Monster Jam World Finals XVII

Monster Jam World Finals XVII
Promotional logo.
Host	FELD Motorsports
League	Monster Jam
Date	March 17-19th, 2016
City	Las Vegas, Nevada
Venue	Sam Boyd Stadium

Monster Jam World Finals XVII (Also written as Monster Jam World Finals 17) was the seventeenth Monster Jam World Finals, held on March 17-19th, 2016 at Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada. A thirty-two truck lineup was featured for the main event, with two of the competitors being the champions of both of that year's Fox Sports 1 Championship Series and Monster Jam AMSOIL Series, respectively. Meanwhile, a sixteen-truck lineup was featured for the Young Guns Shootout. The event was broadcast on Fox Sports 1 after it took place. Scott Liddycoat in Dragon won the Young Guns Shootout championship, defeating Tyler Menninga in Blue Thunder. For the main event, Team Grave Digger would win both racing and freestyle championships, with Morgan Kane winning the world racing championship, defeating reigning champion Todd LeDuc in Metal Mulisha. Adam Anderson would then go on to win the world freestyle championship with a score of 33.

Lineups

(Note: * indicates a truck/driver's first Young Guns Shootout/World Finals appearance).

(Note: ** indicates a truck/driver's only Young Guns Shootout/World Finals appearance).

(Note: *** indicates a truck/driver's last Young Guns Shootout/World Finals appearance).

Young Guns Shootout

1. Dragon*** - Scott Liddycoat***
2. Soldier Fortune Black Ops - Tony Ochs
3. Wild Flower** - Rosalee Ramer**
4. Obsessed* - Eric Swanson*
5. Hurricane Force*** - Steven Thompson***
6. Razin Kane*** - Buddy Tompkins**
7. Saigon Shaker* - Ryan Disharoon*
8. El Toro Loco (Yellow) - Becky McDonough***
9. Max-D (Yellow)* - Jared Eichelberger*
10. New Earth Authority - Travis Groth***
11. Pirate's Curse* - Steven Sims***
12. Scooby-Doo! - Bailey Shea
13. Zombie (Yellow)* - Tyler Groth
14. El Toro Loco (Orange) - Kayla Blood*
15. Monster Mutt Dalmatian - Cynthia Gauthier
16. Blue Thunder - Tyler Menninga**

Main event

1. Metal Mulisha - Todd LeDuc
2. Grave Digger (Chrome) - Dennis Anderson***
3. Son-Uva Digger - Ryan Anderson
4. Northern Nightmare - Cam McQueen
5. Titan - Donald Epidendio
6. Monster Mutt Dalmatian - Candice Jolly
7. El Toro Loco (Black) - Marc McDonald
8. Mohawk Warrior - George Balhan
9. VP Racing Fuels' The Mad Scientist - Lee O'Donnell
10. Team Hot Wheels Firestorm - Scott Buetow
11. American Sniper Bounty Hunter - Jimmy Creten
12. Monster Mutt - Charlie Pauken
13. Doom's Day*** - Pablo Huffaker***
14. Alien Invasion** - Chad Tingler***
15. Fox Sports 1 Cleatus (On Max-D 5) - Neil Elliott
16. Scooby-Doo! - Nicole Johnson***
17. Gas Monkey Garage - BJ Johnson
18. Overkill Evolution - Mike Vaters II
19. Avenger - Jim Koehler
20. Max-D - Tom Meents
21. Lucas Oil Crusader - Linsey Weenk
22. Monster Energy (Escalade) - Damon Bradshaw***
23. Monster Mutt Junkyard Dog** - Dustin Brown***
24. Soldier Fortune - Chad Fortune
25. Zombie - Bari Musawwir
26. Max-D (Gold) - Colton Eichelberger
27. Monster Energy (F-150) - Coty Saucier
28. Madusa - Brianna Mahon*
29. Grave Digger - Adam Anderson (Fox Sports 1 Championship Series champion)
30. Grave Digger (Purple) - Cole Venard (East Coast Monster Jam AMSOIL Series champion)*
31. Grave Digger (Orange) - Morgan Kane (West Coast Monster Jam AMSOIL Series champion)
32. Dragon - Scott Liddycoat (Young Guns Shootout champion)**

