first year for King of the Hammers, but it was the first year they brought UTVs out, and it was just a demonstration class.

[00:30:15.260] - Big Rich Klein

That was me. I put that race on.

[00:30:17.880] - Jon Crowley Jr.

You were totally involved with that. Yes. And one of the reasons I jumped in, I had never been to Johnson Valley before. So I'm like, all right, Bob, let's build this Kawasaki Territz to go race this thing, but I don't know what the hell I'm doing out there. So you drive, I'll co-drive. It'll be my car. Yeah, that was pretty interesting. I still have vivid memories of that. And we could The most interesting part was we could have spectator help. Right. So I still have pictures that come up every once in a while as memories on Facebook, which is cool, of us going up after shock. And there was no bypass on after shock at that point in time. You had to go up the waterfall. And to do that on a Kalisaki Teryx with 26-inch tires, there was no way. And we had, unless you were going to winch or something like that. But since we had spectator help, there was six guys that basically just heaved our UTV up the rock. It It was pretty funny. We didn't do so well. We finished, but I think by the time we got in, it was like, Oh, you were racing?

[00:31:41.500] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. Well, all the other guys, all One of the other guys got in a while ago. Well, sorry. We had some issues.

[00:31:51.340] - Big Rich Klein

The first person that finished was... Oh, my God. Mitch Guthrie. Yeah, Mitch. And I wasn't even at the finish line yet because I wasn't expecting anybody for another hour.

[00:32:08.660] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, well, he owned Johnson Valley for the first, jeez, probably six, eight years. He pretty much won everything. The first year they made the UTV race hard was 2013, and that's when it all changed. Before that, it was just a sprint in the desert sprinkled with going up or down Elvis. And in the 2013, it's like, well, we're going to make this thing really hard. And I raced that against Mitch. And we finished, actually that first year, they threw us in with the EMC class, and we finished right before five o'clock. There were, I think, three official finishers, and I They lost to Mitch Guthrie by 16 seconds after all day going all over the place. It was nuts. And Dave Cole, at that point in time, threw us up and down some crazy trails. And that's one of the one of the hardest UTV races at King of the Hammers ever, just because of the attrition rate and the number of finishers. They do way harder trails now, but for the experience level of where we're at and the evolution of everything, the course was really hard that year.

[00:33:43.240] - Big Rich Klein

Right. I'd have to agree with that. That first year, when we went up after shock, we took out a stock Polaris. Yeah. And just the ranger. And we did what I wanted to do as a course. And Frank Johnson, Nicole Johnson's husband, was the one driving, and he got that thing up that waterfall. Wow. That's pretty impressive. I was like, All right, well, we can get this up there. We can all of them get up there. And he was like, I can't believe we just beat the hell out of this thing, and it didn't break.

[00:34:26.060] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, that's surprising.

[00:34:28.300] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah, it was. I think we just hit it in the right time with the weather. And the waterfall may have gotten blown out from that Thanksgiving to when KOH was because of the weather or something.

[00:34:47.420] - Jon Crowley Jr.

As you know, pre-running always changes the course. Yes. If the UTVs are running anything, the big cars are running, the course changes dramatically between pre-run and race day.

[00:35:03.900] - Big Rich Klein

Very true. Very true. I remember the other thing about that very first UTV race was Casey Curry finishing with reverse gear only. Backwards.

[00:35:14.740] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. Yeah. He and Reid Nourdine were in that car.

[00:35:18.310] - Big Rich Klein

Was that who? I didn't know who was with him. Okay.

[00:35:20.840] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. And then the guy you just had on your show a few days ago, Dean Bullick, raced raced against him in 2015. That was another really, really hard year. And he and I had a side bet because we were in cars that really shouldn't be racing. We were in 60-inch cars when everybody else had or 60-inch cars, and everybody else had bigger, better cars at that point in time. But we decided to have a manufacturer bet, and he was in a Wildcat sport from Articat, and I was in a Razor S 900 from a Polaris. He beat me. He got second place, and Mitch Guthrie, of course, got first, and I got third place. But that was another super hard day. It was all the way till five o'clock by the time we finished.

