2008 Wild West

The Wild West Rally was September 27-28, in Pomeroy, Wa.

We had a fun rally! The weather was nearly perfect, and the roads were in great shape.

There were three cars in our class- John Lane in a 1976 Volvo, and Charles Buren in a 1995 Impreza (FWD) rounded out the field. Lane was expected to win, and he did.

Dan drove on Saturday. We were having an excellent rally until Stage 5, when we drove JUST BARELY off the road on a tought uphill hairpin that was covered in deep silt. We got stuck there and lost 15 minutes waiting for Sweep to pull us out. We did finish, 3rd in class and 16/21 overall. Lane took 1st in Group 5, as well as 1st overall. Buren took 2nd place, but was losing a lot of time due to broken power steering.

Saturday, I drove. My goal was to beat Buren. Lane is just too fast. We beat Charles on four of the seven stages and had a 29 second lead after two stages. On the third stage, I nearly blew it. We came into a tough hairpin turn (with spectators!) and almost put the car into the ditch, where Mark Tabor's WRX was. We lost 10 seconds to Charles here. Then, on stage 5, I had a half-spin, losing another 10 seconds. Charles was driving well, especially without power steering. But, there just were not enough stage miles left, and we took 2nd place in class (Lane 1st, Buren 3rd). We also took 8th overall, and were the 3rd fastest two-wheel drive car. Cody Crane in a Group 2 CRX managed 6th overall with an excellent drive. Lane took 1st overall, AGAIN. What a great drive.

We had a blast and had a great service crew in Ron, Bryce, Jessica, and Dave. Luckily, they didn't have too much to do as the car was pretty solid. In fact, the crew had to work more on the van this weekend, which suffered another alternator failure.

Full Results are here: http://www.wildwestrally.org/results.html

Some Youtube video here:(We are the last car in the video - Not our best driving moment...) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKXrvZd94JQ



Next race is Mt. Hood rally on October 18th. This is going to be a fun race, since motorcycles will be joining us for the first time. The rally already has 25 cars and 31 bikes on the entry list!! We're looking forward to another good battle with Charles.

John Lane's FAST 500HP Volvo:

The T-Rex RX-7 leaving a dusty legacy...

Charles Buren's sharp looking Impreza: