Maple Leaf Winter Rally - "Tulips in February"

[BruceL]

[TrevorH]

[STeveD]

[Opal]

[STeveD]

Okay, you've survived First Frost, probably one of the (unintentionally) hardest Novice class rallies in more than a few years! If you liked the challenge of the drive, but not the complexity of the notes, then the February 20-21st overnight Maple Leaf Winter Rally in Bancroft is a must do!

Novice notes will be Tulips and simple Distance to Turn instructions:

Tulips (styles 1 - 4 on the first row only): http://www.torontoautosportclub.ca/articles/RallyMaster/102.html

Distance to Turn style:


0.00 Stop Tee Left out of the parking lot
0.13 Traffic Signal SA at Main St.
1.39 Bear Right onto Highway 408
4.55 SA at 1st Line exit ramp
7.12 Bear Right onto exit ramp for 2nd Line
7.51 Traffic Signal Left onto 2nd Line
8.36 SA at 9th Concession
11.34 Stop Left onto 8th Concession
12.91 Odometer Check at the Yellow 'Left Curve' sign on the right
Take 18 minutes and 7 seconds to get here. CAS 72
13.84 Stop Tee Right
16.63 Left onto Hadden Rd.
18.19 Straight Ahead at Davis Ave. CAS 54
19.38 Left at Spring Rd.
21.54 Forced Right
22.86 Stop SA at 4th Sideroad
25.60 Right onto Sparks Rd. CAS 68
27.18 Stop Left onto Glen Forest Rd. EOS


If you can handle that, you can handle the winter rally.

Challenging, twisty, and full of crests, these snow covered roads are a hoot to drive. Starting at 10pm, going until 6am? Even better! This daytime video was last weekend. Yes, Bancroft still has snow!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4vBNIWCKF4

Aside from winter tires, a safety triangle, and a red cross card, no other special car preparation for your daily driver is needed! Your navigator will want a pen and a map or book light to read the notes, and maybe a little Gravol. GPS are allowed and recommended. In case of the worst, have warm clothes, a candle, and a typical winter safety kit in the car. That's it! $80 per car, awards breakfast included.

Read the Supps and sign up here: http://www.mlrc.ca/MLWR/index.html

If you need a last chance to work together in the car before this event, Monday February 8th is a quick night time rally just north of Toronto. They will be using simple Distance to Turn instructions for the novice class.

http://www.mlrc.ca/minirally.html

http://icerace.net/triangle.wmv

[BruceL]

more video. Still no snow. Bloody cold, though!

MLWR 2010 Teaser 2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tx-i02M0YkE)

on-line entry will be up very soon

[STeveD]

Apparently, it's too darned cold to snow in Bancroft.

http://www.theweathernetwork.com/weather/caon0039

[TR_Tim]

It'll be thermal underwear and the big gloves in the TR..............

Given the distance, noise level and length of the rally, I think we'll be trailering up to Bancroft. But we plan to be there with the old beast.

[RyanHuber]

Alright folks, now's the time to stop thinking about it and get your name on the list! Online entry and payment, as well as updated supplemental regulations (as of today, including an odo check on the way into Bancroft) are now up and running at http://www.mlrc.ca/MLWR/index.html . We're looking forward to seeing everyone for a fun rally on the 20th, so let's show the snow gods we mean business with a nice full entry list and maybe they'll give us some nice fresh snow in return!

[BruceL]

The route has been green-crewed, and I've just updated the instructions. Here's the summary from Paul and Rita about road conditions.

"We were up doing the green crew on the weekend. The road conditions were very different then in the past and for the most part in great shape.

The "back roads" are mostly frozen and smooth, while the paved major roads (Hwy 28 and 62) are incredibly rough. The drive to the rally will be worse than the rally roads!

The massive frost heaves from past years are almost absent. There were only a few that will overtaxed the suspension if you don't slow down. Most are marked in the routebook and the others are clearly visible.

At night, most roads were a mix of frozen dirt with periodic icy patches (at most 10 metres long, usually in front of a south facing rock face -- run off) and a dusting of light snow (Bancroft got a couple of cm of snow on Sunday night). A couple of roads were hard, thick, packed snow with excellent traction and almost no ice.

With the warm daytime temperatures and sunshine over last weekend, some exposed roads turned into a layer of mud over a frozen base which quickly froze up after dark. This was the really slippery stuff, but should be frozen again by the 10 pm start.

The snow banks are almost absent everywhere (30 cm, at the highest) and the ones that were out there are as hard as concrete. Once over these small banks, the snow is granular and soft, but not much of it with rocks protruding everywhere.

The forecast is calling for another few cm of snow this week and continuing "warm" temperatures, which will change everything!

