August 22, 2008 :: July and August News Updates

By:: Joe Sylvester

July 25-26, :: Toledo, Oh Monster Jam –

Toledo went extremely well for us. The show was very close to sold out both nights and the pit party on Saturday was jam packed full of fans. Friday night I lost in the first round of racing after overdriving a corner and sliding just enough to throw off my angle coming out of the turn. Freestyle went very well and I scored high enough to hold the lead which would later be beaten by one point. The crowd was amped as I treated them to a Joe Sylvester / BAD HABIT high flying freestyle performance. Saturday I lost first round of racing to Grave Digger after taking a weird impact on a landing that caused a hiccup in my fuel system making my motor fall on its face. Freestyle once again went very well with the BAD HABIT truck catching the biggest air of the weekend and spinning some tire smoking donuts. The fans were very happy that weekend and we signed autographs for almost 2 hours after both shows. Other trucks competing at this event were Grave Digger, Fullboar, Escalade, Safe Auto, and Rap Attack.

August 1-2, :: Brookfield, OH :: Yankee Lake Truck Night *Trucks Gone Wild filming –

For the second time, the Trucks Gone Wild crew came out to Yankee Lake Truck Night to film for their upcoming release. This dvd series is becoming widely popular all over the country. Friday night we displayed the truck along with some Rockstar Energy Drink for the fans to try out. Saturday I did a freestyle performance driving the Ohio fans completely crazy! The attendance was around 6,000 people Friday night and about 3,000 on Saturday. A lot of people got to come up close and see the truck in person as well as all my sponsors.

August 7, :: Reading, Pa Fair :: KSR Motorsports Freestyle Series-

The Reading fair was pretty small but the attendance for the Thursday night show definitely was not. The stands were filled beyond capacity and the fans were on fire. Although delayed by rain and hindered by the mud, we still managed to put on an awesome freestyle performance with some big air and a cyclone donut that was so fast and long that I was actually dizzy when I stopped! Judged by fan applause, I won freestyle that night. Other trucks in attendance were Snakebite, and Viper.

August 9, :: Honesdale, Pa :: Wayne County Fair, KSR Motorsports Freestyle Series-

This was our second year performing in Honesdale and once again the stands were packed beyond capacity. The pit party was crazy and there were so many fans that security actually had to come get them somewhat organized around my truck. We did 2 separate freestyle runs that night both going well for us with some big air and crazy donuts. After the show during autographs, I received several comments from fans on my performance. Once again after fan applause, the BAD HABIT truck chocked up another freestyle victory. Other trucks in attendance were Snakebite, Viper, and Tow Mater.

August 15, :: Bath, NY :: KSR Motorsports Freestyle Series-

The small town of Bath, NY was soon to be rocked when the big black and white JSM transporter came rolling through on Friday morning. This would be the first monster truck show at the Bath Fair and there were so many people trying to buy tickets that the line actually went all the way through the fair and out into the street outside the fairgrounds! The stands were packed and so was the fence surrounding the infield. I would be pulling double duty at this show performing a stunt show on my quad shortly before climbing into BAD HABIT to do a freestyle. The Pit Party went extremely well and my Rockstar Energy stunt ATV got almost as much attention as the monster truck! You could just feel the excitement of these fans, many of which had never seen a monster truck in person before. My return to ATV stunt performing went very well and the crowd was on their feet the whole time! Without even catching my breath after riding, it was time to get into my fire suit and do a freestyle performance in BAD HABIT. The area we had to work with was exceptionally narrow and short but I made the best of it putting on a wild performance driving the fans into a frenzy. I drove so hard and had to be on the brakes so much due to how small the place was that they actually caught fire at the end of my run! The fans once again declared BAD HABIT as the winner by way of applause. I would like to thank my lovely girlfriend Shannon for coming out and selling my merchandise for me. I might also ad that she sold everything I had! The fans were super excited and are definitely looking forward to next year’s show. Other trucks in attendance were Snakebite, Viper, and Tow Mater.

Now it’s off to a big event called the Cornfield 500 in a little town named Columbus, Pa. It was a fun event last year and a film crew from the SPEED channel will be there filming. Then from there, we will be doing a couple more shows in New York as well as a display at a local Air Force base for an open house celebration that is expected to have between 30,000 and 50,000 people in attendance! Thanks to everyone again for all your support this season and I look forward to working with everyone again in 2009! As always, let me know if there is anything we can do for you.

July 22, 2008 :: May, June, and July Updates

By: Joe Sylvester

Hello to everyone and I would first like to apologize for the lack of updates lately. Things have been really crazy lately around here. As some of you may already know, the MLMT series we were scheduled to compete in has been postponed until 2009. Due to that change in our schedule, we have switched gears somewhat and made several updates to our schedule. We are still working very hard in the shop making sure BAD HABIT is in top notch condition every weekend allowing me to push it to the limit for all our great fans.