Special bodies

• Hurricane Force featured a special headlight pattern on the truck.
• Razin Kane would run a special livery aqua blue body for the Young Guns Shootout.
• Bounty Hunter debuted the American Sniper Bounty Hunter at Friday's pit party.
• Overkill Evolution ran a chrome body.
• Avenger ran a Junkyard themed body.
• Titan debuted the carbon fiber body.
• Grave Digger 31 ran a purple body.
• Grave Digger 25 ran an orange body.
• Jester displayed a leprechaun design to celebrate St. Patrick's day. (did not compete)
• Zombie Hunter displayed the full final design for 2016. (did not compete)

Hurricane Force's special headlight pattern.

Razin Kane's aqua blue body.

American Sniper Bounty Hunter.

Chrome Overkill Evolution.

Blue Avenger.

Carbon fiber Titan.

Purple Grave Digger.

Orange Grave Digger.

The completed Zombie Hunter, originally supposed to have run the completed body for the 2016 season, but only wore it on display for this event.

"Make a Wish Foundation Day"

The trucks practicing on Wednesday.

Soldier Fortune violently wrecks.

On Wednesday March 16th 2016, Monster Jam held their annual "Make a Wish Foundation Day", giving truck rides and autographs to disabled/terminal children. Trucks also practiced that night on the track.

Results

Dirt crews work on the St. Patrick's Day decorated track for Thursday's qualifying and Young Guns Shootout.

Young Guns Shootout

Round one

Pirate's Curse vs. Saigon Shaker

Monster Mutt Dalmatian vs. New Earth Authority

El Toro Loco (Blood) vs. Dragon

Max-D vs. Scooby-Doo!

El Toro Loco (McDonough) vs. Obsessed

Hurricane Force vs. Zombie

Razin Kane vs. Soldier Fortune Black Ops

Blue Thunder vs. Wild Flower

Round 2

Pirate's Curse (Red-lights, crashes) vs. Monster Mutt Dalmatian

Max-D (Crashes) vs. Dragon

El Toro Loco (McDonough) vs. Zombie

The Young Guns Shootout championship race.

Razin Kane vs. Blue Thunder

Semi finals

Monster Mutt Dalmatian vs. Dragon

Blue Thunder vs. El Toro Loco (McDonough) (Crashes)

Championship race

Blue Thunder vs. Dragon

Pirate's Curse backflipping for the encore.

Young Guns Shootout encore 

Followed by Wild Flower.

The Young Guns Shootout encore featured all of the Young Guns Shootout competitors performing donuts. Afterward, Pirate's Curse and Wild Flower performed simultaneous backflips.

Qualifying times

1. Monster Energy (Bradshaw) - 15.815
2. Grave Digger (Kane) - 15.899
3. Son-Uva Digger - 15.924
4. Grave Digger (A. Anderson) - 15.940
5. Metal Mulisha - 16.000
6. Max-D (Meents) - 16.018
7. Fox Sports 1 Cleatus - 16.176
8. Dragon - 16.179
9. Monster Energy (Saucier) - 16.180
10. Gas Monkey Garage - 16.255
11. Monster Mutt - 16.264
12. Bounty Hunter - 16.267
13. Monster Mutt Junkyard Dog - 16.279
14. Northern Nightmare - 16.322
15. Doom's Day - 16.337
16. Mad Scientist - 16.380
17. Alien Invasion - 16.453
18. Zombie - 16.463
19. El Toro Loco - 16.474
20. Mohawk Warrior - 16.518
21. Soldier Fortune - 16.530
22. Grave Digger (D. Anderson) - 16.614
23. Titan - 16.635
24. Team Hot Wheels Firestorm - 16.665
25. Lucas Oil Crusader - 16.724
26. Monster Mutt Dalmatian - 16.746
27. Scooby-Doo - 16.809
28. Grave Digger (Venard) - 16.834
29. Avenger - 16.873
30. Max-D (Eichelberger) - 16.894
31. Madusa - 17.065
32. Overkill Evolution - 17.128

