Classic over-achiever, Laura Butcher, shares an unparalleled perspective into off-road. Currently heading up VORRA and Farmy’s Off Road Park, along with her full-time gig at Tread Lightly! Laura is a wonder. Listen in on the experience she brings to the table. It’s a great listen, be sure to tune in on your favorite podcast app.
5:05 – “are you willing to give welding a shot and be on the Ag Mechanics team?”
22:09 – In EMS, if you can make it in Vegas, you can make it anywhere. I became addicted to the chaos
30:41 – it was 58 below, I ended up with second-degree burns along my rib cage
36:03 – when my brother said, Can you please come home, I came home.
47:24 – everything forward became very serendipitous, starting with the Rebelle Rally
59:41 – We had the VORRA name, now what?
1:09:19 – It all ties together between VORRA, Tread Lightly! and Farmy’s – what led me there was my constant difficulty with BLM permitting.
Special thanks to 4low Magazine and Maxxis Tires for support and sponsorship of this podcast.
TRANSCRIPT
[00:01:39.270] – Big Rich Klein
On this week’s episode of Conversations with Big Rich, it is my pleasure to talk with Laura Butcher. Laura is a Nevada Program Manager for Tread Lightly. She is the owner of VORRA, the Executive Director of Farmies Off Road Park, and a Rebelle Rally competitor. Laura, thank you so much for spending some time and coming on board and having this conversation with me and doing this podcast.
[00:02:06.340] – Laura Butcher
Thanks so much for having me. I’m super excited to be here.
[00:02:09.800] – Big Rich Klein
Let’s jump right in and I’m going to ask you the question I ask everybody. Where were you born and raised?
[00:02:18.810] – Laura Butcher
Okay, yeah, good place to start. I was born in Sacramento, California, and up until the time I was 12, I was raised on the border of two smaller towns near Sacramento, Elk Grove and Galt, California. My dad’s family has a really big ranch in that area, so I grew up out as a farm kid.
[00:02:43.320] – Big Rich Klein
Well, that makes more sense. Okay.
[00:02:45.260] – Laura Butcher
Yeah. And then when I was 12, we moved to Yerington, Nevada.
[00:02:49.700] – Big Rich Klein
That’s a lifestyle change.
[00:02:51.980] – Laura Butcher
That was a bit of a shock to my system, but it worked out really well. I finished eighth grade and all of high school in Yerington, and Nevada became home after that.
[00:03:08.190] – Big Rich Klein
So Yerington, I’m very familiar with the area course because we have something in common. You’re the owner, along with your husband, Brian, of VORRA. I used to be the promoter and owner of VORRA. Yes. Quite a few years been there. That’s where I met Brian, is because he raced with us. But Yerington, it’s a very rural town, like most everything in Nevada, except for Carson, Vegas, and Reno. But it always seemed very family-ish to me. I would agree with that. When we did the races there. So what was it like in Yerrington?
[00:03:49.670] – Laura Butcher
I mean, it’s such a great small town to grow up in, and then I feel so fortunate that I went to high school there because I think that it being such a small community gave me a lot of opportunities that I might not have had going to a bigger school. I graduated with 89 kids in my class, so I knew everyone. Everyone knew me. And not having a ton of kids in your class has its pros and cons like anything else, but it provided me with a wealth of opportunities to participate in different activities and sports. I would say that was probably a big part of shaping me for who I am at this point, being able to be involved in… I was involved in FFA the whole way through my childhood. Well, 4-H, I should say 4-H, and then FFA as a high school kid. Those were big portions of my life. But in addition to that, going to school in a small area, I did cheerleading. I was on the track team. I did high school rodeo, student council. I was involved in a lot of different things because it was a small area.
[00:04:58.580] – Big Rich Klein
yeah, because if you had stayed in, say, that Galt area, I know Galt has a pretty good size high school.
[00:05:05.940] – Laura Butcher
They do. My mom is from Galt and my dad is from Elk Grove. Okay. So I have a lot of family there. It probably would have been great. It would have been fine. I certainly didn’t want to move when I was in junior high. Right. But all things considered, looking back, I think it was a really great decision that my parents made. And the development, the character development for me was really helpful.
[00:05:33.510] – Big Rich Klein
Do you think it’s because with a larger school, you have less of a chance to shine because there’s so many other personalities in a large school?
[00:05:46.550] – Laura Butcher
To an extent, yes. I think that has a lot to do with it. I think that, yeah, it sounds bad, but there’s less competition. But those sports teams, they need a certain amount of kids just to function. And when I was in high school, FFA, for instance, perfect example, the welding team, the ag mechanics team, they didn’t have enough people to compete. So my Ag instructor came to me and was like, Hey, would you be willing to give welding a shot and be on the Ag Mechanics team so that the team can actually compete? And I was like, Absolutely, I will give it a shot. And I worked with my friends that were already involved in that. They taught me how to weld. This group of guys became my best friends at that point. And I did really well with welding at that time and ended up our team was scored very high within the state. And I think I was ranked like the team was second in the state, and I think I was ranked fifth as a welder. Wow. READ MORE
