How a NORRA Mexican 1000 Racer Uses onX Offroad

Meet Boyd

Based out of southern California, Boyd Jaynes has been a professional photographer for years in the automotive industry and off-road racing community. When the historic NORRA Mexican 1000 race came to life again in 2010, Boyd wanted to race. He found a 1968 Bronco and named it “El Diablo Caballo” or “Devil Horse” and entered it in the 1,300 miles race spanning the length of Baja California — and won. And then won the next six years.

As a race photographer, racer and everyday off-road enthusiast, Boyd relies on the onX Offroad App to help him stay on track, find new trails and riding areas, and add Waypoints as he scouts new photography locations.

“I’ve been using onX Offroad App for a while now and can’t imagine hitting the trails without it. I use it to scout for photo shoots, find open trails and add custom Waypoints in the field. The best part is being able to share everything with friends, like photos and tracked routes.”

Color-Coded Maps and Interactive Trails

When traveling to new places, Boyd says it’s handy to quickly check out the App to find public lands and open trails. With Offroad Premium, find public lands like National Forest and BLM in seconds. Zoom in to find trails—green means they’re open and red means they’re temporarily closed—then click for info like open dates, width restrictions and more. Blue trails are Featured with descriptions, difficulty ratings and photos. Also look for recreation points like campgrounds, fishing accesses and rock crawl areas.

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Use onX Offroad With or Without Service

A lot of the locations Boyd travels to are remote and without any cell service or Internet coverage.

“Raise your hand if you’ve been stuck in the backcountry with no service and an outdated map. Yeah, me too. I’ve used a lot of maps and tools in all the years I’ve been off-roading, and onX Offroad is by far the best, especially for offline maps.”

Before you go, take a couple of minutes to download your zone. Tap “Offline Maps” then “New Map.” That’s it. The built-in GPS on your phone will track your location, even without service.

“Sometimes the goal of a journey is to get off the grid. So, before I head into the backcountry, I take a minute to download the map I need. When I’m out of service, the Offroad App’s GPS still works and allows me to track my location and add Waypoints. The downloaded maps help me stay on course and make it back to basecamp at the end of the day.”

Track Your Location, Time, Distance and Speed

The desert is the real deal — as are the mountains, dense forests, or anywhere else you could easily get turned around on a 4-wheeler, dirt bike or even a truck. Track your trip for distance and speed, but also so you can get home safely.

One of my favorite features in the onX Offroad App is the Tracker. I use it to track my route, distance and speed. All you have to do is tap the green ‘Start’ button. When you’re done, hit ‘Stop’ and save it for later. It’s that easy. The Tracker shows me where I’ve been and helps me gauge when I’ll need fuel.

Last year at the Sonora Rally in northern Mexico, I was working as a photographer. The course is secret to the racers and almost just as hard to find for us media guys looking to shoot the action. Before heading into the massive sand dunes, I started the Tracker. After shooting the racers all day and staring into endless dunes, everything started to look the same. When it was time to head back to civilization, I used the Tracker to follow my steps back out, something that would have been impossible without the App.

Customize Your Markups and Share

When you’re done adventuring, document your trip by saving your markups. Add notes and photos to Waypoints, name your Tracks and then share everything with friends.

“As a photographer, I scout a lot of places for potential photo shoots. This requires detailed notes, directions and photos—all of which I have to relay back to my team. onX Offroad has made it really easy to track my route so I know how to get to specific locations, as well as add Waypoints with photos and notes like “Epic spot for a sunset shot” or “Set up basecamp here.”

After a scout, it’s so easy for me to share everything with my team. Go to ‘My Content’ and there you’ll see saved Tracks, Waypoints, Areas and Lines that you’ve saved. Choose what you want to share, then tap the three dots and ‘Share.’ They can upload that data into their own Offroad App.”

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Jenny Sheets

Jenny Sheets is the copywriter and vertical marketing specialist for onX Offroad. She lives in Montana where she dirt bikes, trail runs, camps, and overlands with her husband, dog, and son, Henry Danger.