Brad Lovell's F-150 Raptor Wins Vegas to Reno Stock Class for the Fourth Straight Time

Source: Ford Authority — September 4, 2026

The 2026 Casey Folks Vegas to Reno race is America's longest off-road race, stretching more than 500 miles across Nevada desert. In the Stock Full-Size class this year, Brad Lovell, Adam Lovell, Jason Hutter, and Paul Blangsted drove a production-based Ford F-150 Raptor powered by the 3.5L EcoBoost V6 to the class win — finishing more than an hour and a half ahead of the next competitor. It was the Raptor's fourth consecutive Stock Full-Size win in as many starts at this race. Four for four.

That stat is worth sitting with. A truck that leaves the factory road-legal, with stock suspension geometry and a bone-stock drivetrain configuration for class purposes, just beat everything in its category across 500-plus miles of washboard, silt beds, and high-speed Nevada desert. The braking demands in that environment are nothing like a highway commute — repeated hard stops from high speed into technical sections, brake fade risk from heat buildup over hours of continuous running, and no time to cool down between hits.

What Desert Racing Asks of Your Brakes

Off-road desert racing is one of the harshest brake use cases in motorsport. Unlike road racing, where a structured track gives you predictable braking zones, desert racing throws random speed changes at you constantly — a whooped-out section followed by a 100+ mph dry lake pass, then a blind corner. Pedal feel and fade resistance matter more than raw stopping power alone. The hardware needs to work the first time, every time, for hundreds of miles straight.

The stock Raptor brakes are decent for what they are. But when you're pushing a truck this hard — or towing near its limits, running fire roads, or just want the confidence of knowing your setup has genuine headroom above your use case — the factory setup has real limits.

Alcon's Big Brake Kit for the F-150 Raptor

The Alcon Front Big Brake Kit for the 2010-2020 Ford Raptor and F-150 is the most complete brake upgrade available for this platform. It's built by Alcon — the same company whose motorsport calipers appear on race cars across endurance, rally, and off-road programs globally — and engineered specifically for the Raptor's unique front-end geometry and axle loads.

The kit upgrades rotor diameter and moves to a multi-piston Alcon caliper, dramatically increasing clamping force and rotor surface area compared to the factory single-piston sliding unit. More swept area means more heat capacity. More clamping force means shorter stops with less pedal effort under load. And because Alcon uses motorsport-derived materials and machining standards, the fade resistance curve holds up far longer into hard use than an OEM pad-and-rotor swap could deliver.

Beyond the performance numbers, there's the visual side: an Alcon caliper sitting behind a Raptor wheel is an unmistakable statement. Red anodized finish, laser-etched branding, and a profile that fills the wheel arch the way the factory hardware simply doesn't. If the wheel is going on, might as well have something worth looking at behind it.

At $3,250 for the front kit, this is a serious upgrade for a serious truck. It fits 2010-2020 Raptor and F-150 models — a wide window that covers a lot of trucks that are already lifted, modified, and used hard.

The Raptor Platform's Track Record

Four straight Vegas to Reno Stock Full-Size wins is not luck. It reflects a platform that's genuinely competitive in one of the most demanding environments you can run a truck through. If you own a Raptor or F-150 and use it anywhere close to its limits — towing heavy loads, trail running, overlanding, competitive off-road — the brake system is worth upgrading before you need it, not after.

We covered the Raptor T1+ program at this same race earlier this season. If you want more context on what Vegas to Reno demands from a truck's brake hardware end-to-end, read our earlier breakdown: Ford Raptor T1+ Makes U.S. Desert Racing Debut.

See the Alcon Front Big Brake Kit for the Ford Raptor / F-150 →