NORRA Mexican 1000 Rally

So, as I've alluded to elsewheres on the forum, apparently I am going to be co-driving in the Mexican 1000! Doing so is going to have me away from home for 3 weeks (with a brief 6 hour sleep there) as I am traveling for work before the event, so it's going to be interesting.

We're competing in an Eclipse (makes me nostalgic for the Talon I wrote off last year). The driver, Ron Robnett, is relatively new to rally (I believe 3 events is the number he has competed at) but is a very intelligent individual with high praise from the people I have talked to about him.

Now, everyone has heard of the Baja 1000, and even I didn't quite understand what the Mexican 1000 is. Essentially, it is what the Baja 1000 was before that race started requiring you to have 36" of suspension travel trophy trucks bombing along 3' whoops at 100mph. The Mexican 1000 is a lot more relaxed and caters to a more historic/nostalgic sort of competitor. It's not nearly as intense as stage rally, but I am truly looking forward to it. That's not to say it isn't difficult though, as navigation rather than note calling will be at a premium!

Le car:

How did this all come about? A co-driving friend of mine in the eastern states ended up having some medical difficulties and was unable to co-drive for Ron. Her first instinct was to contact me (how nice eh?) and let me know the low-down on Ron and what he was looking for.

Now normally, I'd jump at the chance to take a vacation and go racing in Mexico, but my job responsibility/time at work has increased greatly in the past 3 months. As such, this is the schedule I'll be running on over the next 3.5 weeks:

Apr 16 -
7:30am Leave for up north on a plane

April 22-
10:30am arrive back in Edmonton after 6 16+ hour days, ship race suit and helmet via express mail down to Los Angeles

April 23-
4:00am head back north for 3 more 16 hour days

April 25-
7:30pm (this is where the fun begins) fly out of the north and arrive in Edmonton at 8:30pm. Grab bags, check bags AGAIN, go back THROUGH security to catch flight to Vancouver @ 9:45pm

April 26-
12:00am looooooong ass layover. Finally get on plane and arrive in LA @ 10:45am
11:00am drive to Mexicali
5:00pm arrive in Mexicali, drink, eat, go the berkeley to sleep

April 27-
ALL DAY make preparations/figure out the driver/crew/car and what I gotta do to make everything run smoothly

April 28-May 1 Race (1200 miles total, with well over 600 miles of that timed competition)
Evening of May 1, party hard (whether we make it or not!)

May 2-
3:30pm fly out of Cabo to Portland for the Oregon Trail Rally 8:00pm arrive at hotel. Meet friend who drove down from Edmonton. Pass out (from drinking or exhaustion, it can go either way)

May 3-5 cause trouble, drink Americans under the table flap gums with all my Canadian brethren at the rally (Antoine in a WRC Evo! Brendan Reeves competing in 2wd!). I have a special shirt I made due to the recent Rally America ongoings:

May 6-7
drive home at a leisurely pace. Just for fun, we made sure to install the electric cutout on the 2013 Genesis we'll be cruising in for added pleasure.

And that'll be that.

I've always wanted to race out in the desert, the recent events in Mexico has sort of put a damper on it for me though. Good luck, sounds like a great time .

Well, I am now in and around your country, you 'merikans have been warned!

As a side note, I've now been on 9 seperate flights in 30 days

Buy GoPro.

Post video.

I want to do this on a bike in the worst way. Take lots of pictures and good luck.

Website where I can keep up?

Cool! I'll be traveling a lot of the same roads the following week in my lifted Subaru Impreza. I'll probably try to do it at a more leisurely pace since it's supposed to be a "relaxing vacation"

N Sperlo wrote: Buy GoPro. Post video.

Done and done. Two 16gb cards ass-well

mazdeuce wrote: I want to do this on a bike in the worst way. Take lots of pictures and good luck.

Thanks for the luck! Lots of pictures incoming...

N Sperlo wrote: Website where I can keep up?

http://www.norra.com/index.php

Rally Car

Tow rig and chase vehicle (works surprisingly well, never felt an issue power-wise on flatland, would much prefer a baja turbo though!)

Damn you 'merika, damn you and all of your tasty food to hell... (it looks so beautiful in this picture, like it's an ad lol)

Class one'in it:

Aircooled Porsche says what?

Answer: I need more oil cooling:

In and out burger!!! They are the best :)

Us crossing the finish line today (yes, a picture of a picture). We completed 3/4 of almost 800 competitive stage miles, 400+ miles of transit as well. Not enough can be said of the people who helped get us to the end, including crawling the last 5 miles at 15mph due to a crushed exhaust and a collapsing intake hose! We'll be back from the sounds of thing... stay tuned for the day by day writeup!

