Mt. Hood Rally is here

The Mt Hood Rally is this Saturday, October 18th. This is the only rally that we do that allows 2 pass recce, which means we get to make our own notes from scratch.

Gabe West will be navigating for me this year- the first time he's co-driven at Mt. Hood.

The only other car registered in Group 5 is Charles Buren in his Impreza. We're looking forward to a good battle with Charles, as well as some of the other 2WD folks like Cody Crane in his CRX.

We want to beat the 2WD stage record for the Gilhouley stage, which stands at 6 minutes, 37 seconds (held by Cody). Last year, we ran 6 minutes, 38 seconds. This year, we're only running the stage "up", so it may be more difficult to get the record.

Check out the Mt. Hood website here.

AND, the event should have live scoring updates here: SCORES.

I'll post an update after the rally.

2008 Wild West Video

Here's some video from the Wild West Rally. This was a really tough hairpin on the Skyhawk Stage. On the first running, Dan was on the wrong page in the routebook, and we were a little frazzled because we were a bit rushed at the start line. On the first pass, there's a car in the ditch on the outside of the hairpin- We nearly join him when I can't find reverse and the car rolls forward.

On the second running, we made the turn a bit better!

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:

Olympus Results

So how did we finish up at Olympus? Well, it could have been better!

At the end of the first regional Rally, we held 2nd place in G5, 3rd place among 2WD cars, and were 9th out of 22 overall. Dan took the helm for the 2nd regional rally and things were going well. We had a nice battle with Lou Beck in his Focus and the Zedril's in their Lancer. However, on the second to the last stage, our RX-7's differential failed and we coasted to a stop on stage. We still had a blast and we were still smiling when we pushed the car onto the trailer.

We've since traced the failure to a defective pinion gear in the differential. We're having everything rebuilt and will be ready for the next rally soon.

Some great video of us was put on YouTube by Mike Schmeling. Click here.

In the National Rally, Ken Block won overall.

Here's a photo of the broken pinion gear... note the missing teeth.


Here's a photo of the red Impreza passing us on the side of the road. Look close to see me holding the "OK" sign.


Here's a photo of me placing a triangle to warn oncoming rally cars that we are stopped here.
Here's a photo of me taking the car into a tight, downhill right hand turn.

Travis Pastrana took 2nd place in the National rally...


John Lane took 1st in two-wheel drive in this 500+HP Volvo.

1st Regional Rally Complete

We'e just finished the first regional rally and we think we took 3rd 2 wheek drive and 2nd in G5.  These roads are fast!

Our top speed according to our rally computer was 108.  We were hoping for 110!

Dan gets to drive the remaining stages of the day, since the second regional rally begins today.

Looking forward to defending or improving our place in 2WD.

Olympus Recce Day

Today, Dan and I did the recce for the Olympus Rally. Recce is short for Reconnaissance- We drove each of the stages that we will run on, and checked our "notes" or directions for the stage. The stages for this rally are going to be very fast. We expect to exceed 100 mph on every stage. Roads are mostly gravel, and are very smooth and flowing. There's nothing to break the car as long as we stay on the road! The picture above is of our friend Ron's WRX. He kindly lent it to us to drive on the recce.

The weather has been cool and very windy. But so far, it has been dry. There's 30-40% chance of rain or snow in the next two days. We want it to stay dry!!

There is just one other car in our class, G5. That car is a 500+HP Volvo of John Lane. We can't beat Lane if he finishes. We will drive our normal race and see what happens. There is also a HUGE "side" prize fund put up by other two-wheel drive competitors. The winner among regional two-wheel drive competitors stands to win quite a lot. Check it out here: 2WD Prize Fund.

After the recce, we watched "Cowboy" Kenny Bartram warming up for a show that he did for the crowd. See video below.


Later, we were joined by friends Doug P, Joe, Sonya, and Ron. These folks will service for us this weekend and hopefully have a good time of there own!

I'm driving on Saturday, and Dan drives on Sunday. I'll try to send an update tomorrow of how we did for the day. You can also Check out the Rally-America updates and scoring here: Rally America Updates.

Olympus is coming!

The Olympus Rally is just around the corner. April 19-20. Doug and Dan will be there! Doug will be driving on day one, and Dan on day two.

This will be a Rally America National rally, so Rally America will be doing live updates. Check them out here:

Live Updates for Olympus

You can also catch results and photos from the Rally America page:

Rally America

For more event-specific information, check out the Olympus rally website:

Olympus Website

Also check this page for more info as the race gets closer, and for some nightly updates after the rally is over.

Doug