No real photos yet. Seems like every other car was photographed, but ours.

Quote
modernbeat
No real photos yet. Seems like every other car was photographed, but ours.

Could be
a) toooooo fast!!!
b) tooo cute!!!
c) photogs all gob-smacked at how Sooper Bitchin the car was handling and were stunned into inaction.

---

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.

And the pro comes through with a shot.



And another more-airborne shot should be coming.

Quote
modernbeat
Brianne also won the Regional Rally Cup Championship for her class - the shootout for all the regional champs.

Congrats! But wasn't she the only one that entered in OL?

Wish we could have come out to race with her, but we just ran out of time and money...

Quote
Jard

Quote
modernbeat
Brianne also won the Regional Rally Cup Championship for her class - the shootout for all the regional champs.

Congrats! But wasn't she the only one that entered in OL?

Wish we could have come out to race with her, but we just ran out of time and money...

The Regional Championship entries were a bit thin. Open class had two entries with one DNF, G2 had 3 entries (all from Central region) with 2 DNF that weren't really due to the stages and just bad mechanical luck. One OL entry and one P entry.

How have the previous events been for something like this? It seems to get a "true" regional shootout, you would have to give something like free entry or tow fund to try and get the champs from each region to come to the event.

It's a bit dilluted to be a champion of the only entry. Still a feat to finish the weekend in itself and shows that the Central Region champion is true by winning both days against the local regional competitors.

And, since Stage 1 was classified as a Super Special, you really lucked out on the time for that stage (but did get a really neat trophy.............)

ymmv

press on,

---

just a poor, dumb, Michigan navie

Quote
Jard

Quote
modernbeat
Brianne also won the Regional Rally Cup Championship for her class - the shootout for all the regional champs.

Congrats! But wasn't she the only one that entered in OL?

Wish we could have come out to race with her, but we just ran out of time and money...

Ya only G2 and Open had a field.

Same story here, I wanted to come out but my visa says i've already outspent my budget. plus i just did prescott 3 weeks ago (tight turn around)

I've heard if we were to Ask rally-america that they may have done something in way of a tow fund , or free entry .. (both maybe)

They should really give out of region competitors free entry + tow fund assistance so more teams can make it.

OR they should rotate the regional runoffs event between regions, it really bothers me that the regional runoffs are in Michigan every year. I have family in the LP so i just need to plan better. (and find a tow vehicle ) hehehe

>Jimmy: Yes, VERY lucky the new rules allowed that. That's what I get for nursing a fever in bed rather than leading my crew.

On the costs and location: What's more central to most of the US rallyist than Michigan? Go further east and the west coast guys suffer. Go further west and those northeasterns get the short end of the stick. I'd like it a little further south, so us Texans don't have to tow 24 hours one way, but there's really no other current event that's at the end of the season and still central to the coasts.

Plus, it's a good enticement to go to a kick ass event!

On the costs, Brianne had to sell her prized Subaru to go to this event. Sure there's money left over, but without the sale she wouldn't have been able to make it at all. We would have really liked to have seen a free entry or tow fund for the Regional Cup competitors.

On the entry numbers for the Regional Cup, well, National has been a towing competition at times. And it's not like we had the shortest tow of all the Regional Champion Open Light invitees, even though we are in Central Region. We really wish some of the other hot OL guys had been there.

Didn't 100 AW (February of the following year) used to be the place for the regional championships? That's a bit more central - but the real problem still is that regional competitors typically stay in their region, so I'm not sure what the point of the finale is if only one or two teams show up.

Ooo, I got it - its just a a marketing gimmick to try and convince one or two teams to enter an event they never would've before.

Sucks you guys had to sell another car to go.

Dave

Quote
DaveK
...but the real problem still is that regional competitors typically stay in their region, so I'm not sure what the point of the finale is if only one or two teams show up.

The way Brianne and I see it is that some classes are Regional only - like Open Light. Similar to IT classes in road racing, which holds it's "national" championship at the IT Fest at Mid Ohio, the Regional Cup feels like it's for the the higher level competitor that is still competing in a non-Nationals class.