World Finals racing

Round one

Alien Invasion vs. Mad Scientist

Monster Energy (Saucier) vs Team Hot Wheels Firestorm

Lucas Oil Crusader vs. Dragon

Metal Mulisha vs Grave Digger (Venard)

Soldier Fortune vs. Bounty Hunter (broke) (350th race of the World Finals)

Mohawk Warrior vs. Monster Mutt Junkyard Dog

Avenger vs. Grave Digger (A. Anderson)

Max-D (Eichelberger) (save) vs. Son-Uva Digger

Gold Max-D's crazy save.

Northern Nightmare vs. El Toro Loco

Monster Mutt vs. Grave Digger (D. Anderson)

Max-D (Meents) vs. Scooby-Doo!

Fox Sports 1 Cleatus vs. Monster Mutt Dalmatian

Titan vs. Gas Monkey Garage

Doomsday vs. Zombie

Overkill Evolution (broke) vs. Monster Energy (Bradshaw)

Grave Digger (Kane) vs. Madusa

Round two

Monster Energy (Saucier) vs. Lucas Oil Crusader

Metal Mulisha vs. Soldier Fortune

Mohawk Warrior vs. Grave Digger (A. Anderson)

El Toro Loco vs. Son-Uva Digger

Max-D (Meents) vs. Grave Digger (D. Anderson)

Fox Sports 1 Cleatus vs. Gas Monkey Garage

Mad Scientist vs. Monster Energy (Bradshaw)

Grave Digger (Kane) vs. Zombie

Quarter-finals

Monster Energy (Saucier) vs. Monster Energy (Bradshaw) (broke)

Gas Monkey Garage's crash.

Metal Mulisha vs. Grave Digger (A. Anderson)

Max-D (Meents) vs. Son-Uva Digger

Grave Digger (Kane) vs. Gas Monkey Garage (crashes)

Semi-finals

Metal Mulisha vs. Monster Energy (Saucier)

Grave Digger (Kane) vs. Son-Uva Digger

Championship race

Grave Digger orange and Metal Mulisha in the championship race.

Grave Digger (Kane) vs. Metal Mulisha

Racing encore

The racing encore featured Tom Meents in Max-D jumping over five trucks, using the middle ramp. After successfully jumping over all five trucks, Meents would drive straight towards the backflip wall, performing a backflip in the process.

Max-D jumping over Monster Mutt Dalmatian, Pirate's Curse, Maximum Destruction, El Toro Loco and Blue Thunder.

Freestyle order

1. Grave Digger (Venard)
2. Madusa
3. Bounty Hunter
4. Soldier Fortune
5. Dragon
6. Scooby-Doo!
7. Max-D (Eichelberger)
8. Monster Mutt
9. Grave Digger (Kane)
10. Fox Sports 1 Cleatus
11. VP Racing Fuels' The Mad Scientist
12. Zombie
13. Mohawk Warrior
14. Monster Mutt Junkyard Dog
15. Titan
16. Grave Digger (Dennis)
17. Gas Monkey Garage
18. Avenger
19. Monster Energy (Saucier)
20. El Toro Loco (Black)
21. Monster Mutt Dalmatian
22. Team Hot Wheels Firestorm
23. Northern Nightmare
24. Lucas Oil Crusader
25. Grave Digger (Adam)
26. Doom's Day
27. Alien Invasion
28. Monster Energy (Bradshaw)
29. Max-D (Meents)
30. Metal Mulisha
31. Overkill Evolution
32. Son-uva Digger

Freestyle scores

1. Grave Digger (A. Anderson) - 33
2. Monster Energy (Bradshaw) - 32.5
3. Grave Digger (D. Anderson) - 31.5
4. Grave Digger (Venard) - 30.5
5. Team Hot Wheels Firestorm - 30.5

   

6. Son-Uva Digger - 30.5
7. Metal Mulisha - 29.5
8. Northern Nightmare - 29
9. El Toro Loco - 28.5

   

   Madusa's backflip.

