First Frost Road Rally, Sat. Dec. 4th, Georgetown

[STeveD]

http://caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/FFNR_2010_WEB.jpg

Saturday Dec. 4th, 2010 - Georgetown Ontario Event #9 of the 2010 Ontario Road Rally Cup hosted by SPDA-online.ca

Description:

A beginner friendly navigational rally event on fun roads in scenic Halton Hills, Ontario. A driver and navigator enter together in one car. The navigator interprets the route for the driver, who tries to maintain target speeds that are set 5% to 10% below the speed limit. This is not a race, it is about staying on route and maintaining precise timing. Arrive at registration by 10:00am to receive a beginner course at 10:45am. This Introduction File (http://www.pmsc.on.ca/PMSC/Events_files/RallySchool_1.pdf) describes how a navigational rally unfolds. The types of instructions that we will be using are described here (http://www.torontoautosportclub.ca/articles/RallyMaster/index.html) in the novice/beginner section.

Start Location:
Kelsey's Restaurant (In Georgetown Marketplace)
256 Guelph St #3 (Hwy 7)
Georegetown, ON, L7G 4B1
Restaurant Tel: 905-877-7150
Lots of parking on the south side lot behind the restaurant
Map Zoomed In (http://www.caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/MapZoomIn.jpg),Map Zoomed Out (http://www.caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/MapZoomOut.jpg)

Schedule:

Registration Opens: 10:00am
Registration Closes: 11:00am
Car 0 Departs: 11:30am
Car 0 Rest Stop: 2:30pm
Car 0 Finishes: 5:00pm
Results during Dinner: 6:00pm

Cost:

$60 per team. Registration includes a $20 dinner/drink coupon for after the rally. Cash preferred or cheque accepted at the event. You can send a Paypal transfer to Treasurer [at] spda-online [dot] ca in advance with your registration form.

Please fill out and submit this registration form (http://www.caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/FFR%202010%20Registration%20Form.pdf).

Approximate Distance:

240km / 5.5 hours with a rest break. Approximately 70% paved roads.

Inquiries and Registration:

Walk-ins are cheerfully accepted, but please advise us if you'll be attending so that we're sure we have enough route books for everyone! Email your registration form to STeveD [at] spda-online [dot] ca or phone Steve at (905)702-0224 with any questions you may have.

We look forward to seeing you on Saturday December 4th!


Sanctioned by RallySport Ontario and the Canadian Association of RallySport, and held under the CARS General Competition Rules.

[TrevorH]

Supplementary Equipment:

There are a few locations where a compass heading will be given. You'll need either a magnetic compass, or a GPS.

Given the season, it's likely that the last section or two will be completed in the dark.

All roads are in good to fair condition.

[Napping]

This was my first rally a year ago. This have started it all. I absolutely have to attend :D!

BTW, need a driver.

[Navigator]

See you all there. :-)

[STeveD]

You'd better see Ivano there.... he's requested the sneakiest darned checkpoint we can put in...

[TrevorH]

The one inside the touchless car wash? I want video of the drivers getting out amidst the foam cycle.

[Navigator]

And I thought you were going to put me back into the mosquito infested feeding area.

[STeveD]

We couldn't rally up enough mosquitoes to make you're life interesting. But we did find one remote spot with a potentially interesting challenge:

Bear.

[TrevorH]

Is it acute one?

[TR_Tim]

You guys aren't funny - you're scaring me! ;-)

[JoeT]

TrevorH wrote:
Is it acute one?

As opposed to an obtuse one?

[TrevorH]

I'd like a 6.5 post TA for going off topic.

We now resume (hopefully) your regularly scheduled Rally information.

[STeveD]

Just for fun... historical weather prediction for Georgetown is a few flurries on December 4th with temperatures hovering around 0!

http://www.theweathernetwork.com/fourteenday/caon0258/table


You will be finishing after sunset, so you might want to make sure that the map light or miner's lamp works.

[STeveD]

http://caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/ffr2010.htm



First Frost Updates:

With some fantastic feedback from the the green "crew" of Tim Laye, the SPDA organizers buttoned up the last few details of the rally yesterday. There were some things that Tim just wouldn't let us do, so we substituted some other little twists. ;-)

There's some snow on the ground in the northern part of the rally and the roads are in good condition. We're expecting a bit of rain and a bit of snow this week. Like last year, CAS is set for a dry rally so we highly recommend winter tires... just in case!


Registration:

Kelsey's Georgetown is opening the doors for us before they actually have any staff working, so breakfast is available next door at the Baker's Dozen, in Zellers restaurant, or there's Timmies a block east and a block west. We will, however, have complimentary coffee for you during registration at Kelsey's.

