PRO MIR

CJ Greaves Goes Three-for-Three on Crandon World Championship Day

As if winning his record-tying seventh Pro 4 series championship in Saturday’s Championship Off-Road finale wasn’t enough, CJ Greaves had a Sunday to remember in World Championship race day at Crandon International Raceway. Greaves opened his day by winning the standalone Pro 4 race, did the same in Pro Stock SXS to complete weekend sweeps of both classes, and capped it all off by chasing down the Pro 2 field in the mixed-class World Cup race to lead an all-Pro 4 podium in the final race of the year.

Hearts were heavy entering race day after a Saturday night accident in the Ultra4 race claimed the life of Rufus Racing competitor Zandy Willems. Saturday’s race was abandoned after the crash, but with the encouragement of his family and race team, Ultra4 chose to race on Sunday in Willems’ honor to complete a full event program. Ultra4 and Class 11 World Championship races completed a full program that otherwise was primarily made up of COR’s premier classes.

The day started with Mickey Thomas earning his second Pro 2 race win in two days, coming home ahead of the past two COR champions in newly crowned Jerett Brooks and 2021 title winner Keegan Kincaid. CJ Greaves then took the Pro 4 race, asserting himself in the lead for good after holding off his father and defending Pro 4 World Champion Johnny; Andrew Carlson snuck through between them for second place as well.

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Still, there was no time for CJ Greaves to rest, as he’d be back in action for the next two races as Pro Stock and Pro Turbo SXS took to the track; Greaves would beat Owen VanEperen and Dallas Nord in the Pro Stock class as his COR title foil Brock Heger suffered a flat tire, completing the class sweep on the weekend. In Pro Turbo, Kyle Chaney became the fourth consecutive Pro driver to sweep both Saturday and Sunday’s events, with Cody Miller and Robert Loire joining him on the podium. Cisco Bio then took Class 11 over Blake Wilkey and Greg Shapiro, while Michael Meister beat Mark Steinhardt and Matthew Brister to the top spot in Pro Buggy to complete a hat trick of three wins in three days.

Ultra4 returned to the track with Loren Healy coming out on top for his third Crandon victory in the past two years, finishing ahead of Paul Wolff and Fun-Haver Racing Team teammate Vaughn Gittin Jr. on the podium. Pro Lite then completed the single-class racing action, and just like in the other Pro short course classes, someone completed a weekend sweep—this time, Kyle Greaves, who came home ahead of Mason Prater and Trey Gibbs.

pro lite

The World Cup race saw an aborted initial start after Zac Zakowski suffered a rollover before the first lap finished. Cory Winner would take the early lead on the restart before giving way to 2022 World Cup podium finisher Ryan Beat, and Beat led up until Greaves finally worked his way through the rest of the Pro 2 field. The duo traded the top spot initially before the faster Pro 4 finally pulled away for good; Andrew Carlson and RJ Anderson would eventually complete the podium, with Beat the top Pro 2 finisher in fourth. Kincaid would finish eighth in his World Cup title defense.

Greaves’ World Cup win was his fourth overall, but just his second in the Pro 4. His most recent World Cup win came in a Pro 2 in 2018, shortly before shifting his focus purely to Pro 4 and SXS classes. In total, Greaves scored five wins in seven races on the weekend across three classes.

Images via Championship Off-Road

Chris Leone

A veteran of the motorsports industry (both physical and digital), Chris Leone contributes coverage of race events of all types to Off-Road Racer. Elsewhere, he is the marketing/communications manager at iRacing, media director of Jim Beaver's Down & Dirty Show, and a frequent contributor to UTV Underground.