HORACE LANGFORD JR. / PVT The Vegas to Reno race will start on Pioneer Road outside Beatty at 10 a.m. Friday. Advertisement

BEATTY -- In 2007, the margin of victory in the TSCO Vegas to Reno Off-Road race, a 500-mile trek on desert trails, mountain passes and washes between Pahrump and Dayton, was a mere 54 seconds.

Friday, more than 300 drivers and riders of cars, truck, quads, motorcycles and utility vehicles will compete in the annual off-road classic. Last year, Mark Weyrich and Gary Weyrich, co-driving a Class 1500 Jimco, won in 9 hours, 30 minutes, 32 seconds. In second place -- finishing in 9:31:28 -- was a Class 1400 Chevrolet truck, mandled on the rough-and-tumble courseby B.J. Baldwin and Bobby Baldwin.

A Class 8000 Ford, with Curt LeDuc and Todd LeDuc as drivers, was a distant third in 10:13:24.

Motorcycles and quads will be on the course as well, with the defending champions Kendall Norman and Johnny Campbell. Riding an open pro Honda, they finished in 9:24.02 -- more than an hour ahead of a 4-Stroke pro Honda co-ridden by Zach Dodson and Luke Dodson.

The starting line will be at Pioneer Road off U.S. 95, north of Beatty. There will be 11 pit stops on the 456.5-mile course between Bonnie Claire and Dayton. Those stops are at Cottontail, Klondike, Tonopah, Millers, Mina, Luning, Rawhide, Top Gun and Weeks (45.1 miles from the finish line).

Motorcycle and quad staging will start at 6 a.m. Friday, with the first motorcycle to leave the starting line at 6:30. Car and truck staging begins at 9:30 a.m., with the first vehicle to hit the trail at 10:30.

The pre-race program starts at 7 p.m. today at the South Point Hotel-Casino in Las Vegas. Registration for time trials for Class 1400 and Class 1500 only will be held from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. Those time trials begin at 6 a.m. Thursday.

Drivers and riders registration will be from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Thursday in the Grand Ballroom at the South Point.

Car, truck, motorcycle, quad and UTV contingency inspections and technical inspections will run from 8:45 a.m. to 6 p.m. Thursday in the South Point parking lot.

There will be a mandatory drivers, riders and pit crew meeting at 6 p.m. Thursday in the ballroom.