In Racing, timing is everything. On June 1, President Vicente Fox made an official visit to the port of Ensenada to preside over Dia de la Marina (Navy Day) activities on the same day that SCORE officials were putting the finishing touches on the upcoming 38th Tecate SCORE Baja 500 Desert Race scheduled for June 2-4.

Following the inauguration of Expomar marine exposition, SCORE President/CEO Sal Fish and SCORE Mexican Liaison/Attorney Oscar Ramos took advantage of the opportunity to greet President Fox and present him with a SCORE racing jacket and a handsome plaque featuring a three-dimensional scale model of Scott Steinberger's #7 SCORE Trophy-Truck. It was the first time that either SCORE official had met the Mexican President.

It was an incredible coincidence that President Fox was in town on the eve of the oldest desert race in the world and it was very gracious of him to meet with us, declared Sal Fish. We spent about five to seven minutes talking he is very charismatic and has a presence about him. He thanked us for our thirty-plus years of bringing tourism to the Baja peninsula. Meeting President Fox is definitely one of the highlights of my involvement with SCORE International Off-Road Racing.

President Fox was very interested and aware of our race, stated Oscar Ramos. It was a unique opportunity to meet him and invite him to our November Baja 1000, which will be the last SCORE race under his presidential administration.

With the right timing, perhaps President Fox will be among the hundreds of thousands of race aficionados who turn out for the 39th Tecate SCORE Baja 1000, an epic desert race down the Baja California peninsula from Ensenada to La Paz on November 15-18, 2006.