[00:36:18.300] - Big Rich Klein

Wow. So what do you think of the... Let's just jump ahead right now to this year, the KOH, and the results there. Were you surprised?

[00:36:33.860] - Jon Crowley Jr.

A little surprised. But after how Kyle Cheney did the year before, it's like, well, okay, he's a machine. He's really good. The platforms are getting better from the UTV side. And a lot of people were butt hurt about it, but he put that thing on on the podium. It was a pretty amazing run, really, to build something that can survive that. And there's a lot of modifications. It's not a stock UTV anymore, but a lot of the drivetrain and everything, it still is on the base platform. You're changing arms and a lot of that. That had a custom chassis, but it's got the same pickup points and all that for the suspension. So pretty amazing that Kyle was able to finish the race, let alone win it.

[00:37:42.140] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah, I wondered what would happen if The first three cars into that new area that wasn't pre-run, I don't remember the name of part of the trail. Those first three cars in there either got broken or stuck in that area. And he comes up to him and just picks his way around that, and in a line that didn't look obvious, but it was the only line left, I guess. And I wonder what would have happened if he would have been one of the first cars in there.

[00:38:16.460] - Jon Crowley Jr.

He's pretty good at reading lines. And in a UTV, you're a lot more nimble. You can fit some places the big cars can't. So There's advantages and disadvantages to a smaller footprint, and he was able to pick through it. It's hard to watch. I do the commentating for the UTV race, but not the 4,400 race. So I was watching it live on the Internet, and it's hard to really tell how difficult it is, especially with a place I'd never been before. And these racers haven't either. But on the ground, you can see things better than what you're watching over the Internet. True.

[00:39:04.540] - Big Rich Klein

Very true. So what are you up to now? Well, there's a big gap we just jumped from your UTV Guide to now. Let's go the evolution there of your work in the media, and of course, the racing came along with that as well. But you had your Internet site, and you're doing, like you said, you were doing write-ups and going through the different machines coming out. And how did that all evolve? And did you continue that, and for how long?

[00:39:49.260] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, I'm still doing it. Okay. I just, sometimes it gets overwhelming. If there's a lot of manufacturer events, You got to fly across the country to go to a media event. It's only a couple of days. You got to fly there, fly back. It's a lot of work. I pick and choose now. I'm not as I'm not as full-time as it used to be. I like to just focus in on adventures and going and seeing cool places and telling people about the adventure and the cool products I'm using and that stuff. So still doing the same thing. It's just focusing in on what's more important for me.

[00:40:41.240] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. Sounds great. And why did you make How did you move to Hurricane?

[00:40:48.420] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Just love Utah. And back in 2020, we thought the... With the political landscape changing, we thought the The market was going to tank. So we decided to... A good friend of both of ours, Lance Clifford, was a real estate agent out here. He posted a house for sale that was a model house, came with furniture and everything. We looked at it and we're like, wow, that'd be awesome. And surprisingly enough, I showed it to my wife and she just, buy it. I'm like, wait, hold on. She goes, no, put an offer in it tonight. I'm like, can we sleep on this? Wow. Yeah, we slept on it. But the next morning, she was still gung ho and ready to do it. So we did. The builder leased it back from us for three years. We're right next to Sand Hollow. We're in Dixie Springs. Real close to Little Rich. And it's just a really neat spot. I mean, you got Sand Hollow right Right there, I can drive from my garage. All my UTVs are street legal, so I can just drive from my garage right there or anywhere. I mean, you've got access all the way to the north rim of the Grand Canyon if you want to go from here.

[00:42:15.700] - Jon Crowley Jr.

It's a beautiful state. It's awesome for off-roading, but also just for everything outdoors. If you want a mountain bike or hike or explore, it's an incredible state. So we're just really enjoying spending a lot of time here and exploring.

[00:42:35.600] - Big Rich Klein

Do you just write about the vehicles, or are you writing also about adventures or trails that you're doing? Where do you- All the above. All of the above. Okay. And where are some cool places that you've gone, say outside of Hurricane?

