Stompin' on the Regulars

So, it's winter here in MI, and most of the racing series ground to a halt back in September. But not the hardy souls of the SCCA Detroit Region RallyCross scene. They had their last event of the season on Saturday (12/8). I managed to con my pal Brent into driving out there to check it out.

Rallycross is the messy little brother of Autocross. In both events a course is laid out using cones in a large open area and competitors run their cars through one at a time. Hitting a cone earns a time penalty - usually +2 seconds for each cone you hit. Times are taken over multiple runs, and then added up at the end of the day. Lowest score wins - just like golf.
The primary difference between the two is that autocross takes place on a paved surface - usually a parking lot, while rallycross is run on dirt or grass. Both emphasize car control, and precision, it's just that you get to slide around sideways in rallycross. No special equipment is necessary to compete - just a helmet and a car - any old car will do, in fact most people drive their cars right to the event. Only one car at a time is allowed on course, so the potential to wreck your car is really minimal. For those reasons Autocross is hugely popular. It offers people a worry-free chance to test their limits, along with their car's. Rallycross is still in it's early stages, but will undoubtedly prove to be very popular.

Our initial goal was simply to spectate. Check out the event and see if the rallycross scene interested us. In gathering info on the event, I managed to make a few contacts that offered to let us ride along during their runs if we wanted - all we needed were some helmets. I've got two, so we were good to go. As the day got closer, Brent started to show some interest in actually competing in his car. His car is fine choice too. A 2000 Subaru Impreza. It's got a zippy little boxer engine with 165hp, nimble handling, and one of the best all-wheel-drive systems on the planet - It's the perfect car for a rallycross. He was a bit unsure at first since it was his only car, so I left it entirely up to him. The day of the event arrived and he was positive he wanted to give it a go - YEAH!!

With that, we drove out to the event, got registered, got teched, walked the course (twice - first time was the wrong direction) and attended the driver's meeting. At the meeting we learned that when you're not driving, you're expected to lend a hand running the event. For the untrained (us) that meant standing at a corner waiting for cars to hit a cone, running out to reset the cone, and radioing it in to timing and scoring. Sounds like fun right? Maybe on a nice summer day - but this was not to be one of those days. The expected high temp was 26 degrees. We froze our asses off out there for about 4 hours before our first run.

Behold! The tundra...


Brent lined up for his first ever rallycross run and I was along as "co driver" (more like dead weight). We pulled up to the start line still futzing with helmets straps, seatbelts, gloves, and just generally being nervous.

The starter waved us on to the course and it was time - I wondered what Brent's approach was going to be. Brent's a pretty laid back guy, but lemme tell ya - he freakin' FLOORED it! I had no idea he was going to attack like that. The whole first run, I kept thinking "Oh man!! Too fast, we'll never make this tur----Holy crap - we made it!"
We clipped a few cones on the first run, but never spun out or did anything too silly. We pulled off at the end of the run and stopped at the timing truck for our time. 102.603 - we had no idea how that compared, but didn't really care. We were just there for the experience.

We ran 3 more times before lunch, then it was time for the afternoon runs. Brent got faster and smoother with each run - still tagging the occasional cone here and there, but we were having a blast and weren't too concerned with it. We think he had one really fast clean run, but the timing got all messed up and he had to re-run. The re-run was good, but the previous run felt way faster.

Unfortunately, before long the event was over and we had to head home. Brent had some obligations that evening, so we couldn't stick around for the final results. We'd have to wait a few days for them to post on the website.
They finally posted the results Monday evening - I just about crapped my pants when I saw them. Brent took second in the 'SA' class (stock all-wheel-drive). 2nd IN CLASS!! I was stunned.
Scanning the results, he also beat out most of the cars in the PA, and MA classes (prepared all-wheel-drive and modified all-wheel-drive, respectively) DAMN!!

Here's some photo evidence of the day's events. In retrospect, I should have let Brent do the afternoon runs alone so I could get some shots of him in action. Oh well...how was I to know he was going to do so well his first time out??