10. Alien Invasion - 25.5
11. Soldier Fortune - 25.5
12. Madusa - 24.5
13. Monster Mutt - 24.5
14. Overkill Evolution - 24.5
15. Titan - 23.5

    

    Titan getting big air.

16. Grave Digger (Kane) - 23
17. Zombie - 23
18. Fox Sports 1 Cleatus - 22.5
19. Max-D (Meents) - 21.5
20. Max-D (Eichelberger) - 20

    

    Avenger's early crash.

21. Scooby-Doo! - 19
22. VP Racing Fuels The Mad Scientist - 19
23. Mohawk Warrior - 19
24. Dragon - 18.5
25. Lucas Oil Crusader - 17.5
26. Monster Mutt Junkyard Dog - 15.5

    

    Team Hot Wheels Firestorm's backflip.

27. Monster Energy (Saucier) - 15.5
28. Monster Mutt Dalmatian - 14.5
29. Doomsday - 14.5
30. Bounty Hunter - 14
31. Gas Monkey Garage - 13
32. Avenger - 12

    

    Adam Anderson's winning performance.

Freestyle encore

Soldier Fortune and Soldier Fortune Black Ops doing backflips.

The military trucks all do backflips for the freestyle encore.

For the freestyle encore, a spare Soldier Fortune, Soldier Fortune Black Ops, and other military-themed trucks came out and performed donuts, in honor of the United States military. Then, all five military trucks performed simultaneous backflips off of the front backflip wall, while Soldier Fortune and Soldier Fortune Black Ops backflipped off the backflip ramp at the back of the stadium.

• Army (FELD) (Max-D): Neil Elliott
• Navy: Jon Zimmer
• Air Force (FELD) (BKT Race): Carl Van Horn
• Marines (Zombie Hunter): Randy Brown
• Coast Guard: Rod Schmidt
• Soldier Fortune: Chad Fortune
• Soldier Fortune Black Ops: Lupe Soza

Other awards

Jim Koehler and Ryan Anderson after winning their awards.

• Rising Star – Stinger (Zane Rettew)
• Arena Donut – Monster Mutt Dalmatian (Cynthia Gauthier)
• Save – Northern Nightmare (Cam McQueen)
• Rookie – Wild Flower (Rosalee Ramer)
• Stadium Donut – Max-D (Tom Meents)
• Arena Wheelie – Carolina Crusher (Gary Porter)
• Stadium Wheelie – Grave Digger (Charlie Pauken)
• Extreme Air – Avenger (Jim Koehler)
• UTI Technician – Hurricane Force (Steve Thompson)
• Arena Freestyle – Zombie (Bari Musawwir)
• Stadium Freestyle – Max-D (Neil Elliott)
• WOW Factor – Son-uva Digger (Ryan Anderson)

Trivia

Northern Nightmare, Lobbing the brake line into the crowd.

