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TOMMY GUN TEAM NEWS UPDATE – September 1, 2008 Archives: TOMMY GUN RALLY - GORMAN RALLY NEWS REPORT 2008 The 21st running of the Gorman Ridge Rally has come to an end and boy was it fun. It was chock full of rally goodness, lots of carnage, and a hearty battle to the finish. Here's the Tommy Gun Rally team's story. In case you're not familiar, the Gorman Ridge Rally happens every year in August in Gorman, CA, which is about an hour north of LA (in the Grapevine). A 'Rally' is a point-to-point timed race on closed dirt roads, divided into 'Special Stages.' There are 12 Special Stages at Gorman, ranging from 4 miles to a little under 10. The entire rally is held within the confines of the Hungry Valley Off Road Vehicle (ORV) Park, which is known more for it's dirt bike trails rather than car-friendly roads - which we'll come to later. A rally team consists of a driver and a navigator – the driver turns the wheel and the navigator tells the driver what lies ahead so he/she can set up for the next corner. Gorman is a single day event with stages run in the late morning and evening, punctuated by a nice long 2-hour lunch that features Tri-tip steak, which is awesome. Stage (race) miles total between 50-60, with about 20 miles of transits on top of that. It’s an ultra compact event with the Rally HQ hotel within a few miles of the stages. This is essential for obtaining a post-event beer within 5 minutes of your last stage finish! The event was sponsored by Karl Strauss Brewery, which certainly motivated competitors to not get stuck out in the hills! We'd been preparing for this event for months prior, so we thought we were set for the infamously rough stages, potential for blistering heat, and taxing conditions. All told, and looking at our results last year, when we lost our clutch 2 miles into the first stage(!), there really is only so much you can do to prepare. If there is ANY area of weakness in your car, it will be found at Gorman. Since our engine had let go before we were even able to leave for last month's Idaho Rally (hours before we were to leave for the Potato State!), we were itching like madmen to get out on stage. With clean driver’s suits, new underbody protection, a dozen new tires, and all fluids topped off, we were ready! The Gorman Rally and others on the NASA (National Auto Sport Association) RallySport calendar are great because you are allowed to run recce (which is short for 'reconnaissance'). This is very similar to what Baja racers call 'pre-running'. Friday morning we got into our recce car, and headed out to the stages. We are allowed 2 pass recce, which means you get to run through once and write your notes, then again to have the co-driver read them to you for modification and fine-tuning. We hurried and tried to get it all done in the time allotted since there were almost 30 teams. We recce'd the stages and double checked our notes from 2007 and were ready to race. A few minor tweaks to the car Friday evening and everything was ready. We laughed because the main competitors in our class were from Colorado, and joked that they would be so astounded by the condition of the roads, they might pack up and go home - in hindsight, we were WAY wrong! On Saturday morning, our huge service crew started arriving. This was the first event of the newly formed 'Dirty Impreza Rally Team', made up of our car, and a Subaru owned by our friend Keith Jackson. DirtyImpreza.com is a Subaru enthusiast website that caters to those owners who like to get their cars dirty. Keith and his group were exhausted, as they had worked tirelessly for the past 5 weeks to get the Subaru WRX STI completely prepped for the rally. In race car fabrication time, 5 weeks is a blink of an eye and the fact they had their car ready to race (and prepped far superior to our car!) in that time frame was amazing. Having an experienced fabricator as a brother doesn't hurt, as brother Kyle Jackson's cage and beautiful welds attested. With a virtual army of volunteers trickling in to help us, each bringing distinct skill sets to the table, the crew worked on some last minute checks and assured us our cars were up to snuff. As alluded to earlier, the roads at Gorman can sometimes be better described as goat trails. Though most of the stages are easily traversed by rally cars and trucks (notice I didn't say regular cars!), there are certain sections that would make Ivan Stewart shake in his driver's boots. With basketball-sized rocks, erosion control dirt undulations called 'waterbars' which double as launch pads, silt beds two feet deep, and holes that can swallow an entire car whole, Gorman is challenging to say the least. The most puckering terrain features however, are the exposures. A significant portion of the race is run along the top (or side) of a mountain range with drop-offs that are a little unsettling. These are drop-offs that would likely render any extraction of a vehicle impossible - you ditch your car off at Gorman and you're looking for a new rally car, if anyone ever finds you that is. Those are the main ‘gotchas’ that we worry about. Rocks, silt, waterbars.....they can all be driven over - going off a cliff is pretty much a day-ender. That being said, we exercised caution whenever nearing the cliff edge. After tech inspection, the car was given the go-ahead and we tried to sleep in anticipation of Saturday's racing. We pulled out of the MTC to transit to stage 1 at about 11:15 AM. A few highlights are below. Stage 1 is one of the short, fast ones of the event, and we sought to get a good pace down early so we wouldn't have to fight all day to make up time. Though the stage was transited for a few cars because someone got stuck, we set a top-5 stage time that we're very proud of. Probably wouldn’t have happened without the stoppage of the other cars, but we'll take it regardless! Stage 2 started