Oregon Trial---oops, trail..no, trial

Well well well. We had a frustrating event this time. We felt like fish out of water at PIR, were were lost, confused, and slow. Couldn't get the tires to hook up, went throught the finish of stage 1 backwards, made total fools of ourselves on stage 5, oh well. We started out day 2 OK, but catching cars on the stage is no fun at all and that happened 3 times. Then, on the start to stage 9, the GTX electrical gremlin showed up again... total ignition cutoff above 2000RPM, no fun at all. We crawled through the stage just trying to make it to service. Then the car healed itself a bit, but in an apex I hit the gas and gee whiz, no power, so we slid wide and highcentered, ending out day. John Lane dignosed the problem over the phone in a most impressive fashion and we disconnected the throttle position sensor and the issue went away... just in time for us to find a busted wheel lug when we changed tires! But Pat Richard's crew fixed us up in a few minutes, at around 10:30 Saturday night. Many, many thanks. First stage Sun morning, we did pretty darn well, codriver yelling herself hoarse cuz the intercom acted up. But the second run though emerald forest, everything worked, the car was behaving, we were in the groove and going really really fast and smooth when we came into that one long section of raod where you can see 1/4 mile ahead. I remembered it well from the first time through and knew there was time to be gained there. Setting up for a sweep right after sweep left, 4th gear oversteer drift and nose into the apex. My outside wheels were in the middle of the orad where the surface changed from loose to concrete with rocks sticking out..tons and tons of grip. So the back of the car tucked right back into line 20 feet from the apex and we missed said apex by 2 feet to the inside. This space was occupied by a large tree. Oopsie! We ended up broadside in the road with no engine or steering. I used the starter motor to get as far off the road as possible and we spent the rest of the stage trying to make sure we ruined no one elses' day by wrecking in the same place. Sorry Amy, about your spin there, didja get your taillight back I hope? So I have a bent car, we'll try very very hard to get the poor thing ready in time for Olympus. We'll be back, and more on pace like we were at Doo wops... Thanks again to the organizers, to PIR for letting us mess up their infield, the Manspeakers for codrive and service crew, and to everyone else that helped us out one way or another!--Jay

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Jay Woodward
Snohomish, WA
'90 Mazdog Frankenprotege
Chronologically, 46...

Dood I'm glad that you didn't get yerself hurt in your little Snafu onstage!!

Matt..... Jay is making work for us again!!

JL

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JohnLane

Volvo 260turbo AKA The Fire Breathing Monster
Overkill is consistently more fun

Jay Wrote:
> ..with no engine or steering. I used the starter
> motor to get as far off the road as possible

Excellent out-of-the-box thinking.

Keep at it, these things really _do_ get easier with experience!

Cheers,
Anders

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Grassroots rally. It's what I think about.

We had many, many close calls on that same stage shortly after passing you. We were catching Amy and driving nearly blind on the final part. She was driving fast and making lots of dust, but we were one corner behind her and catching it all. Nothing more unnerving as a codriver that 100 / Cr 20 L3 and you can't see anything and the driver isn't backing off at all (thankfully). We ended up losing both wheel speed sensors from spending so much time sideways coming into every corner blind and hot and trying to scrub a ton of speed. Then we wrecked 3.8 miles into the final stage, after taking 40+ seconds off the previous stage. Uphill, 100 L4<>3, came in, left side in ditch, when the corner opened the back end stepped just enoough out to go into the loose gravel and over the crown. Front of car is out, driver is still planted trying to save it, but we were hauling ass coming into it, and it was so loose that we just went, zoop, right off the outside. I saw it coming and prepared for my first good beachball as we were heading for the edge of the exposure, where we would probably roll a few times until either something stopped us, or we hit the bottom about 100 feet down. Then bam, a stump right to the front right and we as done. Only slightly off the road. Okay, get out the triangles, front end is pretty bad, but okay, the car could have been much worse.
All in all though a good weekend for us. I'd be perfectly happy running Emerald Forest everyday of my life forever. That stage is a blast.

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Grant Hughes

I'm with ya on that stage. Fun fun fun...but I dunno man, I think Crane Creek is my fave. Gotta run OT again, with the goal of FINISHING THE EVENT.... as opposed to trying to light the woods on fire in an ancient GTX. Lesson learned, don't go fast outta frustration!

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Jay Woodward
Snohomish, WA
'90 Mazdog Frankenprotege
Chronologically, 46...

What's Crane Creek?

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Grant Hughes

First stage of Doo Wops this year...I might not have the name right but I think that's it!

yeah. the name's right. If you haven't driven the Doo wop rally, you're missing out bigtime. Ask anyone in the NW what their favorite rally is and they'll all say the same thing..Well-organized but laid back and relaxed, AWESOME roads, short transits, low entry fee, what's not to like?

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Jay Woodward
Snohomish, WA
'90 Mazdog Frankenprotege
Chronologically, 46...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/25/2006 01:34PM by Jay.