• This event marked the first of the following occurrences:
  • The first World Finals in which Grave Digger won the world racing championship since 2010, and the first World Finals in which said truck won the world freestyle championship since 2000.
  • The first World Finals in which the Young Guns Shootout champion would crash in the freestyle competition.
• This event marked the last of the following occurrences:
  • The last World Finals to use manual judging. This would not be used again until World Finals XXI.
  • The last World Finals to feature a home release DVD.
• On Friday, in the first round of racing, Northern Nightmare lost control, and sparks shot from the brake lines of the truck, sending a chunk of metal flying into the stands, hitting a group of people. Luckily, no one was seriously injured in the accident.
• This would be the second year in a row that Brianna Mahon would cover for Madusa, as she had an injury and sat out so far in 2016. Last year, at the WF16, she covered for her as she was attending a WWE awards ceremony.
• The "Jester" truck (set to display at the pit party), on its way to Las Vegas, encountered the truck trailer carrying The Xtermigator and Razin Kane (the former also set to appear at the pit party while the latter to perform at the Young Guns Shootout). The teams for Xtermigator and Razin Kane and for Jester decided to hitch a ride together in the Jester trailer truck to Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas, accidentally leaving the trailer for Xtermigator and Razin Kane behind in New Mexico. The Jester trailer truck had to return to New Mexico 400 miles away (thus 800 miles round trip) to bring it to Las Vegas. To accurately depict actual events regarding this event. Team RKMT had transmission trouble with their rig and broke down in Gallup, New Mexico with Razin Kane and Xtermigator in the trailer. Team Jester had left about 24 hours later than the team RKMT trailer and while on the way to Sam Boyd Stadium picked up Team RKMT driver Buddy Tompkins in New Mexico and continued to Las Vegas. The Jester trailer along with Ice Cream Man that was riding in the trailer as well were dropped off at Sam Boyd Stadium. The Team Jester rig doubled back to New Mexico to pick up the Team RKMT trailer to bring it to Las Vegas while the RKMT rig was left behind to have the transmission repaired. Both teams and all 4 trucks made it to the stadium without missing any events.
• The pit party would be the largest to date, having 100+ trucks attending (Including competing trucks).
• Neil Elliott drove Fox Sports 1 Cleatus on his Maximum Destruction chassis. As a Maximum Destruction driver, he was one of only two drivers to run alternate bodies (the other being Grave Digger's Charlie Pauken who drove Monster Mutt on its normal chassis.)
• Many of the decorations on merchandise have been themed off gold and clovers, due to part of the event (the Young Guns Shootout) taking place on St. Patrick's day.
• YouTube gained some minor controversy in 2016 after the audio on several amateur videos of Avenger's World Finals 17 freestyle was muted out due to copyright reasons due to the song that was playing during Avenger's freestyle. At least six videos were muted out by YouTube, including a full freestyle compilation video, which had to be entirely re-uploaded with Avenger self-muted after YouTube muted the entire video solely due to Avenger's freestyle. The muted song was Let Me Hear You Scream by Ozzy Osbourne.
• Play'n For Keeps broke down during the pit party truck parade.
• During the airing of the freestyle event on Fox Sports 1, Monster Jam did a special side by side comparison, simultaneously showing Dennis Anderson and Adam Anderson freestyling, comparing the two freestyles analytically, due to the fan judging controversy that occurred that year.
• Team Hot Wheels Firestorm did three backflips in his freestyle run, making it the first time a truck has done three backflips in a single run.
• During practice on Wednesday, Soldier Fortune would flip going into the turn during a race, footage of the crash can be found in a 360 video published by Monster Jam, titled "Monster Jam World Finals XVII racing practice - 360 Video".

Pit party (Non-competing) trucks

• Backwards Bob
• BKT
• BKT Ride Truck
• Black Stallion
• Brutus
• Captain's Curse
• Carolina Crusher
• D'Sturbed
• Dirt Crew
• El Diablo
• Enforcer
• Equalizer
• Extinguisher
• The Felon
• Fluffy
• Grave Digger 11
• Grave Digger 23
• Grave Digger 27
• Grave Digger 29
• Grave Digger 26
• Hitman
• Ice Cream Man
• Iron Outlaw
• Jester (Leprechaun body)
• King Krunch
• Knucklehead
• Second Madusa (Pink)
• Maniac
• Maverik Monster Trakker
• McGruff
• Midnight Rider
• Monster Mutt Rottweiler
• Monster Patrol
• Nasty Boy
• Obsession
• Play'n For Keeps
• Quad Chaos
• Rage
• Rat Attack
• Red Solo Truck
• Reptoid
• Scarlet Bandit
• Sergeant Smash
• Skull Krusher
• Sniper (Was initially planned to debut at the 2015 pit party, but was unable to be completed in time.)
• Storm Damage
• T-Maxxx
• T-Wrecks
• Thumper
• Thunder Chicken
• Time Flys
• TNT
• Unnamed & Untamed
• Venom (Echternkamp)
• Warrior (Ride Truck)
• Wheels of Freedom
• Wild Thang
• XDP Diesel
• The Xtermigator
• Zombie Hunter (Last appearance)

Pit party trucks that did not appear

• Airborne Ranger
• Cyclops
• Sheer Insanity
• Survivor