As with all winter rallies, be prepared for anything!

Paul and Rita"

Still looking for more entries. Remember, simple instructions!!
Bruce

[STeveD]

Ferd and Christoph won expert again, as usual! (5.9 total points). Expert and Intermediate ran the same relatively simple notes. Novice class got even simpler notes.

All of us "experienced" folk got caught out by the multiple Route Checks. We all forgot that buried in the ORRC rules is a statement that you take a one minute time assessment (actually, a TINE assessment) for each and every route check to give you a time to get back to the car with the sticker and take off. Most of us forgot that and just made up the time getting to the next checkpoint. Paul Henshall gave us a "Time Out" for the first one, but not the second one. That confused us. But he was supposed to be Quiet Zone police for his second one, so that shouldn't have existed anyway.

They also added some unique "Self-operated Checkpoints". Basically, they tell you a landmark to look for, and you write down what time you got there on a sticker, or the ideal time that you SHOULD have got there. And they collect that sticker at the next checkpoint.

The conditions were really unique! On almost all of the roads, you could find bare hard packed dirt/gravel for grip braking or accelerating. Around the corners as well, you could keep the loaded tires on dirt. The dirt was spattered with ice, but you didn't really have to keep all your tires on it. There were much fewer frost heaves, and the Leonards did a really great job of listing the tough ones, and where ice and run completely across the road. We did Old Hastings at least twice last night and it had the roughest conditions with the most bumps. Ol' Smokey didn't have to slow for any of the bumps/heaves, but stock cars whose owners cared about their survival, would have needed to slow.

So keeping up with CAS really wasn't much of a problem for most of the rally with the excellent grip. The one exception was Eels Lake Road in Leg C... turned onto that and it was typical winter rally coverage! A few inches of loose and packed powder. Most of us had forgotten how to drive in SNOW after being spoiled with high grip conditions for 6 hours before that.

Then there was a left hand turn on Eels lake that MUST have been thin snow on top of hard ice. I was going hand over hand to counter the oversteer. Ol' Smokey doesn't have the power to induce oversteer on anything but glare ice, so that pretty much settled what must have been there. You could see tire tracks where quite a few cars had gone through the short 30cm banks there. By that point in the night, Opal and I were running half-way through the novice pack, so we were probably car 10ish or so on the road. We came around that corner and found a Subaru Legacy facing us, but there was enough room to get by them. I heard that sweep or car 99 had to pull a Legacy wagon out of this area later because it was buried deep.

Anyway, a good night! Opal and I finished first in intermediate with 4.3, which also gave us the overall win. That vindication felt good, given our previous disasters at MLWR. I was under the weather still after a minor surgery on Thursday, so I honestly was glad to have the easy driving conditions last night. There was quite a lot of back and forth between Opal and I on things we were unsure about. us. We KNEW there must be some kind of allowance for the Route Checks, but we didn't know what it should be until Christoph asked at the end of Leg B and told us.

Being under the weather, and still more than a little competitive; unwilling to aim for anything but the overall win throughout the night, I was probably a little less pleasant than usual to be in the car with. Opal deserves a special "patience and understanding" award for not going off on me last night. ;-)

I'll have to process videos later, and do some editing to make some of the language family friendly. :-) At least the tape was running on Eels Lake Road, which was the most challenging drive of the night. Oh, and Old Hastings. We'll have to see how the bumps looked the second time through when I didn't back off.

Trevor and Ted finished 3rd intermediate with 10.7 points out of a field of NINE competitive intermediate teams! Only 0.1 points off of second place... 6 seconds after over 7 hours on the road! There was more than a few rallycross champs and performance rally drivers there, so that was a really good achievement.

So once again, Ryan, the Leonards and MLRC did a fantastic job and kept everyone safe with good notes. If you haven't tried this yet... put it on your calendar for next February. Trust me! If you read this forum, it's something that you should try.

[STeveD]

Maxine and Christine paired up again and would have finished seventh if they hadn't been caught behind the 20 minute max late allowance in Leg C. Your first time behind max late is always a learning experience.

Tim and Perry ran a great rally to finish third novice! A phenomenal result for a team that refuses to use any modern convenience such as GPS, All Wheel Drive ;-), or even a calculator! They rally to 1961 technology standards; back when all checkpoints were timed to the minute, not the tenth like they now are. No offs, no damage (exept their analogue clock that failed before the start) and they drove the TR back up on the trailer for the ride home in pristine condition. I have photos to prove it!

And.. ya know... it was great to see so many of the teams that competed in their first rally at First Frost back at it for MLWR.

