This is in my build thread, but figured I'd post up a recap of the Waste Management Winter Rallysprint this weekend, seeing as pretty much our entire team (and several other teams there) are active members on this forum. So, hope you enjoy and can figure out who the GRM people are :)
For those of you who were there, please chime in, add photos, or whatever (either here or my build thread, or both!)
Waste Management Winter Rallyspring 2017 (SCCA)
We headed up on Friday to our second WMWR since it became an SCCA event (it was previously a Rally America event, with basically the same format). Like last year, the field was fairly small (15+ cars) due to the unseasonably odd weather. Usually in mid-February in upstate Pennsylvania it's very wintry. Last year it was cold but no snow. This year there was a good amount of snow on the ground but temps got up into the 60s, so the stage was a messy mix of ~6" of snow, slush, mud, some ice, some gravel, and every other surface you can think of.
loaded up
This made tire choice interesting for everyone. About half the field left on snow tires and the other half on gravels. Last year we used snows in similar conditions and ended up flatting two of them, which sucks. So this year we decided to go with the gravels - we'd give up some traction and speed, but would be able to "abuse" the tires a bit more without fear of flatting. Keep this in mind for later.
Ozgur and his/our crew trying to get Alp's e30 ready to roll....in a shopping center parking lot
About half of the field was in our class, R2U (2WD cars under 2.5L engines/NA), with some accomplished regional drivers who we know. With the conditions, it was sure to be a battle fo FWD cars for the class, with most RWD cars just fighting it out amongst ourselves for bragging rights. This proved to be the case, in the end, with FWD cars taking the top 5 spots in the class.
On the RWD side were Alex Jagger and Ryan Symacek in their 240SX, Billy Petrow driving the Broken Motorsports 240SX, Ozgur Simsek and Brian Battocchi in Alp Seyhan's BMW 325i (a last-second replacement for Ozgur's e30, which wasn't quite complete), and Rober Pepper's Porsche 944, plus one or two others I'm possibly forgetting. I think all the RWD cars except Ozgur's went out with gravels.
During the Friday recce it was clear that traction was going to be questionable in many areas - sunny-side areas were getting a ton of melting turning to gooey mud and giant puddles. Shady-side areas still had full or partial snow cover and were very slick as well. THere were some dry(ish) gravel areas here and there, but not many. In the soft areas, this stage gets very, very rocky with big chunks getting dug up by the high-power cars, making some danger for underbodies and wheels/tires.
Transit into the sunset
Friday night we got tech'd (no issues) and then met up with some of the other drivers at a local bar and while Jim recopied his stage notes at a table, I drank way too much and chatted with a table ful of locals nearby. I don't usually have hangovers, but had one all day Saturday lol....oops.
we love Pepper's Porsche. From Fairfax, VA same as us :)
Local brewhouse...
Before the rally, we drove over Petrow's skidplate to try to straighten it. Didn't work, so they found a bigger weight...
The off to parc expose, where we signed some kids t-shirts and hung out before starting off
Turner and Rhoads, who would go on to win overall
Alan's Neon
Porsche
We started mid-pack on Saturday in the draw. WMWR is the same stage run 5 times (3 times one way, two times reversed). Each stage is about 10 miles or so with transits of a few miles. We went out pretty cautious to feel out the conditions on gravel tires (we did recce on snow tires).
First stage was fairly uneventful other than one steep, long hill that begins after a sharp right turn (so hard to carry any speed). This was tough in recce with snow tires and promised to be tough on gravels. As luck would have it, we turned the corner and.....Alex Jagger's 240 SX was midway up the hill backing down after failing to get to the top. Since we had no way to help, we went "two wheels off the track" and did oiur best to get past them and up the hill. Somehow by the slimmest margin we managed to get through and went on to finish the stage - not terribly fast but clean.
The 240s after finally making it up the hill (both had issues)
Second stage we went out with more speed and again had no major incidents that I recall, but knocked about a minute and a half off our first stage time, which is good.
Third stage was interesting as we caught up to one of the Subarus, and managed to pass them. About 5 minutes later coming into some tree-flanked kinks, when I went to make the right kink the tires didn't bite at all and we slid right at the tree. I straightened them out and aimed at the smaller tree to the left hoping to get some braking bite, and we managed to stop a foot short of the tree. The Subie went on by us again, and we got back on his tail for the rest of the stage.
Then off to service - got a bit of fuel, and cleaned some glass. And ate some good food made by our and Ozgur's crew. Our crew stayed busy , however, helping out Ozgur and his crew making multiple repairs to Alp's e30. So there is that.
ON the first reverse stage, just a minute in we found that same Subie overcooked a corner and stuck in some snow. We stopped to try to give them a tug out, but it was a slippery downslope and we couldn't get any traction at all when pulling so they unhooked and we went on our way, now with Tad Uzzle's Mazda2 on our tail. We let him go by after a couple minutes, but ended up catching him and passing him again.
