WOW...just read through the post below and am I ever long-winded, boring, and full of excuses. Sorry (will do better next time).
Chad
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Cochrane Rally 2007
I'm a bit overdue for this update. We competed in the Cochrane Rally of the Ranchlands on March 17th, 2007. There was a record number of entries for the event at 25 teams. This rally included "recce", or in otherwords, we had the option to drive the roads before the event to make pace notes. We were also given the organizer supplied notes if we wanted to use them. Since we had no experience creating pace notes, and since this was essentially our first rally after our premature exit at PFR, we decided to do recce but use the organiser supplied notes (rather than creating our own from scratch). We also decided ahead of time that we were going to take it easy and finish the rally. The registration, recce, and the technical inspection was on Saturday and then the rally was on Sunday. Saturday was a beautiful day and there was lots of melting and mud on the stages. However, the day of the rally we had snow and freezing rain. Even before the start of the rally we had problems. Our service man (my good friend Todd from Calgary) came over to the rally car as we were about 2 minutes away from the start to tell me my truck wouldn't start. This was the truck that I had just purchased the weekend before the rally (used). So Todd was forced to unload all of my tools and equipment into his truck so he could have them ready for us at the service area approx. 70kms away. Unfortunately, having my truck not start really threw me off for the day. We had to abandon the truck in Cochrane for the day and we had no idea what was wrong with it (although Todd thought the starter quit). I kept thinking about the truck all day long. The funny thing is if it had been my old truck I would have thought "stupid truck" and that would have been it. Since I just got this one, it really struck me that I might have just purchased a lemon and, as I said above, I couldn't put it out of my mind all day.
Anyways.....We decided to REALLY take it easy since we didn't want to break the car and then have two vehicles out in Alberta that couldn't go anywhere. Despite this we were having grip issues right off the bat. I attributed this to the snow and ice, but after talking with some of the other competitors I realized they were setting considerably better times than us. We continued to struggle with grip and on SS5 (5th stage) we went off the road on a slow downhill left hander. I wasn't on the brakes at all and the car just wouldn't make the corner. We got high-centred on a snowbank and couldn't move the car. We had to wait for sweep to come yank us out of the snowbank. Fortunately, there was no damage to the car. There was significant damage to my confidence, however. We lost about 9.5 minutes on the stage (compared to the first time we went through this same stage in the same direction) and then took 3 minutes in penalties for arriving late to service.
Ok...here is where it gets kinda embarrassing. We get to service late and decide to rotate the tires front to back since the fronts have some wear (although not much). We go out on the stages and still have lots of grip problems on SS6 ans SS7. At the end of SS7 is a turn around and a relatively long wait for SS8. We check tire pressure and we're at 38psi. Ok..so it's my fault for not checking the tire pressure anytime between having the tires mounted and the end of SS7. So I check with a few other people and they're running 28 to 31psi. So all the steel studs on the tire are around the outside of the tire and when we were using too high of tire pressure only the centre of the tire makes contact with the ice (no studs). So we drop pressure to 29psi and the car feels WAY better on SS8 (although I'm still not feeling confident with the car due to our off, and my nerves were still being tested as I continue to wonder what's wrong with my new-to-me truck). We decided that we'd lost so much time with our offroad adventure that we weren't going to take any risks and just slowly finish our first rally.
So, we finished in 2nd last place of the cars that finished (20th of the 25 entered). The only team we beat spent twice as much time as us in the ditch (and we beat them by less than a minute, so they were way faster than us for the rest of the rally). I'm a bit dissappointed with our final position, but I am proud that we finished this time. We learned a lot at this rally, including checking tire pressure before being in the middle of the race. We missed most of the banquet at the finish since we were busy trying to figure out what was wrong with my truck. Fortunately it was a broken wire on the starter, so it didn't take us long to get it fixed, loaded up, hook up the trailer and take off back for Saskatchewan. I feel a little silly for stressing so much about it now. I apologized a few times to Heath and Todd for not being much fun to be around before we knew what was wrong with the truck.
Once again, we'd like to thank our supporters for this rally. If you need a new water well, don't hesitate to contact Lorne at Stauber Drilling. If you Geo-environmental consulting (ok..well maybe you don't need this often unless you're in the mining industry) call ME at MDH Engineered Solutions. If you need any photographic services, please contact Deb at Balance Photography. Also check out flatoutperformance.com if you're looking for aftermarket parts for your car.
I still plan on posting a build log for the race car. Check back if you're one of the 70-or-so people who've actually been to the site before.
