Hi Everyone Taranaki Tarmac Rally 2014 report. wet wet and wetter would just about say it all. like most i imagine you are always worrying about the traction levels on wet back roads, did keep me awake a bit on the friday night. speaking of Friday night, got there signed in and scrutineered and the buzz was great, until Len and I went off for an awesome Thai meal, just finished and marveling over how good it was when we were rung because we had missed a compulsory drivers briefing. So we sprinted back ( yes on foot, bloody miles ) to be told we had a 50 dollar fine and strangely no briefing really offered at all. We were told it was about the virtual chicanes in stage 6 and to go on the Rallysafe site to find out all about it. What a load of crap nothing at all to support it, it did feel like revenue gathering rather than safety but hey we missed it...... so ill get my rant done now.......... If virtual chicanes and god knows what else are what rallysafe are going to deliver im out, im not here to play playstation, im here to compete with a car and a steering wheel in the real world. Seems that organisers may like to play or rather Toy with us with this device, and i say we need to send a strong message as to them not doing so now. We were used as guinea pigs for a stupid idea that is boring and unsafe and confusing and with ridiculous 30 second penalties for each one you missed and there were 3, i dont know why i even bothered to try and win class, a waste of time as this totally wrecked our 2nd place and a hard fought day. Just so organisers know, I am your customer not your test laboratory, it costs a heap to get to the start line and this behavior is totally unacceptable and not in the spirit of our sport at all. And as someone said at prize giving, how much do a few hay bales cost. The safety aspect of the Rallysafe unit are great, and push to pass we used 3 times, but get big brother out of the car. It was also very apparent that the organisers viewed this GPS info as god like and absolute, however as many of us in the technology sector know it is far from it. All day long the distances were out with the road book so therefore the speed could never be judged as accurate, so as a driver instead of looking at my speedo to slow to 50k do i know have to unsafely watch a tiny screen......i can tell you know the distraction in our vehicle was about as unsafe as you can get, our place in the notes gone and no green go flag for the first one... wrong wrong wrong in so many ways, 19 people disadvantaged about a 3rd of the finishers.....MSNZ stop it now............... so back to the day, a great day to not have the gruntiest car and my car was handling amazing on the Kumhos i had bought on rims 2nd hand, i felt really contacted to the glassy road and really enjoyed the challenge. Stage 1 we drove like nanas as we didnt have the demister sorted and couldnt see a thing, which put us on the back foot but i wasnt worried. We came on in the second stage and the confidence just started to build, small spin in the 3rd ( as per video ) and then the in the 4th stage we had the bit between the teeth. As we came to the end of the 5th i could here the exhaust screaming and unfortunately we had blown the up pipe to the turbo. So for the rest of the day we had no low down anything really but boy did we ring the revs out of poor old bumble bee. (She secretly loved it i reckon) i was attacking the corners to keep our lack of straight line pace in check and thats where the old grp N style really helps. We were stoked to finish and Len did a great job keeping me in check, fantastic team work and what great stages, it really is an awesome event. Thanks Taranaki Car club and all those who stood in the rain to make it happen you guys are the stars.......we really appreciate your efforts A Huge thanks Brendon for sorting out Glen to do the panel work and then to sort out the broken bits in a short time frame, you are a legend mate. Thanks also to Adam for your time on the car, maximum respect guys......cant go racing without such awesome help. Thanks to Adam, Jilly and Matt for servicing, great work and a big thanks to Co Driver Len Fisher, always a privilege to sit next to you me old mate. to theoldfoundry.co.nz and decoart.co.nz, thanks for your support, and to anyone else who may be interested in supporting or helping, i look forward to hearing from you.....asap....... cheers until next time. Vizible
Posted on: Thu, 17 Jul 2014 01:11:47 +0000
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