Yeah, but the body shop guy will get the worst part of it

The superficial stuff should be pretty straightforward.

They were FLYING, that much is certain.

There should be a lot of guys out there with huge $$$ subies wondering why they spent that much coin to go that much slower than Jay in a 15 year old car.

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Matt
PNW USA

no shit....fucking rally ate up a ton of dough in fuel and tires...

did good on day one, first in gp 2, first 2wd car out there.

Day two: Lost an ignition ground wire on the 20 mile stage at about mile 18. had to drive through the next stage with an absolutely wicked miss, sometimes ignition sometimes not, going into corners was scary, we just hoped that the car would pull out. We lost time in service tracking down the issue (3:48). I pressed very hard on in an attempt to make up the time in our group. Two bent a-arms later I realized that we probably were going too fast. One was a hay bail that came out of the dust of some god damn subaru we caught in about two miles, they were right, they were hard, we continued and still set a good time. The other was a large rock on a left 90...it was in my line, I hit it, it bent another a-arm yet again very early in the stage with one more stage to run, I pressed on, but used too much fuel, Our first DNF was running out of fuel on the last stage of the day.

Day three, start slow (we only had the a-arms on the car left over), then I said fuck it. Go hard or don't go at all, right? we kicked ass all day until we lost a tire on the second to last stage, I still have no idea what we hit with the right fron, but it was hard enough to bend the right front wheel....we lost 11 minutes changing to tire, but still ended up second in gp2 for the day.

I found my rythym at this rally on the third day, if we wouldn't have had the tire issue we would have finished in the top 10 regionally...I've learned to choke on the phrase, "well that's rally." But whatever, we still have alot to learn.

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-Tom
DemonRallyTeam | Fine Tuning | CTS Turbo & RP Turbos | RalleyTuned | JRM | Meister Autowerks
Spitfire EFI | Product Apparel | JVAB Imports | NLS | AP Tuning | USRT

Add us on Facebook | Next Event: 2013 Olympus Rally June 22-23 Olympia, WA



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/27/2006 01:29AM by Tom B.

Yeah, I kept watching your stage times Tom. You were doing awesome for an old Rabbit!

Here's a pic or two from our wreck.

http://www.landefabrication.com/pics/crash/crash1.JPG
http://www.landefabrication.com/pics/crash/crash2.JPG
http://www.landefabrication.com/pics/crash/crash3.JPG
http://www.landefabrication.com/pics/crash/crash4.JPG
http://www.landefabrication.com/pics/crash/crash5.JPG

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Grant Hughes

Grant,
What the fuck is going on???
Ferchristsakes!!! That slighty scuffed Sub-a-rat isn't blue.
How can you explain that?

Don't you think that could cause some confusion?

Will you guys be correcting that when you do the little skim-coat of body filler to repair where you guys brushed by a twig and did the little scrape in the top coat of the clear I see in the piccies??


(Good visit, Grant.)

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John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

www.rallyrace.net/jvab
CALL +1 206 431-9696
Remember! Pacific Standard Time
is 3 hours behind Eastern Standard Time.

like I said, we were fairly quick out there and quite a few people noticed. we'll be back out there for the next one. I was bummed when I saw your car out on the last stage, I thought you just got stuck....but it reminded me to slow the hell down after that....I think my crew got a couple images of the car.

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-Tom
DemonRallyTeam | Fine Tuning | CTS Turbo & RP Turbos | RalleyTuned | JRM | Meister Autowerks
Spitfire EFI | Product Apparel | JVAB Imports | NLS | AP Tuning | USRT

Add us on Facebook | Next Event: 2013 Olympus Rally June 22-23 Olympia, WA

I don't care what color he paints it. He'll probably stick to red though I'd guess.

I was just damn glad we hit the stump and it ceased momentum. I didn't even see the stump coming and was preparing for my first proper tumble, tumble down a hill side. Then, bam sheeeeeesssh, stop. My side was slightly over the hill and my door was blocked by logging debris. The left rear tire was about a foot off the ground and we were slightly over the hill. I had to climb out the window and jump down into the debris. Thankfully, the tree slowed us mostly and the debris stopped side slide.

The whole right of the car has the clear coat scratched from stage 13 and 14 where the was something like a 4R XtLg that had all this bramble overhang and we were staying tight in the ditch and whipping the shit out of the way. The rear view mirror collapsed in both times.

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Grant Hughes

Shoot, I'm not even from the NW and I think Cane Creek is one of the best stages on the west coast. That and Taholah. Oh, and Pico.

Funny, they're all in the same rally!

Anyone who hasn't done Doo Wops is missing out bigtime.

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Self-righteous douche canoe

And of course Brooklyn and Smith crick and....

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Jay Woodward
Snohomish, WA
'90 Mazdog Frankenprotege
Chronologically, 46...