I'm personally planning on building a truck to "rally" specifications for this event (their idea of rally includes a brand new Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland addition done up to run in the top 5 overall, with glass windows and A/C!), so I am on the lookout for the toughest mini-truck you can get. Conditions require extended cab, and must have an SUV counterpart to use as chase/tow/service vehicle. I'm thinking deranger and exploder.

And as a final warning, do NOT do this event in a rally car unless you don't care about it, or you are willing to essentially "use the car up" completely over the course of the event. I hope to post some video from other people (never got a chance to), but some of the stuff we went through... the only reason was Ron's sheer power of will, including the will to do whatever it takes to make it "up and over" the obstacles in our way. The fact the car held up as well as it did... simply mind blowing. We only ACTUALLY wrecked two control arms, one rally tire flat (ran falken mediums for about 400 miles), and a front DMS 50mm started weeping from the seals.

If you are crazy enough to do this event; minimum DMS 50mm's (PROPERLY SETUP, longer AND softer springs with correct damping, all things we didn't have), swaybars removed, full body length skidplates (and at least 3/16" thick, I think we were running 1/8" thick?!), completed boxed control arms, and realistically a tubular front end to get the front frame rails out of the way and provide more front end protection/better approach angle. If done properly, a rallycar would SLAY in the smoother sections, but you'd still have to be prepared to skip the car over boulders 1+ foot tall and pummel the car in general. SHORTER IS BETTER, and overhang is a killer. Awd lightweight cars work hilariously better in the fine sand of seabeds/lakebeds/silt river bottoms than 2wd heavy pickups with big tires.

I think a 2.5RS could make a KILLER car for this (again, if you didn't care about ever selling it or using it again).

Awesome! Congrats on finishing! I can't wait to hear the whole story.

Nice!

I wonder if a small but powerful truck (boosted '90s Toyota Pickup? Or Ranger) could beat cars in this event. With enough power they can be as quick as a car on the straights, and from your description of the ideal suspension setup I'm guessing that getting around corners fast isn't very helpful. Apart from the corners, you wouldn't have to slow down for nothing mang.

Turbos are a big nono in desert racing. Cornering can actually be a huge deal, as sometimes you'd be on twisty pavement or gravel roads smooth enough to do stage rally on for 20 miles straight or more. The biggest issue is simple ground clearance. If we could get another ~4" of ground clearance and run a 215/75R15 rally tire (if such a thing exists) or truck tire, that alone would have helped a ton.

What I haven't told you is how we center punched a whoop at 80mph on the first day and bent the front frame rails down at a 45* angle from the front of the block forward, and nearly rolled the car end over end. More travel, more ground clearance, and better suspension setup would have saved us.

As an average joe, this event should be taken as one to do and FINISH all stage mileage, which is a claim maybe half the entrants can claim. You'll never beat the guys with $300k rigs and 20 guy service crews (or a freakin KAMAZ service truck :o )

Hrmmm.... what's the licensing requirements for something like this?

Add another one to the bucket list...

Swank Force One wrote: Hrmmm.... what's the licensing requirements for something like this?

You pay $175 (75$ for a NORRA membership, $100 to enter as a codriver) and show up. I E36 M3 you not!

The event is VERY laid back, which has its ups and downs. A trophy truck ran over a buggy (yes, you read that right) and the trucks tire intruded in the cab enough to break the dudes collarbone. The truck didn't even know what happened and continued driving.

A biker also died Unsure if that was due to an accident or what (info like this is sometimes very hard to come across).

Mexico (if you haven't been often) is a weird place compared to NA. It's not 3rd world, but it sure ain't 1st world. The fact is, the race is all done COMPLETELY on open, public roads. You can (and will) get oncoming traffic at anytime, even in the middle of nowhere. You will have kids jump out in front of you. You will fly through random villages at 60+mph.

Safety and awareness of your surrounding/what other vehicles are doing is up to you. It definitely isn't something to take lightly. The good thing about the Mexican 1000 is that the actual competition is much more relaxed as well, which means competitors are WAY more willing to help, especially if you are in something oddball (like the 3 aircooled 70's porch 911's that entered).

Man every time someone's truck causes minor property damage in the offroad TSD here, it causes a moderate E36 M3storm.

HiTempguy wrote: Aircooled Porsche says what? Answer: I need more oil cooling:

I'm in LOVE

When i first saw this thread I was thinking that rally =/ offroad racing, which seems to be where you are coming from. I'm seriously considering doing this in a UTV.

icaneat50eggs wrote: When i first saw this thread I was thinking that rally =/ offroad racing, which seems to be where you are coming from. I'm seriously considering doing this in a UTV.

This was done like a rally raid, it was much more like stagerally than desert racing IMO, especially the routebook. Once you use a 10" samsung tablet with gps essentials on it... a whole new way to navigate has opened before my eyes. Very, VERY cool way to do stages. Gps was good enough I could call easy/medium/hard corners before we got to them in quick succession!

Very cool and I love the kammback (what I used to call them) on the DSM.