Tad
Some other photos
On the second reverse stage, we went out faster but about halfway in I overcooked a slippery turn and had a small off, but happened to be where a rock was buried in the snow. We hit pretty hard on the back wheel, but kept on going. As it turns out the wheel was slightly bent and it caused a slight air leak, but it held up for the rest of the stage with no noticeable issue (and both wheel and tire shoudl be salvageable). We had another chase with Tad in the Mazda but didn't catch him this time. Instead, by 3/4 of the way through the stage we were a turn or two behind Tad and Paul Batman had come up on us in his Impreza. Didn't really have a place to let him by in the last section of the stage, at least safely, so we just pushed harder and he dropped back a little bit. The last two hairpins were tricky as the car was so mud-covered I coudln't see anything out the side windows so was basically asking Jim to call out the apex so I knew when/how much to turn. As we hit the last stretch, a half-mile long stretch with mostly 4s and 5s (fairly mild) turns, the surface was still partially snowy. We hit the last right 5 fine, but on the following left-4 I couldn't hold the track and we slid toward the trees on the right at a good clip. (Luckily) there was a water-filled ditch there and we basically fell into that with the right wheels, stopping us from hitting any trees with Jim's side fo the car, and I pushed on down the ditch trying to get out and hitting random objects in the way. As it happens, Batman followed us directly into the ditch as well, but managed to jump back out quickly (AWD), so he roared by and I mnaged to give it enough gas as the ditch got shallower and we popped up and out (and almost went off the other side of the road lol). So anyhow, that was like 50 feet before the finish. So we finished!!!
We transited to time control and then started to head back to the Rally HQ area and.....lights and car went dead. Voltmeter showing zero. Before stage 4 I noticed that the alternator was doing funny things with all the lighting on, but it seemed to have stabilized. Guess not. I think we ran that whole stage with full lighting on and no alternator charging! Recall that I just installed this one (a 105A unit to handle our lights) to replace our fully-functional 80A alternator. Figures.
Luckily, our crew was heading down the same road and saw us. Chris Nonack and Mike hung out while Stepehn took my tow rig to get the trailer. After about an hour we loaded up on a gravel road and went to Rally HQ.
As it turns out, only two RWD cars finished the rally - us and Jagger/Symancek, who got stuck several times and were far behind us. Robert Pepper's 944 fought an electrical issue and bowed out on the last stage with a failed alternator. Petrow's 240SX lost a front wheel and/or hub and had to be picked up on stage. Ozgur and Brian battled all kinds of issues all day (blow-out rear shock mount, fuel pump relay, etc) and eventually broke their oil pan on stage 4 and retired. The R2U class was won by our friends Kevin Turner and Matt Rhoads in their FWD Impreza on snow tires (also the overall winners!), followed (I think) by the Beliveau Boys from up north in their Golf and Alan Edwards in his Neon (who hit a tree last year). We had no major/damaging offs and no penalties, so those are both good things.
Ozgur's oil pan
Petrow's lack of wheel
Then we had some celebratory Gennys
Then we all went out to a bar and drank some more with the other drivers, navis and crew
All in all, not a fast or trophy-winning performance, but with the conditions out there taking out about half the entry field, we're pretty happy to have gotten through with only a few small issues (two banged-up wheels and the alternator issue). While we'd love "great" conditions (i.e. either all-snow, or all-dry), this kind of event is challenging and I think it improves my driving more than anything else - plus we had a good time with rally friends and crew.
On the way home, we stopped at some middle-of nowhere car lot we passed, as Jim has been talking about another vehicle to haul engines and generally use for utiliy tasks and during this trip seems to have gotten onto the thought of a Baja. So we saw this BFE car lot with liek 10 cars, but a silver Baja sitting there. Hooked a U-turn with the trailer an went back. Nobody came out to talk to us, so Jim just got in the car and stood in the bed (but did not buy it) ,lol....
So, got home, unloaed, unpacked, washed the tow rig and the rally car, put the trailer away. Tomorrow I'll do an inspection fo the car for any other damage and swap back in our old alternator and send this one back. .
Mike (our crew) took a ton of awesome photos of us in action, so hopefully I'll be able to post those up here in the next couple days. Also we ran 3 GoPros on the car (roof, inside middle, and one facing back at us) so once we tet some video edited, will link that up.
Posted some updates on our facebook team page, please visit us there and give us a like!
Thanks once again to our crew for this event: Mike Seitz, Stephen Nichols, Katie Spoth, Chris Nonack, Brian Morse, an Tyler (whose last name I forget, because I suck at names). Also thanks to the WMWR and SCCA organizers, especially our friend SueAnne Carson!