On May 23, we headed out to Brookfield, Ohio for another evening of Yankee Lake Truck night where I was to perform a freestyle exhibition. As always, I love performing in front of my hometown crowd and went out there and put on an on the edge freestyle filled with big air and a wild save at the end of the run.

June 7, I made the trip to Honesdale, Pa where I performed another freestyle exhibition that also kept the crowd on their feet. Honesdale kicked off the beginning of my tour on the KSR Motorsports freestyle series. We will be doing several more freestyle performances for KSR Motorsports throughout the rest of the summer.

Thursday, June 19, the Hollywood Knights car club which I belong to, put on a car show at Shepherd Self Storage in Boardman, Ohio. The car show was a benefit for a fallen member of our club who passed away after an atv accident. BAD HABIT was there on display and I had a chance to hang out with a lot of friends and fans from my hometown.

On June 28, at Quaker City Raceway in Salem, Ohio we did another benefit for Alchemy Acres Animal Sanctuary 2nd annual pet and family festival. I performed a freestyle car crush exhibition that raised money to benefit Alchemy Acres which is a non-kill, non-profit organization that helps find homes for domestic animals and takes in hurt and sick animals and nurses them back to health.

July 11 and 12 was a big weekend for us. We returned to the Mansfield, Ohio Monster Nationals for the third year in a row with hope to make a big impact. Last year, we won racing Friday night and this year we were looking to defend that title. Friday night we got taken out in the first round after missing qualifying due to a flat tire. Freestyle went much better and the Mansfield crowd was on their feet and going absolutely crazy while the Purple and Orange BAD HABIT Chevy was out on the track. While fighting with the rain throughout the day on Saturday, my crew chief and I managed to repair damages to BAD HABIT from Friday night’s freestyle just in time for the show. After my performance the previous night, the event promoters moved me from being second in freestyle to last, which is the headlining truck position. Needless to say I was quite excited and honored to be offered this position which would be a first for me. Racing was very difficult due to muddy conditions but we managed to make it to the semi finals where we lost by a small margin to Excaliber. Freestyle went very well with my typical wide open, big air assault on the track ending with my right rear spindle snapping off sending my wheel and tire rolling down the track. The fans were on there feet once again and going crazy. All in all the weekend went very well and I feel we represented ourselves and our sponsors in a very positive way.

Saturday July 19 was a very busy day for Joe Sylvester Motorsports. Starting off at 9 in the morning, we set up BAD HABIT on display in the middle of Boardman at a Denny’s restaurant advertising for a monster truck show that will be in town this coming weekend. We also set up our Rockstar Energy Drink tent to promote our new sponsor and gave out some drinks to fans that stopped by to see us. At 1:00, we loaded back up and headed out to Barberton Speedway in Norton, Oh to perform a freestyle exhibition along with the Rap Attack monster truck for the fans during a car race. After doing a short pit party with the fans and making a parade lap for the national anthem, we went out to infield and tore the place up pretty good much to the delight of the Barberton fans.

Now we are back in the shop this week getting prepared for this weekend’s double header in Toledo for MONSTER JAM. We are very excited for the event which should be another sold out crowd with plenty of room to get crazy and put on a good show. I will be back in touch next week to let everyone know how things go in Toledo.

May 5, 2008 :: Joe Sylvester Motorsports to use and endorse Ethos Fuel Reformulator! Click the image below to find out about the benefits of Ethos and to purchase online!

"I use Ethos Fuel Reformulator in all my vehicles from my 18-wheeler to my street truck. I have noticed huge fuel savings and increases in horsepower!" -Joe Sylvester

April 15, 2008 :: Chris Short to be Full Time Crew Chief for JSM in 2008!

By: Joe Sylvester

I would like announce that Chris Short, Crew Chief for JSM and the BAD HABIT Monster Truck, will be on board with us full time for the rest of 2008! Chris has worked very hard throughout first quarter on our Monster Jam Tour and I am proud to welcome him to the team full time. I greatly look forward to working with Chris the rest of this season!

February 25, 2008 :: Recap from Dallas, TX , Cleveland, OH , and Dayton, OH Monster Jam

By: Joe Sylvester

The last three stops on our 7 week Monster Jam tour went quite well. Dallas, TX went well all weekend. Knowing that we were coming home for the following week to run in front of a home town crowd, I decided to run somewhat conservatively to insure the truck would not need much when we got back home for Cleveland. The fast paced nature of these shows doesn’t give us much opportunity to see what our scores are and how we placed so until I can read the results online, I actually don’t even know how I did most of the time. The results have still not yet been posted by the USHRA so I do not have many result details from Dallas. I know racing did not go all that well and I never made it past the first round all weekend. Freestyle Saturday night stands out in my mind because I had some pretty good air over the vans including one where I actually smashed through a van that had overturned when I jumped it going one way. Sunday went well until at the beginning of my freestyle run the rear sway bar on BAD HABIT broke in half ending my run early.