[00:43:01.620] - Jon Crowley Jr.

One of the places I really like is over in Kanab. It's hour 15 from Hurricane, and there's so many places to explore from there. You know, North Rim of the Grand Canyon. It's a really, really neat place there. You can go over to Vermilion Cliffs. You can go up, backside of Zion. You can get all the way up to Duck Creek, 8,000, 9,000 feet. Get over to Escalante. There's just a bunch of places to go and neat places, neat destinations to explore.

[00:43:49.040] - Big Rich Klein

Have you gone up through the Escalante and out toward Moab?

[00:43:55.340] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

[00:43:56.560] - Big Rich Klein

I've done that a couple of times. It's pretty awesome.

[00:44:00.960] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, and shoot south of Moab, down by Blanding, a bunch of more remote areas over there. I want to spend more time exploring. And there's just so many neat spots, and they're great destinations. My wife doesn't like riding for the sake of riding. She wants a destination. There's lots of Indian artifacts, petroglyphs, all that stuff. And that's neat to mix in some of that, and maybe a little bit of hiking, too.

[00:44:37.040] - Big Rich Klein

And you guys, you do an adventure series? Am I correct on that?

[00:44:44.620] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Not really an adventure series. Just get out and do... I do lots of multi-day rides where you're either camping or going from motel to motel thing in smaller towns. I'm not as big of a tent guy as I used to be, but I like to get somewhere and have a nice warm shower and somebody making me dinner and a cocktail.

[00:45:15.140] - Big Rich Klein

So no rooftop tent on top of your your UTV?

[00:45:19.080] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I haven't, but lots of stuff were just a normal tent. I did the UTV Conquest with Bob Rogge, Bob Sweeney. Bob Sweeney puts all that on with the Juppie Jambury crew. I did the Rubicon. That's a three-day deal, and you're in a tent for that. But they're cooking for you. Paula and Bob both helping run the bar there for that, for charity. It's nice just to have somebody cooking for you and somebody making you drinks. It's for a good cause. So that's all good.

[00:46:02.300] - Big Rich Klein

So you haven't guided any trail ride yourself where John and Theresa are the hosts and take out vehicles?

[00:46:10.140] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I guide a lot of stuff with my friends, but I don't do anything where I'm paid to do that. I don't want to be responsible for people that are paying me.

[00:46:22.940] - Big Rich Klein

Right. Okay.

[00:46:24.210] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I just like to get out there and show people. I like taking people that haven't been somewhere, somewhere neat, but they're friends, not people paying me to do that. Right.

[00:46:39.700] - Big Rich Klein

And what about the big UTV events at Hurricane Dunes, Sand Hollow? Do you participate in any of those big rides out there?

[00:46:50.360] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, this is a big month, actually. We got Trail Hero next week and UTV takeover coming up two weeks after that. So I'll be at both of those riding. Trail Hero is a little bit more of a Jeep 4x4 a crowd, but there are some UTV events and rides, so I'll be out there for that.

[00:47:16.220] - Big Rich Klein

Cool. We'll be out for the Wednesday night for the Rocksportz gala, but I can't stay because we've got the Rebell Rally and can't be away from Placerville that long, taking care of my mom. So we can't do both events, unfortunately.

[00:47:33.740] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. It's a busy... October is a really busy time in hurricanes.

[00:47:40.960] - Big Rich Klein

Right. What's going on. Perfect. It's perfect weather, except There's a reason they call it hurricane, and that's because of the winds that come up.

[00:47:50.800] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah.

[00:47:51.420] - Big Rich Klein

I swear at the end of every Trail Hero that I've done, on the Sunday night, Monday, after everything ends, there's 60, 70 mile an hour winds coming off the sand dunes.

[00:48:07.720] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, it definitely can blow hard here a lot. They don't call it hurricane for nothing. Right.

[00:48:15.460] - Big Rich Klein

So what's in the future for John and Teresa? What are you guys going to do in the future?

