STPR Super-Special stage?

STPR is the most overblown, overhyped, underdelivering rally in the U.S. For years I heard about what a great event it was, everyone wants to do it, great roads, huge entry lists, a classic, prestige event steeped in tradition. I finally went there a couple times a few years go (not driving but as service crew for Dave Hintz) and was terribly disappointed. I was not impressed. Poor organization, the town's too small to support an event that size, it's a long way to tow and a lot of money to spend on a one day event (and a lot of it spent waiting around the park trying not to leer at high school girls in prom dresses) the scrutineers are not satisfied until they have found at least one thing to fail on every car in the event (I had one guy say that the four steel wide head pop rivets holding the fire extinguisher bracket were not strong enough and I should drill them out and use sheet metal screws or through bolts!!?! I asked him, "Do you even know what the the shear strength and tension strength of these rivets is? It's like ten times the weight of the fire extingusher." Anyway, enough of that rant. Suffice to say I didn't think it was that great. Maybe the roads are fun, I dunno. If you like drag racing between hairpins through tunnels of trees right next to the road. Oh, and rallycrossing now, too.

Even that wasn't the worst rally I was ever at. The worst was Paris, Texas in 1995. I don't think any rally could ever be as bad as that, it would never be allowed these days (I hope.) And it was the Divisional Runoffs that year. I've heard it's a lot better now, but how could it not be? It was downright unsafe. I won't go into all gory details but the rally was run on an old site or something like that and it was a big grid of gravel roads. They ran a course through the grid so there was mostly square rights and square lefts but there were no buildings or trees or anything through that area so to block off the road you weren't supposed to go down at a "corner" they would use a traffic cone. At one part of the course they had opposing traffic coming at each other and one car would turn off to the left and the other car would turn off to the right and the only thing blocking off the section of road between the two (the middle of the "H", as it were) was a single traffic cone. Did I mention that this was at night? And the traffic cones were painted black? Lot's of people got lost, the route book was terrible. In fact we were listening in on the Ham net in service while Doc Shrader was writing the route book for stage 7 while stage 6 was being run. There had been a change or something. Just thought I'd share that since it relates to that STPR spectator stage.

I ran that event in Paris also. Not to defend Doc or to blame either, but things have improved since we took over. Doc was too far away to do a good job on running the rally and at that time, the mantra was that every stage had to be different. It still isn't the best a rally could be but we are trying.

---

RichardM

Richard Miller Wrote:
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> I ran that event in Paris also. Not to defend Doc
> or to blame either, but things have improved since
> we took over. Doc was too far away to do a good
> job on running the rally and at that time, the
> mantra was that every stage had to be different.
> It still isn't the best a rally could be but we
> are trying.
>
> RichardM


Yes, I've heard that the rally is much better now (how could it not be?) I'm not saying Doc was responsible for that mess. Ken Stewart was the chairman, I believe, and also competing in the event. When it came time for the start order guess who was first on the road (on a very dusty night event?) Oh, what a coincidence, it was Ken Stewart who was nowhere near the fastest driver there. Janice Damitio won that event and Leslie Suddard finished third but Stewart never would have finished second had he not had clear road all night (and had half the front runners not gotten lost.)

STPR did have a lot of good things like tradition, lot's of beautiful, fast smooth roads, cool old-school one day endurance format. Except for the water crossing you could run it without a sump guard. I think Wellsboro is a great town.

Yeah, in their entry heyday, they needed more rooms in the area and the orgs have become a bit dysfunctional. 80% of it ran at night on State forest roads, which they have lost, at least at night.

Of course it was a much shorter tow (8 hours) for me than Doivi. I ran it about 8 times and worked it 6 times. RIP.


It's a shame to lose any stage roads and for me to be at home this weekend.

It looks like SRT-USA bought some new trick suspension pieces from Slowboy Racing. ;-)

---

Ted Mendham
www.rensport.net

Doivi Clarkinen Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> STPR is the most overblown, overhyped,
> underdelivering rally in the U.S. For years I
> heard about what a great event it was, everyone
> wants to do it, great roads, huge entry lists, a
> classic, prestige event steeped in tradition. I
> finally went there a couple times a few years go
> (not driving but as service crew for Dave Hintz)
> and was terribly disappointed. I was not
> impressed. Poor organization, the town's too
> small to support an event that size, it's a long
> way to tow and a lot of money to spend on a one
> day event (and a lot of it spent waiting around
> the park trying not to leer at high school girls
> in prom dresses) the scrutineers are not satisfied
> until they have found at least one thing to fail
> on every car in the event (I had one guy say that
> the four steel wide head pop rivets holding the
> fire extinguisher bracket were not strong enough
> and I should drill them out and use sheet metal
> screws or through bolts!!?! I asked him, "Do you
> even know what the the shear strength and tension
> strength of these rivets is? It's like ten times
> the weight of the fire extingusher." Anyway,
> enough of that rant. Suffice to say I didn't
> think it was that great. Maybe the roads are fun,
> I dunno. If you like drag racing between hairpins
> through tunnels of trees right next to the road.
> Oh, and rallycrossing now, too.
>

Dave,

Too bad you never got actually run the roads at STPR; your limited exposure has badly skewed the view you have, IMO. Anyone thinking it is/was a series of drag races betweens trees just does not know what they are talking about. I agree to a point about the scrutineering situation; it was always the most stress filled scrutineering I ever went through. But, POR had a hardliner scrutineer for many years too, so it is not unique.