Photos soon; I apologize for the quality at the end of the night. I accidentally zoomed the camera into "digital enhanced zoom" range and that makes everything look like crap. :-(

[STeveD]

http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/3rdNovice.jpg

http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/3rdInt.jpg

http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/1stInt.jpg

Ol' Smokey:
http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/Ol_Smokey.jpg

The best looking rally car in Ontario:
http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/Tims_TR.jpg

http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/Tims_TR4.jpg

[STeveD]

http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/Leg_A_Results.jpg

http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/Leg_B_Results.jpg

http://spda-online.ca/modules/xoopsgallery/cache/albums/album14/Leg_C_Final_Results.jpg

[TR_Tim]

Congratulations to all the crews that took part - especially to the peerless Steve and Opal. Great result, guys!!

It was our first time on this rally and I can honestly say that anyone who loves driving MUST take part in this event. I know that conditions were less severe than in previous years, but that suited us just fine. I can honestly say that I've never had so much fun in a car - and that includes back to my younger, single days (ok, so we don't really DO that back-seat thing as much in the UK...).

The TR relishes those changeable, unprodictable and slippy conditions as the skinny tyres give such sure-footed handling and nice progressive breakaway that allows for consistent four-wheel drifting getting us through any corner, no matter how much it tightens over ice. Ok, so the low ground clearance and primitive suspension make the frost heaves a little......interesting. The guys following us through Eels Lake reported that they wanted to stay close just to watch the TR get airborne. As it returned to the road, Perry and I followed back down shortly(?) afterwards....and the head-shaped bumps in the convertible top disappeared at about the same time!!! We manged a quick jaunt in a snow bank....well, actually ON a snow bank as, apparently, we got airborne again and gently landed on top of it. Still, we motored on with no loss of speed and all was well.

As Steve says, the only casualty was our clock about 40 minutes before the start. Yes, that's the wind-up mechanical clock that was originally in a MIG fighter jet in the 60's ;-) We dashed to the gas station and picked up a truly TINY digital watch for 12.99 which just about got us through. OK, so LCD technology wasn't around in the 60's, but it still only tells the time and, anyway, we were desperate!!

Regardless, a truly excellent rally. We loved every second and must give Ryan, Bruce, the scorers, marshalls (stewards?) and the breakfast chefs heartfelt thanks for putting on such a great event and allowing us all to come out and play.

Great results by the winners and placers and great efforts and spirit from ALL competitors. Now, this is what rallying should REALLY be like - any chance we might get back to a few more drivex-style as time goes on??

[STeveD]

I'm trying, again, to upload a higher res version of this segment, but it keeps giving me errors. In the interim:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TvRtWxRqHM

<object width="640" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/4TvRtWxRqHM&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/4TvRtWxRqHM&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="505"></embed></object>

[STeveD]

Tidbit: I filled up twice at the Esso across from the Fish and Game club. We had 13.99L/km consumption on Legs A & B of the rally. A bit of an increase over the 10.5 that I've been getting with the Amsoil SSO 0W30.

When it's done processing, the higher res version of that video is supposed to be at:

<object width="640" height="360"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=9641345&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;sho w_title=1&amp;show_byline=1&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=00AD EF&amp;fullscreen=1" /><embed src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=9641345&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;sho w_title=1&amp;show_byline=1&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=00AD EF&amp;fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="640" height="360"></embed></object><p><a href="http://vimeo.com/9641345">MLWR 2010 Eels Lake Road to Checkpoint C3</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/slowpoke">Stephen D</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p><p>From car #20, Intermediate Class, 1997 Subaru Legacy 2.2L automatic.<br />
<br />
Hella FF1000's with 130w, 100w bulbs from HSL Rallysport<br />
Old used Hotbits DT1 Coilovers<br />
Skidplate and Poweflex bushings from Fourstar Motorsports<br />
Blizzak WS-60's with cuts made by Fourstar Motorsports for Pierce Neige<br />
Snow handling alignment by Can-alignment<br />
Amsoil Motor Oil, ATF, Diff oil<br />
<br />
<br />
</p>

Hopefully the video doesn't run at double-speed like it keeps doing at YouTube for my 720p videos. It makes the rally look a lot more exciting, but the video doesn't match the audio.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbTwuw3q7Ic

[STeveD]

Latter part of Eels Lake: http://vimeo.com/9658800

[RyanHuber]

Results are now posted on the website:

Leg A: http://www.mlrc.ca/MLWR/MLWR10A.pdf
Leg B: http://www.mlrc.ca/MLWR/MLWR10B.pdf
Leg C: http://www.mlrc.ca/MLWR/MLWR10C.pdf

Thanks to all of our competitors for coming out, we hope to see you all again at rallies soon, and next February!