And yeah it sucked to sell that car, but it will allow Brianne to compete at LSPR, Sno-Drift and 100AW. Can't believe LSPR and Sno-Drift are in our region. It's a looooong tow for those events to still be in our home area.

Quote
modernbeat
The way Brianne and I see it is that some classes are Regional only - like Open Light. Similar to IT classes in road racing, which holds it's "national" championship at the IT Fest at Mid Ohio, the Regional Cup feels like it's for the the higher level competitor that is still competing in a non-Nationals class.

I think with the size of the country in general it makes most non-regional championships simply who can take the most days off work or tow the farthest. OL certainly isn't the only class that has this problem - RA 2wd, Super Production, and USRC have been won some years simply by making all the events when the competition misses a few. Unfortunately even MaxAttack with just two rounds needed suffered from the same thing this year in terms of crowning a series champion (though had great numbers of competitors at each round). Hell, even our '5 events within a 200 mile radius' hillclimb series has suffered lack of entries as of late making "season champion" titles pretty worthless. Wish there was a way to have more people show up at more races!

Dave

Quote
DaveK

Quote
modernbeat
The way Brianne and I see it is that some classes are Regional only - like Open Light. Similar to IT classes in road racing, which holds it's "national" championship at the IT Fest at Mid Ohio, the Regional Cup feels like it's for the the higher level competitor that is still competing in a non-Nationals class.

I think with the size of the country in general it makes most non-regional championships simply who can take the most days off work or tow the farthest. OL certainly isn't the only class that has this problem - RA 2wd, Super Production, and USRC have been won some years simply by making all the events when the competition misses a few. Unfortunately even MaxAttack with just two rounds needed suffered from the same thing this year in terms of crowning a series champion (though had great numbers of competitors at each round). Hell, even our '5 events within a 200 mile radius' hillclimb series has suffered lack of entries as of late making "season champion" titles pretty worthless. Wish there was a way to have more people show up at more races!

Dave

I was trying to spark interest to get some guys to run the Central G2 championship. Only people I could get a commitment from was Greenhouse. Bushore will do it if he has a job. He's already spreading funds thin.

And now with Greenhouse having two DNFs in a row and Bushore shredding his trans, I'll just have to wait and see who shows up at Sno*Drift.

I still don't know if I'm going to do 100AW or not. Loved the roads, nice and simple with nothing really out there to catch you off guard. But I might just focus on doing MA events this year. My budget goes up and down all over the place so I've had a hard time trying to accuratly plan it for the year.

Quote
A1337STI
Are 4.44s prone to failure on a stock RS motor? are you thinking it was a fluke or just bound to happen?

Bound to happen. (If it's the R&P that broke, anyway.) 4.44s are prone to failure period. A big shock load can do it as well as big torque.

Quote
DaveK
Didn't 100 AW (February of the following year) used to be the place for the regional championships? That's a bit more central - but the real problem still is that regional competitors typically stay in their region, so I'm not sure what the point of the finale is if only one or two teams show up.

Ooo, I got it - its just a a marketing gimmick to try and convince one or two teams to enter an event they never would've before.

Sucks you guys had to sell another car to go.

Dave

100AW was the regional champ. until LSPR was dropped from the national schedule. They usually offered half-price entry for the RRC. It still only occasionally got East/West competitors (often guys who had decided to run a National season after finishing well in the previous year's regional).

It was always confusing to have the second event be the previous season's championship event, and was never really emphasized, being part of a national. Even with MaxAttack! and the Regional Championship, none of the out-of-region teams made the tow.

I'd love to have a way for regional guys to compete against each other, but the country is just too big, and gas too expensive. Even with free entry it would probably be cheaper for somebody in any other region to run a local event than tow to the UP. We're all trying to maximize grins/$, and towing 20+ hours just isn't the way to do it.

Quote
fliz
...Even with free entry it would probably be cheaper for somebody in any other region to run a local event than tow to the UP. We're all trying to maximize grins/$, and towing 20+ hours just isn't the way to do it.

Our diesel bill just for the tow up and back was right at $750. That doesn't include driving to service, around town, co-driver driving in, crew driving in from Ohio, etc...