Dirt NationI've had some pretty dumb adventures in my life. For some, a pal had to drag me along, like when my friend Rebecca and I rode 50cc Chinese motorcycles across Mongolia for 11 days. Other adventures I have instigated all on my own. Racing a Mazda Miata in a Baja desert race is probably the stupidest idea I've come up with in a long time.For some unknown reason I've decided that it is completely reasonable to pay over $6,000 in entry fees– along with paying for hotels, food, gas, prep and spares– to race 500 miles in Baja California in the NORRA 500 October 9-10 in Buddy the Off Road Miata. The cool part is you can follow along live with in-car footage thanks to Starlink and StarStream on my YouTube and Instagram page. Live tracking will be on the NORRA website. The uncool part? Buddy might just break in half.I've raced in Baja before in a few different classes, but this will be the first Mexican race for Buddy. He's not new to racing though. I wrote about a race in Laughlin, here on the hallowed pages of Jalopnik, and Buddy and I even took first in class at the Mint 400...twice! But Baja is a whole different desert. Here the silt comes up fast and the g-outs even faster. You can be clamoring over rocks one second and then trying to survive the whoops the next. Baja is unforgiving and all I want to do is finish. That's right, our motto is JFF: Just F–ing Finish.The FormatDirt NationThere is no pre-running at NORRA like there is with other Baja races like the SCORE Baja 1000. Instead of releasing the map early, allowing teams to do a week or more of reconnaissance and mark their GPS routes with preferred lines and such, NORRA gives us a GPS file the night before the race and a digital roadbook. My navigator, RobBob Stewart, will use the roadbook to warn me of any dangers all while monitoring the GPS, gauges and watching our six. That's off-road speak for cars coming up behind us, of which I predict there will be many.Another difference here is the format. While the SCORE races are a sprint, NORRA uses a rally format, with strict on-time rules and transit stages. We'll start in Ensenada and head south, taking on special stages in the dirt as well as transit stages on the pavement. Although there is a time limit to the transit stages, they are padded with time so my team will have the opportunity to fix relatively small issues during a transit. The only help on the special stages is fuel. If I break during a special Rob and I will either have to fix it ourselves or wait for the sweep to tow us out.We'll end the first day in San Quintin, some 115 pavement-miles south of the starting line. There we will have an overnight to address any major problems. The next morning it's back up to Ensenada for the finish line. And let me tell you, a finish-line beer is the best beer you've ever tasted.The PrepDusty SummitIt's been about two and a half years since Jalopnik readers have seen Buddy on the site and since then I've done some upgrades. We are on our fourth and I think final suspension iteration. Buddy still runs the Fox 2.0 shocks but now he has reservoirs for heat management and less fade and each corner has a dual spring set up thanks to Hyperco. The 3D-printed bump stops from Perry Parts are key here, making sure we can use all the travel from the arms without damage. Buddy still has the stock lower arms all the way around, but they have been boxed and plated for strength. I've been running the custom chromoly front upper control arms with a uniball for a while, but I also installed a set of adjustable rear control arms from Paco Motorsports so now the rear can actually be aligned. It takes a bit of grinding to get one side to fit with the bump stop mounts– I never said this car was straight– but it's crammed in there.Moving on to the rear, the differential now has a beefy skid plate and it's welded. I had been thinking about welding the diff for years and I finally bit the bullet. I'll be taking the old LSD with me in case it explodes, but the locked rear end will make the silt less scary. At least, that's my thought.Up front, Buddy has an everyday 1.8-liter Miata engine with stock internals. It's turbocharged for a whopping seven pounds of boost and tuned to 200 horsepower thanks to Toby at Advanced Engine Dynamics. Toby also programmed a dummy limp mode in case the car gets too hot. I'm not saying I grenaded the last motor this way...but I'm not saying it didn't happen either. I got rid of the Jackson Racing M45 supercharger a few races ago, which brings me to the upgrade I should have done when I first decided to race this car.Buddy's basicsEmme HallBuddy now has a real off-road UMP air filter that is located inside the cabin. The one that came with the supercharger was completely insufficient and contributed to its early demise. This big ol' honker is the same air filter I used to run with my air-cooled Volkswagen. It's effective and easy to clean, which means Buddy breathes cleaner.Lastly, I took out Buddy's windshield and added a fresh-air breathing system from Rugged Radios. RobBob and I will have clean air pumped into our helmets so we won't have to worry about getting silt and dust in our lungs. Huzzah! No more hacking up a lung for five days after a race!Other than all that, the car still has the same cage and safety equipment, stock five-speed transmission with a stage 1 clutch from Flyin' Miata and 29-inch BFGoodrich tires. Buddy's communication system is from Rugged Radios, he wears LED light pods from Ridgid Industries and we now carry a Starlink and StarStream for the live feed– and it's all wired pretty terribly by yours truly.I'll be racing in the Vintage Stock Production class. Sure, Buddy isn't completely stock, but the rules dictate that the category is for "...cars that are largely based on mildly modified production cars and retain most of the car's chassis and body." Sounds like Buddy to me!If you want to see more photos and get Buddy's full build list, head on over to www.yeahbuddy.fun. I'll post a full race report after we finish the race, so keep your eyes peeled here on Jalopnik. Hopefully, Buddy will still be in one piece.Want more like this? Join the Jalopnik newsletter to get the latest auto news sent straight to your inbox, and follow us or add us as a preferred search source on Google.