Vaughn Gittin Jr. cleans up on any surface.
In May the semi-retired and two-time Formula Drift PRO champion showed up at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta and took down his RTR teammate and five-time Formula Drift PRO champion James Deane at round two of the 2026 Formula Drift PRO Championship.
Exactly one month later, Vaughn Gittin and teammate Loren Healy entered the 2026 Baja 500 in Ensenada, Mexico and lined up in their Ultra4 4400 Ford Bronco Raptors.
After all was said and done during the grueling, teeth chattering 468.70-mile race across the Baja Peninsula, Healy and Gittin placed second and sixth, respectively, in the fiercely competitive Class 1 classification.
Back home in Concord, North Carolina and making things happen at the RTR Lab, Gittin took a breather to talk about his recent competitive travels and accomplishments.
“I’m back at the RTR Lab,” said Gittin Jr., 46, said on June 12. “I just got back from the Baja 500 and catching up on work stuff and then I’m heading to do a test tomorrow with some of our production vehicles. I am super pumped. Baja is such a freaking crazy challenge, right? Man, machine, team and terrain. This was our second Baja 500 that we’ve done in the big trucks. We took our Ultra 4400 Raptors out there.
“Myself and my teammate Loren Healy went out there and put in the work. We pre-ran for almost a week. We put in about 800 miles before the race started. It was really, really amazing to get the work put in. Last year I blew the corner off my truck off a big-ass rock that I forgot to put a note in about,” he said. “This year I noted every single rock on the left and the right side of the course. Yeah, we were in Class 1 this year. They changed the rules a bit and now our trucks were eligible for that.
“Frankly, it’s a better place for us. We put the work in pre-running and then come race day we were ready to rock. It really showed that putting in the work allowed us to have the confidence and the ability to have the pace. The race was going really incredible. Loren and I were following our strategy and running in the top three for the majority of the race and the first few hundred miles. Unfortunately I had some mechanical gremlins.”
Gittin entered the Formula Drift PRO Championship round at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta and after winning the Top 32, Top 16, Great Eight and Final Four tandem battles, took down teammate James Deane in the final to score the Round 2 victory.
“Going into Atlanta I had high hopes,” explained Gittin. “You know I’ve won there more than anyone. The whole weekend myself and my teammate James Deane were talking trash. He knocked me out in the Top 32 two years before this and I was like, ‘I’m going to see you in the freaking finals and I’m going to whoop your ass!’
“Sure enough, after qualifying they lined us up to where we sure could meet in the finals,” Gittin added. “When I got there, we had so many changes to the Mustang since I drove in the off-season that I realized in the first lap, ‘Shit! I don’t even know how to drive this car.’ It was so different that the timing and approach to it was different. I really just put my head down and just really intensely focused on learning the car, learning what the judges were looking for and just staying really dialed and that really just unlocked a really great performance. When it came to competition, I was just really, really dialed in. I got the grasp of the car and just felt super, super connected to it. It would let me do anything. It was like a fairy tale. I mean I just knocked out competitor after competitor.”
Facing Deane in the final was a thrill for Gittin.
“James and I lined up and had an incredible battle and I got the win and an incredible, incredible end of the event. It was awesome,” Gittin said. “I got the monkey off my back and beat James. James is a five-time champion and arguably the greatest of all time when it comes to competition and I got to whoop-up on him. It was really cool. It was literally a fairy tale night and I’m just grateful and proud to been able to make it happen. Being able to come and do a couple rounds a year really is filling what was a hole in my competitive spirit. To be able to come back and win, especially at the level that things are happening, is really reassuring. It feels really good.”
So what else might be next for motorsports Renaissance man Vaughn Gittin Jr.?
“We have a Trophy Truck that we’re building right now to get to that pinnacle of off-road,” answered Gittin. “I’ve got my eye on maybe some hill climb stuff. I am talking in hoping in for a roadrace here or there in the next couple years. I’m not crazy interested in NASCAR Cup. A road course would be fun, but I am not interested in putting in the time that it would take to get on the level of those guys on an oval. Whatever is challenging and fun, you know? That’s what I am.
“My compass is in the pursuit of fun and inspiring people and challenging myself. Whatever that may be right now, I don’t know. I really love what I’m doing, but I am looking at some more bigger scale events in a similar space. We’re assessing the future and one thig I know for sure: it’s going to be awesome.”