[00:48:20.620] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Well, I still love to just go adventure, however that is. Doing rim to rim in the Grand Canyon or driving somewhere in a UTV to get somewhere to see something cool. I love to explore. So that's a big part of what I'll be doing. Plus, I don't think this is our last grand baby, so I'm sure we'll be spending lots of time with the grandkids in the future. Just starting to get to retirement.

[00:49:04.880] - Big Rich Klein

Do your kids do the off-roading?

[00:49:10.300] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Not as much. They do like to get out and about. We did a family trip on the Rubicon at one point. I had three different UTVs. My daughter and her boyfriend were in one, Theresa and my son David were in another one, and Then I was in one by myself hauling all the gear and everything. It was a four-seater with all kinds of crap stashed in it. But that was pretty neat. We went in and camped at Buck Island for two nights and then did a day trip over to Observation Point and back. So that was neat. And the family really liked that experience and have talked about it quite a bit since.

[00:49:58.360] - Big Rich Klein

Awesome. And so doing a review, what's your favorite UTV of all time? Or are there UTVs that have certain aspects that are great, and then another one that does something else better type thing?

[00:50:21.160] - Jon Crowley Jr.

It's like an RV. There is no perfect one. You always want something bigger, smaller, faster, more nimble. It really depends on where you're riding. So I mean, one of my favorite ones right now, I guess I'm getting old and soft is Polaris Expedition. It's an enclosed cab with HVAC. And out here in Utah, the weather can be hot, cold, rainy, snowy. You never know. And it's nice to be able to ride, especially with my wife, and not have to worry about what the weather's like. Right. That's pretty soft. You can call me a sissy if you want, but it's nice to be able to do that. The vehicles are evolving in the UTV world. More of them are getting HVAC, but the Expedition is the most sporty of them. So In the future, I hope they get even more sporty with HVAC. So we'll see.

[00:51:36.200] - Big Rich Klein

Is that Polaris that you're talking about, is that the one that has, it looks like a... Almost like a minivan. Looks like an SUV. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's one of those elements or something.

[00:51:51.980] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I've got the two-seat version, which reminds me a lot of the old Bronco 2 back in the day. Okay. Short wheel, little wheelbase.

[00:52:01.300] - Big Rich Klein

Right. I've seen the four-seaters. I've not seen the two-seater. Went down to the sports show down in Sacramento at Cal Expo, and they had one that was all dressed out and everything. And I was Holy shit. That's beautiful. Do you see that price tag?

[00:52:20.060] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, they're pretty spendy. That's the downside is you're going to spend a lot. I mean, of two seats, you're close to 40, and the four seats are 45. And then there's a whole bunch of people putting all kinds of stuff in them. So it's pretty easy to get yourself up to 60,000 in a heartbeat. Pretty crazy. The evolution of the UTV isn't just on what they can do versus what they used to be able to do, but the price tag.

[00:52:50.280] - Big Rich Klein

Right. Yeah, exactly.

[00:52:51.940] - Jon Crowley Jr.

I used to think that you'd never get past 30,000, but here we are, pushing 50.

[00:52:58.880] - Big Rich Klein

Pretty insane. Yeah. Well, John, I want to say thank you so much for sharing with us. And I hope that all of your adventures in the future are outstanding and that you're able to keep doing what you're doing because it sounds like a great lifestyle.

[00:53:21.600] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah, I love it. Can't complain.

[00:53:24.440] - Big Rich Klein

Perfect. All right. Well, you take care and thank you so much.

[00:53:29.180] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Yeah. Great catching up, Rich. Take care. Okay.

[00:53:31.180] - Big Rich Klein

Bye-bye.

[00:53:32.240] - Jon Crowley Jr.

Bye.

[00:53:33.480] - Big Rich Klein

Well, that's another episode of Conversations with Big Rich. I'd like to thank you all for listening. If you could do us a favor and leave us a review on any podcast service that you happen to be listening on, or send us an email or a text message or a Facebook message, and let me know any ideas that you have, or if there's anybody that you have that you think would be a great guest, please forward the contact information to me so that we can try to get them on. And always remember, live life to the fullest. Enjoying life is a must. Follow your dreams and live life with all the gusto you can. Thank you.