Wow! What an event. It was a long, cold, icy weekend, but in the end it was a great event.

It started out like always, with little issues causing concern. Tech found a front wheel bearing that was starting to go, so we watched that all weekend, hoping it didn’t get loose enough to fail. Then, changing tires before Parc Expose, I noticed grease all over the hub. The clamp on the outer CV had fallen off. Luckily, the service crew (thanks Brent & Jose) was able to wrap some safety wire around the boot and it held all weekend.

The event started out great. My goal was to take it easy to feel out the grip. Stage 1 went well, I passed one competitor who was stuck, and ended up setting the 2nd fastest time in class. Then on Stage 2, I hit the brakes too hard coming into a tight corner at the end of a long straight, killed the engine, and shot through the corner into a snowbank trying to upshift to get it to restart. The car stopped about a foot short of a large tree and was BURIED in the snowbank. Some spectators came over to dig out the car, but it wasn’t moving. It took a few minutes for Jay to run the triangle up the hill we’d slid down and get the tow strap out, but eventually we got it and Billy Mann tugged on us until we were free. We ended up losing ~10 minutes and dropped to the back of the field.

The next stage was “The Ranch”. It’s a narrow road that turns into a jeep trail halfway through. It’s only plowed for the rally, so we didn’t have our normal stage notes and had to rely on notes our competitor, Chris Greenhouse & Don DeRose, wrote during recce. I really enjoyed the rough stage, and once again scored the 2nd fastest time.

Stage 4 was another reminder that this was my first snow event. I came into a corner just a little too hot and slid up on a snowbank, high-centering the car. There were no spectators at this corner, so we had to wait for the next car to pull us out. Another car went by while we were getting strapped in, and then he spun into a snowbank, blocking the road. By the time we pulled him out, there were two cars waiting behind us. I pulled over to let one by, then spun out a little further on and the second car went by while I got the car turned around. All in all, it was a disastrous stage.

At service, the crew knocked all the snow out of the wheels & put on the lights for the night stages. I set a new goal of not stuffing it the rest of the night, and backed way off, braking before the icy sections leading into the corners. It worked, and what felt like my slowest stage ended up being a class best. I felt I learned a lot on Friday, and while I was hoping for something better than fourth place, I was happy to finish and have a chance at redemption on Saturday.

Day Two coming…

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 at 10:45 am and is filed under Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.