After a 2 day drive back home, it was time to get ready for Cleveland. Other than normal maintenance, we had some body repairs to do from my freestyle Saturday in Dallas as well as repairing the rear sway bar. We got called last minute to do a display at a Cleveland area Advance Auto Parts store on Thursday night. That went well other than the cold weather and we got to meet some cool fans. Friday night saw us take 2nd place in the wheelie contest but suffering a 1st round loss in drag racing. The small arena circuit of 50 foot long drag racing has not been good to us all first quarter. The motor we are running in BAD HABIT is underpowered compared to most all of our competitors and every weekend we are still getting closer to tuning it properly. Freestyle went well but ended early due to the rear steer breaking on the truck. We would have to settle for 3rd place in freestyle, which actually for the caliber of trucks and drivers in attendance, 3rd is not all that bad. Saturday afternoon went alright but as always with afternoon shows, you don’t have much time to fix the truck before the night show, which for me was going to be special since a lot of friends and family would be there. We took 3rd in the wheelie contest, once again lost in the first round of racing, and took 4th in freestyle. Saturday was the big show and with BAD HABIT running strong we were ready to tear it up in front of friends and family that night. We took 2nd in the wheelie contest after I stood BAD HABIT completely straight up and down stuffing the tailgate into the cars upon landing. Racing was another 1st round loss but freestyle went very well despite my run ending early due to breaking a rear axle shaft and planetary. After making some huge air jumps and losing the front clip of the body early in the run and being the first truck to jump the freestyle motocross landing the judges awarded the BAD HABIT team with a score of 29. I would place 2nd that night with a score 1 point less than perfect.

It was back to the shop again to get ready for Dayton. We had a lot of work to do including major body repairs and replacing the right rear axle shaft and planetary sun gear and end cap. Dayton is not as close to home as Cleveland for us but we still wanted a good showing in front of our home state crowd. Even though it was on concrete and was a small arena, the race course was set up for a Chicago style turning course, which I like a lot better and my truck is better suited for. Friday night saw us take home 5th in the wheelie contest and 5th in freestyle. We were not able to put together a clean run in racing though to make it past first round. Saturday afternoon we would place 6th in the wheelie contest and lost in the first round of racing again to Grave Digger due to a broken sway bar, again. My crew chief Chris short and I both worked hard throughout the show and took the front sway bar off and put it on the back of the truck. The coil-over suspension on the front of BAD HABIT can work without a sway bar only with a little more body roll. The rear however having nitrogen shocks, needs to have a sway bar. We made it back for freestyle and not being used to how the truck was working, I decided to take it easy and placed 4th. Saturday night was our night to shine! We took 3rd in the wheelie contest and won the first round of racing against Fullboar. The semi finals saw us paired up with Monster Mutt and we were able to put together another win! Then it was time for the finals against Grave Digger. For the first time in my Monster Jam season, we won the racing finals! Everyone was excited to see us take home a win in Dayton including all the other drivers. With a racing win under our belts, we were not about to lay down in freestyle. Being only the second truck out in and 8 truck line up makes it very difficult to score very high. We managed to put together a solid, big air, high speed run including a reverse jump over the car stack! The judges deemed it worthy of a 26 which put us in the lead which we held up until Grave Digger came out last and beat it by one point. All in all, Dayton was a very successful weekend.

With our first quarter Monster Jam tour now at a close, we are now getting ready for our outdoor season to start. I would like to once again extend my sincere thanks to all of our sponsors for standing behind us this season. Without all of you, I would not be able to compete. Also, my new crew chief Chris Short has become an integral part to my operation. He has worked himself to death over the past couple months and deserves a lot of credit for helping me keep BAD HABIT up and running week in and week out. I am greatly looking forward to a successful outdoor season this year with him spinning the wrenches!

February 5th 2008 :: News Updates :: Little Rock, AR and Springfield, IL Monster Jam

The past couple weekends saw the Joe Sylvester Motorsports team in Little Rock, AR and Springfield, Il for more rounds of Monster Jam competition. Friday evening in Little Rock, we took 3rd in the wheelie contest and followed up with a 1st round racing loss due to some issues tuning the motor. The donut contest went a little better with us taking 2nd. We ran a strong freestyle run tying for first in the scoring. Saturday night we were still struggling with tuning the motor and lost in the first round of racing again. We came back to score 3rd in freestyle later in the night.

