Mike Klensin was born and raised in Tucson, Arizona. His parents were both elementary school teachers and he grew up watching his father do his own vehicle repairs. Those skills helped mold his future.

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As a kid he progressed rapidly from riding bicycles to racing BMX bikes, then off-road desert racing on dirt bikes.

A passion for racing doesn’t come cheap, so an entrepreneurial spirit helps. He started generating income at 15 when he found there was good money in roof coating. Then he approached car dealerships and offered to wash their cars. How did he get to work? His first transportation was a 1948 Cushman Eagle motor scooter. “I drove that because at 15 you didn’t have to wait for a driver’s license.”

From two wheels to four

Retail jobs helped him pay for real cars. His first used vehicle was a ’68 VW bug and his first new vehicle came right out of high school – a 4wd Tacoma pickup truck. He was disappointed to find it wasn’t going to do what he wanted it to do. Rather than pay someone else to build the off-road vehicle he wanted, he decided to build his own.

His first off-road vehicle was a ’46 Willy’s Jeep; he upgraded the engine, changed the steering, put a lift on it and added a roll cage. Soon other enthusiasts were asking him to build vehicles for them.

In ’97 Mike landed a job doing vehicle repairs for a local dealership. “As far as learning how to work on cars, that came from my dad.” In the four years that followed he received brand-specific training and earned certifications, but “I couldn’t get paid enough there. They always saw me as an apprentice, even though I was training new guys. The dealership paid them double what they paid me.”

Growing his own business

In 2001 Mike and a coworker quit and opened their own auto repair shop. “It went really well for a year. We made a bunch of money. I worked the office and my partner worked in the shop. After about a year he started wanting to flip roles, so I bought him out.”

That same year he started doing rock crawling and began building rock crawlers for himself and others. By 2006 he was doing more 4wd work than auto repair; so he pursued off-road repairs and enhancements exclusively. “We did custom fab work and regular off-road; we used to do big builds – about 70,000 Jeep builds.”

When the economy changed, he adapted. “We closed our retail location and put the wholesale business online. Today we have customers all over the U.S., in Mexico and in Australia.”

In 2009 he took third at a rock crawling event that qualified him to race the 2010 King of the Hammers. By 2012 he was ninth out of the top ten at King of the Hammers.

Mike’s company is Crossed-Up Customs – “Artec industries is the #1 seller for our chassis.” Mike met Amanda Products through Artec. “The people at Amanda Products went to Artec and said ‘we want one of these chassis;’ and that’s how I met them. I built the 4-seater for their SEMA booth.”

Learn more about Amanda Products and the SEMA show: http://www.off-road.com/blog/2013/11/03/amanda-products-and-amanda-manufacturing-launch-new-websites/

Today Mike is 37 years old, divorced, with an 11 year old daughter Alyssa. “She goes to races with me when she can and is bugging me for a race car herself.”

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Besides Alyssa …

What are you most proud of?

“In 2012 we were top ten at King of the Hammers; we finished 9th and barrel rolled off the finish. The car was about 1 season old. We had just worked all the bugs out of it, spent a lot of frustrating finishes through that year getting the bugs worked out. We finished real well and showed people we could do it.”

See the spectacular finish, video by TailgunnerMedia – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5YxT-ouBDU

Any advice for enthusiasts who want to race?

“Be consistent and keep the car in one piece. Anyone can be fast on a certain track, but to be consistently fast without overdriving the car … if you don’t finish the race, it doesn’t matter how fast you are. In the end people don’t say ‘he was leading the race at mile 55’ – it’s how did you finish. People recognize finishes, not tries.”

What’s your next big thing?

“I’m in the process of building a new car for the 2015 season. John Brock owns this one. I built the chassis, he built the rest.” He promises to share photos as he goes.

Follow him on Facebook at Team Crossed Up Off Road