SEVENTEEN-year-old Rosalee Ramer is the youngest professional female monster truck driver in the United States. While most teenagers are just learning how to drive, Rosalee, from Watsonville, California, has been jumping and crushing cars for three years. Rosalee, who became pro at just 14, has been interested in monster trucks since she was a toddler.
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MotorTranscript
00:00Jumping a monster truck is like flying. Now we're going 30, 40, sometimes even 50
00:05feet in the air. It's pretty indescribable.
00:15Some people try and give me a hard time because I'm a girl once in a while but
00:18you know you really can't let it get to you. If you do then that's your biggest
00:22disadvantage.
00:25My name is Rosalie Raymer. I am 20 years old and I am the driver of the
00:31Wildflower Monster Truck and the youngest professional female monster truck driver.
00:35And we're here in Turlock, California today for the Spring Nationals.
00:50So I've been racing monster trucks professionally since I was 14 years old.
00:53When I was 13 I crushed my very first car and then by 14 I was in full-time competition.
01:01All right, hold it.
01:07I think I was too young to remember when I first started working with trucks and cars.
01:13I have pictures at three years old holding flashlights out at monster truck shows while
01:18the guys were working on trucks.
01:24As soon as I got the opportunity. I've always been working on trucks alongside my dad whether
01:28that's working on his truck, helping build my own.
01:32You have that side?
01:35All right.
01:36My dad is like my best friend, you know. It's pretty great getting to spend every weekend on the road with him.
01:41At age 11 she was driving my truck around in the pit area getting comfortable with it.
01:48It was just an ongoing progression and we just added that in. It just seemed like the natural next step
01:55to put her in a monster truck and set up one that fit her and her style.
02:00This is Wildflower, my 1932 Ford Coupe monster truck. She runs on 66 inch tall tires. That's five foot six
02:15inches. That's as tall as I am, but they weigh about somewhere between 600 and 800 pounds depending on
02:21the tire you run. Back here for our power source we've got 565 cubic inches of blown alcohol mode,
02:29so she's got about 15 to 1600 horsepower and she runs on methanol. Back here is my wheelie bar.
02:36You can see it gets a lot of action. Last weekend wheelie contest bent it up a little bit.
02:45We've got two nitrogen shocks on each corner of the truck. So to go along with the two nitrogen
02:50shocks in each corner we run a four link suspension. Monster trucks are a lot to handle. It's two different
02:55complete steering systems, a lot of horsepower, a lot of responsibility, but you know I think
02:59I was definitely ready when I jumped in the seat.
03:11Sometimes I say it's kind of like driving a roller coaster, but I have control over it.
03:19The highest I've jumped is probably about 50 feet in the air.
03:21I mean the adrenaline rush is absolutely insane. Going 30, 40 feet in the air you feel like you're
03:30flying and sometimes there's a moment of hang time when you're up there.
03:33Where you just lose your breath a little bit and you're not sure exactly when you're going to land,
03:41but you're you're still planning for when you do. It's it's pretty incredible.
03:45It's pretty cool. Ready to go dad?
03:51Ready to have some fun? Yes. Alrighty. Love you too. Alrighty, good to go.
03:59I've probably competed in over 300 competitions.
04:15I've won multiple competitions from freestyle to racing to donut competitions and wheelie contests.
04:27I'm studying mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech with a minor in industrial design and right now
04:38I'm going into my fourth year. I try to keep monster trucks in school pretty separate. Right now with
04:43the build of our new truck we're working on the chassis so getting all the tubes bent and fitted before
04:48we weld it up to start putting the rest of the truck together. It's a lot of fun to be able to share
04:55something a passion that you have together makes it just so much more fun and exciting.
05:02Monster truck is the only platform really where girls and boys compete on an even playing field.
05:07There's no girls monster trucks boys monster trucks. We're all out there competing against each other together.
05:12I'm doing something I love to do out here and I like to say I put my best into everything.
05:17I think Rosalie should win the night in the wild.
05:27I think Rosalie should win the night in the wild.