King of the Hill

“Don’t let go of the gas ‘til you see God.” — Carlos Anton

Kennon represents some of the best things a road can offer a driver. Motorists get to enjoy twists and turns, uphill slopes and downhill dives galore. A banked and graded path cut perfectly into the mountainside reduces the roll risk cars experience when taking corners. And the best part, by far: the view. On clear days, like the first bright and sunny day following a strong rain, you can see the Bued River in the ravine flowing alongside the road. Further down Kennon the view becomes more interesting as waterfalls gush with runoff from the monsoon that just passed. Sometimes, when the sun is at just the right angle, the combination of light and spray creates little rainbows at the catch basins of these waterfalls.

The fact that Kennon Road is on the side of (and zigzags through) mountains, however, is a cause for some concern. One wrong move, a miscalculation, can send a car over the edge and into the gorge. Things like this have happened in the past and it is understandable why people unfamiliar with this route up to Baguio would choose the wider, albeit longer, Marcos Highway. Yet for those native to Baguio City, driving next to a cliff is an everyday thing.

Ask racing expert and Baguio-boy Carlos Anton to what he credits his latest motor sport victory and he will say that it comes from driving uphill, downhill and through the meandering roads in and near Baguio City. “I give a lot of credit to being from here because we are constantly used to having a cliff on one side and it doesn’t bother us mentally anymore,” he says, adding, “We see (cliffs) all day so they don’t really scare us.”

Carlos recently finished first place in the First Philippine National Hill Climb Championship, run and organized by the Hill Climb Club of the Philippines. There couldn’t be a better race for him to join. Three races took place in the event: one in Talisay, Batangas, and two others in Morong and Mount Samat, both in Bataan, with Carlos coming out as the overall champion for the entire event. Chalk up one more victory for this proud husband and father and add it to his already remarkable 18-year career. And who better to dedicate this victory to than his mom, who he says has never stopped supporting him in racing or anything else for that matter?

Carlos had already known a hill climb series would be coming up, so he approached the Mark Young Racing Team and asked if they were interested in participating. “I said ‘If you want to join that, I’d be happy to join your team.’ So now I’m racing for Mark Young.” Good for them, they found a champion driver in Carlos. To prepare for the hill climb, Carlos entered in an autocross event so that he could get more accustomed to the car he would be racing — a Honda CRX sitting on Yokohama tires — the car that would take him to the top of the mountain, literally.

The cherry on top of this victory is that Carlos won the event with a considerably weaker car than many of his other competitors. The Honda CRX that belongs to the Mark Young Racing Team, according to Carlos, only pushes about 200 horses under the hood, compared to the other 300-plus horsepower cars he went up against. Analyzing one of the stages, Carlos says: “The things that hold back the (Lancer) Evolutions are maybe the weight and suspension. Our CRX has great suspension.” So it’s not brute force that wins the race, but selecting the right car for the right race. Being able to identify and work around such subtleties in the sport makes Carlos the best example of the saying, “Racing is 10 percent car and 90 percent driver.”

Deciding how to depict Carlos as 2007’s official King of the Hill was a no-brainer. We decided to drive not too far down Kennon Road to the Lion’s Head, one of the other more commercial attractions Kennon has to offer, and concluded by taking his photo there. What better place to take it? Lions are associated with royalty and respect and Kennon is one of the uphill roads many motorists both enjoy and hold in the highest regard. All this, with Carlos posing in the foreground, suggests nothing short of his excellence when it comes to the uphill climb.

But the story doesn’t end just yet and we still have to make it back up to Baguio in time for lunch. Carlos has to go home to his wife and kid and my brother Paulo and I have to be home for the customary “Sunday Lunch with the fam.”

The best part about taking one car and riding down Kennon with Carlos is that you get to ride up. An uphill climb somewhat reminiscent of the competition for Carlos, I’m sure. So we buckle up in the backseat while Carlos takes the wheel. Riding shotgun is his teammate in the hill climb, Alfie Concepcion, who generously volunteered to take his car down Kennon to help us take pictures.

There’s a bit of traffic on the road, a lot of people seem to be going up to Baguio. Carlos lets them pass by and he creates some space between us and them. After a minute or so we start moving, and the second he lets go of the clutch and depresses the accelerator you know why he’s the king. There’s constant power in the wheels, corners feel like a G-force stabilization (if there is such a thing), and the cliff right next to the road ceases to exist. I realize I have a little grin on my face from the rush of it all. I look over to the other side of the back seat and see that my brother has the same smile on his face.

It’s total control of the automobile with Carlos. He fuses the man with the machine. And Kennon Road has never been graced by a more deserving king than he.

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E-mail me at enricomiguelsubido@yahoo.com. Don’t drink and drive and obey traffic rules at all times. And if you want to race and think you have it, take it to the track, not to the streets. Peace!