poorly. Apparently on stage 1, our battery cable got disconnected and the car was running off the alternator. When we tried to restart the car for stage 2 once our minute was up, the car was completely dead, blocking the stage road. I said to Mindy 'This is NOT happening!' and got out of the car to diagnose the issue - which I quickly discovered and fixed. PHEW. One heart attack of many out of the way. We were off onto 2, and had a relatively uneventful stage until the last mile, when the car started losing power very quickly. About 200 meters later the car came to a grinding halt on stage - again blocking the road near a dangerous corner where other drivers would be going flat out. We hopped out to get our “OK” sign up, and I looked to the trunk real quick to grab the safety triangles. Uh...where's the battery!?!? Apparently one of the huge waterbars we hit had ripped the entire battery box out of its mounting place in the trunk - and relocated in the back seat, without cables! Mental note here, don't hit those jumps that hard! I re-attached the battery cables and ratchet-strapped it down, and we finished the stage without incident. Despite stopping for about a minute, no one came close to passing us, which let us know we that were having a pretty good stage (since cars are released a minute apart). First Service was painless – secured the battery and we were off! Stages 3-6 were very fun and we tried to refine our notes on the stages even further since all stages are re-run multiple times. One of the most unsettling moments however, was on stage 4, where we hit a waterbar we had in the notes marked as 'flat over waterbar' which means Drop the Hammer. We hit it over 50 mph and since the undulation crosses the road at a diagonal angle, it kicked us up in the air about 3 feet and the car tilted about 45 degrees. We pitched and yawed all at once! We landed on the road sideways and luckily I recovered it. Both Mindy and I got our clocks cleaned and I heard something foul from my intercom speakers, which rhymes with "TRUCK!!!!!!" The remainder of the stage was taken at quarter pace while we checked our shorts!!! No damage incurred, thank goodness. Onto stage 5. 2nd service and we got new tires, some new suspension bushings courtesy of our chief mechanic OP, and topped off the tranny fluid. Both rear lower control arm bushings were shot – OP miraculously fixed both super quick. A nice Tri-tip lunch and some Mountain Dew and we were off again. Back onto stage. Stages 7 through 9 were a real hoot, we were getting into our rhythm and I was getting more confident in the notes. When someone tells you to FLOOR IT!!! OVER a crest without knowing exactly what's on the other side, it takes a little getting used to....luckily for me, Mindy is a great co-driver and our notes were spot on. The end of stage 9, however, was a completely different story. One of those waterbars that had claimed a few competitors and popped our battery out earlier in the day strikes again! We hit one at about 45 mph and the landing was so violent if broke our transmission. All gears were gone except 1st. Now I don't know about you, but racing isn't that fun in first gear. We limped out of stage and came into service sullen, downtrodden, and crestfallen – all in one. With 3 night stages to go, the decision had to be made to continue or not. Press on regardless!! Get those lights on, we're going to finish! Notice the strained smiles and it's super hard to turn our heads with our Head and Neck Restraints on! Start of stage 9 was OK. We were re-seeded to the very back of the pack because other drivers would catch us, should we remain where we were in the start order (since we only had first gear). The first part of the stage is all uphill and our only remaining gear actually got us up there quick. Mindy and I were taking it very easy and wanted to just get to the finish in one piece. I told her to put away her notes and enjoy the full moon. After about a mile, the stage opens up a bit. I decide, for the heck of it, to try another gear. I knew 2nd was shattered, but the others could theoretically work. Bang the box into third and….it worked!!! Mindy and I looked at each other and said ‘let’s do this!’ She quickly found our spot in the notes and we were on our way. With a full moon and almost 600 watts of forward lighting, we dropped the proverbial hammer and blasted through the stage. The good thing about racing at night is that you can’t see the dangerous cliffs! In addition, the waterbars and ruts were now deeply shadowed because of our auxiliary lights. This helped us to do some evasive maneuvers around rocks and other unfortunate terrain features. Into the time control, we scored a little over 9 minutes on the stage, which placed us about mid-pack! We were back in the mix. The next two stages were nice and flowing. With the car working well – we concentrated on maintaining momentum through corners since we only had the gear above and below what was optimal for that stage. Our times were relatively competitive for the night stages and we ended up 4th in class, 11th overall, despite our problems. We were super relieved to finish and will be back in the mix in October in Prescott, Arizona for the Prescott Rally! We finished!!! Special thanks goes out to our team (and I do mean TEAM) of volunteers who came out to help us. We couldn’t have finished without your help! And to our sponsors whose support has been invaluable this entire season despite some major setbacks. Thanks to Infinite Optics, Red Line Oil, Grimm Speed, Bear’s Tires, Clarence Brown Alignment, Kartboy Kustoms, Dirty Impreza.com, Rio Nido Roadhouse, and the BoomBop Shop. Thanks also to Bill Rogers some of whose excellent photos we've featured here. Hope you enjoyed the LONG story! Eli and Mindy Tommy Gun Rally Team For more pictures and this write-up with pictures, please see: |
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