Side-by-side racing grew faster than almost any form of motorsport, and it did it by being the one discipline a whole family can enter. Two seats means two people race together, and the youth classes underneath run cars that look exactly like the ones the adults drive.
That family structure is the thing worth building an awards programme around. Seven ideas that come out of how SXS events are actually entered and run.
1. The number panel is the award
A UTV carries its number on a flat door panel in a standard place, and that panel is how everyone at the event identifies the car — spotters, scorers, spectators and the family watching from a hill.
As an award shape it is simple, immediately readable and completely specific to this discipline. The number takes the face, the class and placing take the plate, and it looks like the car it was won in.
2. Two seats means two awards
Nearly every SXS class runs a driver and a navigator, and the navigator is working the whole race — course notes, spotting lines, watching for the car coming up behind in the dust.
A single trophy for a two-person crew is the most common complaint at a UTV prizegiving. Two matching awards, each named to its role, settles it for very little.
3. Youth UTV classes, taken as seriously as the adults
This is the thing that makes SXS unusual. Youth classes are not a token side event — they are a substantial part of many entry lists, running real cars on real courses, and the families in them are the ones who will still be entering in ten years.
Same design family, smaller scale, same materials. A visibly cheaper youth award is noticed immediately, and it is noticed by exactly the people an event most needs to keep.
4. Turbo and naturally aspirated are different races
The forced-induction divide is the fundamental class split in this sport, and the two do not compete on remotely equal terms. Running them under one award line flattens the thing competitors care most about.
One family, the power class and placing on a printed plate. It keeps the event looking like one race while making the division explicit on every award.
5. A desert race and a short course are not the same weekend
One is a long point-to-point over open terrain where finishing is a genuine question; the other is a stadium-style course with heats and a final in front of a crowd. Many series run both.
Keep them in the same family and let the format change the shape — something with more presence for the short course final, something that records distance and finishing for the desert round. The plate still carries the class.
6. Family teams in one car
A parent driving with their child navigating, or two siblings sharing a car, is common enough in SXS to be a defining feature rather than a curiosity. No other discipline here has that.
Both names on matching awards, and if the event wants to make more of it, a family team award of its own. It costs one more plate and it is the thing people photograph.
7. Dust, and the finish nobody could see
A SXS finish in dry conditions is frequently decided in visibility that makes racing genuinely hard, and the whole field shares that experience regardless of where they placed.
Recording the round and the conditions on the plate gives every award from that day a common story, and it makes a finisher award from a bad-dust round worth considerably more than a generic one.
Putting it together for a race
One design family built on the number panel, power class and placing on the plate, matching awards for both seats, the youth classes on the same family and something for the family teams. That is a full programme in one artwork approval.
Send the class structure with the power divisions written as they appear in your regulations, and both crew names per entry. Navigator names are the ones most often missing from an entry list.
Frequently Asked Questions
Should the navigator get the same award as the driver?
Matching awards, each named to its role, is the right answer for almost every SXS event. Both people raced, and handing one trophy to a two-person crew creates a question the entry fee already paid to avoid.
How should youth classes be awarded?
On the same design family at a smaller scale, in the same materials. Youth entries are a large share of SXS fields and the families in them notice a cheaper award immediately.
Can one design cover a desert round and a short course round?
Yes. Keep the family and the artwork constant, let the shape differ by format, and put the round and class on the plate. Competitors running the whole series then collect a set that shows both.
Ready to design your SXS awards?
Send us your class structure and race format and we will build a direction that covers every division before anything goes into production.
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