Crowds cheer on their favorite drivers, trucks at Winter Nationals

Dirt flew and decibels soared Friday night at the Show Me Center for the Monster Truck Winter Nationals and Bad Boys of Arenacross event.

Crowds of 2,166 people Friday and 2,634 people Saturday cheered on their favorite racers and monster trucks.

One of the crowd favorites the last couple of years has been the Bad Boy Bigfoot monster truck, driven by Larry Swim of De Soto, Mo. He's been with the Bigfoot team for three years but has been involved with monster trucks since he was a teenager.

Swim has been racing monster trucks professionally for 10 years. He grew up being into motorsports, and lived in Arnold, Mo., where a neighbor had a monster truck.

"I went to school with his daughter and basically got in his way for a long time," said Swim. "He taught me some great stuff and I met people, and finally got the chance to drive, and here I am, driving for the No. 1 team."

Swim feels like driving for Bigfoot is a dream come true. "I grew up watching Bigfoot, and now I get to drive it. Not many people can say they're living their dreams, but I can."

Being 100 miles from where Bigfoot started is a nice homecoming for Swim and the Bad Boy Bigfoot truck. "The whole [Bigfoot] organization there is awesome. One of our top mechanics is down here this weekend crewing for me," Swim said.

A career as a monster truck driver is fun for guys like Swim, but it's also tough being away from family. Typically, they are home for a couple of days a week, traveling every weekend from January through April. After April, they get a couple weekends off, and in the summer, the families are sometimes able to travel with them.

With Cape Girardeau near home for Swim, his family was on hand for this weekend's performance.

"It's tough, but they understand. Plus they get to say that my husband and dad drive Bigfoot, so it all works out."

On Aug. 1, Swim's career took a hard hit -- literally.

"I was in Salinas, Calif. It was a big, outside track, and they had a big dirt hill for the freestyle motocross guys; it was their landing ramp," Swim said. "I launched off of it -- it was probably 30 or 40 feet in the air -- and the truck flat-landed, and when it did, it knocked the bottom out of the seat, compressed my spine and shattered my L1 vertebra.

"It was a hurt like I've never had before."

Six months later, last weekend's Grand Island, Neb., performance was Swim's first show back in the driver's seat since the injury. Swim's seat has changed, and is now a custom-fitted state-of-the-art racing-style seat designed to cushion impacts and support him through the jostles of jumping and racing the monster truck.

Swim and the Bad Boy Bigfoot did not disappoint the crowd at the Show Me Center, popping big air and crushing cars.

"I'm here to see Bigfoot," said Brandon Pelt, attending with his grandfather, Melvin Cox. Decked out in a Bigfoot T-shirt, Brandon said he likes the big trucks and loud engines.

Though there were fewer participants than last year for the arenacross events, riders as young as 6 years old took to the track to tear up the dirt.

Ron Huckstep of Cape Girardeau was on hand to test his skills in the 450-pro category in the arenacross races. He's ridden in these races before, and has been training hard for the upcoming racing season.

"This is fun; it's in town, local," Huckstep said. "We get to blow it out a little, and put on a good race for the hometown people."

Viper was the favorite truck of Lexi Grojean of Jackson, attending with her dad Cory Grojean and her friend Cora Robey. When asked what she looked forward to most, Lexi replied, "When they crush the cars!"