As for town size, how do you expect to have rallies in big urban areas? Not everywhere is blessed with situations like the PNW, with cities and a major interstate right beside large mountain and forest regions; you have to work with what you can get at times.

I just don't get some of the comments here. There are so many complaints about not enough events, and then complaints if an event is not perfect. STPR has at least been saved as an event; I probably won't be back there for several more years, but I am very glad it is still going. And as for roads, I have been on about every road in the STPR (and the old HIS) area over the past 30 years, and there's not one that comes to mind that I would not want to have as a stage road at Rally WV.

ANd BTW, I never found 'in town' spectator stage courses to be anything but a pain in the a** as a competitor. I always call them 'mickey mouse' stages. But, in keeping the roads for the STPR event to continue, I appreciate the need for the organizers to do this.

Sorry if I am stepping on your toes a bit Dave, but as an (approx) 10 times STPR competitor (on both side so of the car), many times spectating, and a few times working, I strongly disagree.....

Mark B.

tedm Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Would you pay over a $1000 to run that? I'll
> spend my money at Baie!
>
>
>
> Ted Mendham
> www.rensport.net


Looks like only 2 teams (Batram & Moyle ~3 seconds apart fighting for 8th place) that are battling it out at this point. All other teams can't be caught unless they totally break of stuff it. Pretty much just hoopla for spectators being final stage.

Baie or bust if we don't ball it at BlackBear.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/08/2008 09:33AM by CommanderSalamander.

starion887 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>>
> Dave,
>
> Too bad you never got actually run the roads at
> STPR; your limited exposure has badly skewed the
> view you have, IMO. Anyone thinking it is/was a
> series of drag races betweens trees just does not
> know what they are talking about. I agree to a
> point about the scrutineering situation; it was
> always the most stress filled scrutineering I ever
> went through. But, POR had a hardliner scrutineer
> for many years too, so it is not unique.
>
> As for town size, how do you expect to have
> rallies in big urban areas? Not everywhere is
> blessed with situations like the PNW, with cities
> and a major interstate right beside large mountain
> and forest regions; you have to work with what you
> can get at times.
>
> I just don't get some of the comments here. There
> are so many complaints about not enough events,
> and then complaints if an event is not perfect.
> STPR has at least been saved as an event; I
> probably won't be back there for several more
> years, but I am very glad it is still going. And
> as for roads, I have been on about every road in
> the STPR (and the old HIS) area over the past 30
> years, and there's not one that comes to mind that
> I would not want to have as a stage road at Rally
> WV.
>
> ANd BTW, I never found 'in town' spectator stage
> courses to be anything but a pain in the a** as a
> competitor. I always call them 'mickey mouse'
> stages. But, in keeping the roads for the STPR
> event to continue, I appreciate the need for the
> organizers to do this.
>
> Sorry if I am stepping on your toes a bit Dave,
> but as an (approx) 10 times STPR competitor (on
> both side so of the car), many times spectating,
> and a few times working, I strongly disagree.....
>
> Mark B.

No offense taken, that was just my opinion. My point was it didn't live up to all the hype. I wasn't very impressed. Mind you, this was from my point of view as a service crew and what I observed how it was run. I'm sure the roads are pretty fun, a lot of people seem to think so. I've only seen a few on video, in and out of car. The drag racing comment was just tongue in cheek, mostly. I think the STPR stages look like they have some good bits but have a lot of bits that are mostly too fast with trees too close to the road. Not my type of thing. Certainly the stages are not as good for the most part as those that we got to run in the Capitol Forest (r.i.p.) And there's the rub, we're losing good stage roads all over the country. We lost access to the Capitol Forest several years ago. Anyone who never got to run a rally in the Capitol Forest really missed out. Arguably the best rally roads in the U.S.
Anyway, my criticism had much less to do with the roads and more to do with the overall organization. Maybe it was not at it's best the couple of years I was there, I dunno. The town is too small for a 100 car entry but what are you gonna do? That's where the roads are. It's in the middle of nowhere'sville. It would be fine for a regional event or with only a 40 car entry this year that would work out fine. The 45 minute drive to the nearest motel kind of sucked is all.