Springfield was a very long weekend with one show Friday night and 2 shows on Saturday. Friday night we made it to the semi finals in racing only to lose by a very small margin to 26 year veteran Mike Vaters in Black Stallion. We went on that night to finish 3rd in the donut contest and 3rd in freestyle. Saturday afternoon once again found us paired up with Mike Vaters again in the semis, only to lose once again in a very close race. We took 2nd in the donut contest and 3rd in freestyle. Saturday night was a little rough but we managed to come out alright. During the wheelie contest, which is the first competition of the show, I tore the rear drive shaft out of BAD HABIT. We did not have a spare on the trailer but thanks to the Scarlet Bandit team, we were able to use on they had on their trailer. We thrashed on the truck throughout the entire show and barely made it back for freestyle. Everything held up great on the truck and I was able to go out and deliver a performance that brought the crowd to their feet and scored a 27 which would be good enough for 3rd place.

are currently in Oklahoma in route to Dallas, TX for another weekend of 3 action packed shows for Monster Jam. Then it is back home finally where we go to the Quicken Loans arena in Cleveland!

January 23rd 2008 :: News Updates :: Knoxville, TN and Tampa, FL - Monster Jam

We are currently on our 7 week tour for monster jam, 5 of which are being spent on the road in our new toter home and trailer. I would like to start off by thanking all our 2008 sponsors for their support. We have a new 2 way radio system courtesy of our new sponsor Performance 2way so that Chris and I can communicate while I am on the track. The new paint job from Carl Beckett Bodyworks looks killer and received many compliments as well as Brian at DB Motorsports for all the vinyl logos on the truck as well as his awesome design work. SCE Gaskets are holding up and sealing great on the fresh motor from Koffel’s Place, Permatex is sealing up everything else like axle housings and planetaries, Clevite Engine bearings are keeping Howards Aluminum connecting rods rolling, my B&M shifter is providing clean shifts through every gear of my Abruzzi Racing turbo 400, Amsoil is keeping the motor and transmission alive and well, and Hedman Hedders are making it all come alive in an ear shattering decibel level! Of course all the steel added to the chassis courtesy of Boardman Steel is all holding up great and the Meguiars wax is keeping the Beckett Bodyworks paint job nice and shiny. We would also like to thank our other sponsors for helping us out in 2008: Sylvester Construction, Merritt Woodworking, Komar Plumbing, Rockstar Energy Drink, Fritz Skinz, Trucks Gone Wild, and Baker Hill Motorsports!

We just finished up events in Knoxville, TN and Tampa Florida. We were off to a rocky start in Knoxville when the RII radio system in BAD HABIT completely fried and did not work. We had to sit out the event Friday night but after making several phone calls, John Mudd of Motorsport Communications was able to overnight a new kill radio system to us in Knoxville. Myself and new Crew Chief Chris Short completely rewired the truck for the new radio and got it running with plenty of time to spare for the Saturday Event. We did fairly well for being our first event of the new season with a truck that was fresh from top to bottom. Taking 2nd in the wheelie contest, making it to the semi finals in racing, and scoring a 23 in freestyle, BAD HABIT was running strong.

It was then of to Tampa, FL for the big show at Raymond James Stadium. Big thanks goes to Chuck and Vance at Chucks Trucks in Orlando for allowing us to use their shop to get BAD HABIT ready for Tampa. While we were at Chuck’s, we spent a day doing a photo shoot for the upcoming 2009 Monster Rc USA radio controlled monster truck calender. BAD HABIT will be featured on the cover as well as one of the months inside! The photos will not only feature BAD HABIT, but it’s 1/8th scale RC replica as well! The model in the shoot is Amanda, who has a bright future with her modeling career and is also heavily into Monster Trucks and just about anything that has a motor! Another big thanks to the Trucks Gone Wild crew for taking the awesome photos for us! Come Saturday, it was time to get down to business. The day started off with a 5 hour long pit party outside Raymond James Stadium which had several thousand fans in attendance. We were really well received in Tampa by all the fans but the weather did not feel the same. As soon as the pit party ended, the storms rolled in. In a matter of minutes, the track was a complete mud hole. That didn’t stop the 70,000 + fans from coming though, the event was sold out! The muddy conditions not only made it very hard to drive in, but the extreme humidity made the motor very hot. After going down in the first round, it was everything we could to get the motor cooled down before freestyle. I went out for freestyle hitting some decent air in spite of the conditions and completely destroying a school bus! Unfortunately with the motor oil temp up well over 300 degrees, I needed to shut it down before the 90 seconds was up. Scoring a 21 was enough to make a 3-way tie for 5th place out of 12 trucks.

After about 12 hours of washing BAD HABIT, we are loaded up and ready to leave Tampa tonight to head out to Little Rock Arkansas for another round of Monster Jam. Thanks to all the fans who came out and supported us in the rain and the mud in Tampa and all my sponsors, friends, and family who are standing strong behind this season!