My favourite picture from Cochrane Rally:
Anyways.....We decided to REALLY take it easy since we didn't want to break the car and then have two vehicles out in Alberta that couldn't go anywhere. Despite this we were having grip issues right off the bat. I attributed this to the snow and ice, but after talking with some of the other competitors I realized they were setting considerably better times than us. We continued to struggle with grip and on SS5 (5th stage) we went off the road on a slow downhill left hander. I wasn't on the brakes at all and the car just wouldn't make the corner. We got high-centred on a snowbank and couldn't move the car. We had to wait for sweep to come yank us out of the snowbank. Fortunately, there was no damage to the car. There was significant damage to my confidence, however. We lost about 9.5 minutes on the stage (compared to the first time we went through this same stage in the same direction) and then took 3 minutes in penalties for arriving late to service.
Ok...here is where it gets kinda embarrassing. We get to service late and decide to rotate the tires front to back since the fronts have some wear (although not much). We go out on the stages and still have lots of grip problems on SS6 ans SS7. At the end of SS7 is a turn around and a relatively long wait for SS8. We check tire pressure and we're at 38psi. Ok..so it's my fault for not checking the tire pressure anytime between having the tires mounted and the end of SS7. So I check with a few other people and they're running 28 to 31psi. So all the steel studs on the tire are around the outside of the tire and when we were using too high of tire pressure only the centre of the tire makes contact with the ice (no studs). So we drop pressure to 29psi and the car feels WAY better on SS8 (although I'm still not feeling confident with the car due to our off, and my nerves were still being tested as I continue to wonder what's wrong with my new-to-me truck). We decided that we'd lost so much time with our offroad adventure that we weren't going to take any risks and just slowly finish our first rally.
So, we finished in 2nd last place of the cars that finished (20th of the 25 entered). The only team we beat spent twice as much time as us in the ditch (and we beat them by less than a minute, so they were way faster than us for the rest of the rally). I'm a bit dissappointed with our final position, but I am proud that we finished this time. We learned a lot at this rally, including checking tire pressure before being in the middle of the race. We missed most of the banquet at the finish since we were busy trying to figure out what was wrong with my truck. Fortunately it was a broken wire on the starter, so it didn't take us long to get it fixed, loaded up, hook up the trailer and take off back for Saskatchewan. I feel a little silly for stressing so much about it now. I apologized a few times to Heath and Todd for not being much fun to be around before we knew what was wrong with the truck.
Once again, we'd like to thank our supporters for this rally. If you need a new water well, don't hesitate to contact Lorne at Stauber Drilling. If you Geo-environmental consulting (ok..well maybe you don't need this often unless you're in the mining industry) call ME at MDH Engineered Solutions. If you need any photographic services, please contact Deb at Balance Photography. Also check out flatoutperformance.com if you're looking for aftermarket parts for your car.
I still plan on posting a build log for the race car. Check back if you're one of the 70-or-so people who've actually been to the site before.
My favourite picture from Cochrane Rally:
Thursday, March 8, 2007
Thanks Stauber Drilling
Hello all (or should I say "hello few" since this site is still very new - well we're working on increasing exposure). There is just over a week remaining until we leave for Cochrane Rally. I am very excited to get out there with the car, although our strategy/goal is to finish each stage without drama. We are going to drive quickly but not push anywhere near the limit due to reports of mixed surfaces (gravel, snow, glare ice)on the stages. I've been watching the weather forecast for Cochrane and I'm not sure how there is going to be any snow or ice left by the time we get there (highs in the double digits almost everyday). Oh well, I'm planning on bringing both the gravel and the studded winter tires. My hope is that if we can set "good" times on all stages, that we will move up the leaderboard as others have difficulties.
Also, I've finally sorted out about 50 pictures of building the rally car. I'm going to get them up onto some photo hosting site somewhere, and then put the link to it on this site. As mentioned in previous posts, I think this is almost a duty to the rally community since I spent countless hours reviewing other peoples sites to see "how they did it".
In other news, we are very pleased to announce that Stauber Drilling of Regina, SK has joined as a Sponsor to the Gopher Rally Racing Team. If you need any drilling done, water wells installed, etc., please give Lorne or Fred at call at 306 359 1959.
Also, I've finally sorted out about 50 pictures of building the rally car. I'm going to get them up onto some photo hosting site somewhere, and then put the link to it on this site. As mentioned in previous posts, I think this is almost a duty to the rally community since I spent countless hours reviewing other peoples sites to see "how they did it".
In other news, we are very pleased to announce that Stauber Drilling of Regina, SK has joined as a Sponsor to the Gopher Rally Racing Team. If you need any drilling done, water wells installed, etc., please give Lorne or Fred at call at 306 359 1959.
Thursday, March 1, 2007
Ice racing video
A bit of action this past weekend for the rally car. I went out to the local ice race track for a bit of a "shakedown" on the new winter tires.
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