10:00 Doors (and registration) open; please bring a filled out registration
10:40 Novice class by Opal
11:10 Drivers Meeting
11:20 The Leonards arrive
11:30 Car 0 departs.


Rest break:

After about three hours of rallying there will be a rest break of approximately 25 to 35 minutes if you are running relatively on time. We will have some complimentary club wraps, spinach dip and pop for you on your break. Don't eat too much, because you'll be back for results and dinner in about an hour and a half! (Oh, and the most fun driving is in Leg B...)


Wrap-up:

You will have the opportunity to curse or compliment Routemaster Trevor in person when you're back at Kelsey's around 5:15pm. Please enjoy their fare with your $20 Kelsey's gift card while Ted feverishly tabulates scores.


Preparation:

Outside the standard equipment of a pencil and a watch that shows seconds, you're going to want to have a compass or GPS that shows your direction of travel.


So... five and a half hours of rallying on the best roads the escarpment has to offer, with coffee and snacks, and a dinner coupon included for $60!!! Why don't I have your registration form in already???


More info:

http://caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/ffr2010.htm


Registration forms (use one OR the other):

http://caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/FFR%202010%20Registration%20Form.pdf
http://www.oldrallysport.on.ca/orrcentry.html


Inquiries and Registration:

Walk-ins are cheerfully accepted, but please advise us if you'll be attending so that we're sure we have enough route books for everyone! Email your registration form to STeveD [at] spda-online [dot] ca or phone Steve at (905)702-0224 with any questions you may have.

We look forward to seeing you on Saturday December 4th!

Stephen Deneka
First Frost Rally Organizer



Sanctioned by RallySport Ontario and the Canadian Association of RallySport, and held under the CARS General Competition Rules.

[TR_Tim]

"some other little twists"???

Hmmmm. We're looking forward to it. Kind of.

[Napping]

Ahhh. My scheduled driver unable to attend, thus I am in need of a driver. I run novice navigator class. Let me know asap.

[TrevorH]

Sorry to hear that Eugene. I hope you can find a replacement in time.

[STeveD]

Laszlo! Can you please drive for Eugene!? Maybe we can convince him to join SPDA if we find him a driver. ;-)

[madgen]

Sorry this is a bit late, but in case anybody is looking for a gas station with the good stuff, supposedly there's a PetroCan with 94 octane on Mountainview Rd. S. (Ninth Line) just north of Sdrd 10 in southern Georgetown.

PetroCan with 94 octane (http://www.petro-canada.ca/en/locations/4085.aspx?MODE=DTS&ID=35237)

Note particularly that there is another PetroCan at the corner of Mountainview and Guelph St. in the heart of Georgetown, but it does not carry 94; you need to go to the other one I mentioned above.

[tashko]

I can drive can't I? My brother will run the CP that I was supposed to do!!!

I wanna drive!

See you guys tomorrow.

If needed, ask anybody about my driving resume! 2010 ESP autoslalom champion...and I think I won the CAC in 2009 from PEI and another little known award called the Bald Head Racing award at the Targa Newfoundland....
//edit. maybe I didn't win ESP in CAC 2009. I can't remember what class I ran...anyway, I was there I think. Maybe it was 2008 when Bill took me to the hospital. It's all a bit fuzzy. I do remember the speedo in my car hitting 200 and the fuel trims were good.
:-D

[TrevorH]

Hey! Where's the 4 inches of snow I ordered for today?

[AndrewR]

It was great seeing all of you guys out there today, although Kyle's car sounded the best.

The Impreza dragging the fender liner was scaring all the locals.

See you all next event.

[Opal]

A few samples from today's adventure in frozen digits and rally photography:

http://www.pointandshoot.ca/gallery/first-frost-2010/content/bin/images/large/_DSC6291.jpg

http://www.pointandshoot.ca/gallery/first-frost-2010/content/bin/images/large/_DSC6341.jpg

http://www.pointandshoot.ca/gallery/first-frost-2010/content/bin/images/large/_DSC6312.jpg

http://www.pointandshoot.ca/gallery/first-frost-2010/content/bin/images/large/_DSC6234.jpg

http://www.pointandshoot.ca/gallery/first-frost-2010/content/bin/images/large/DSC_6006.jpg

View the full gallery here: http://www.pointandshoot.ca/gallery/first-frost-2010/

[TR_Tim]

To Steve, Trevor, Ted, Tim, Opal and EVERYONE who worked on this rally, a heartfelt THANK YOU!!!!!!!!

We had a great time out on the lanes and the hospitality at Kelsey's was really well organised - everyone seemed to appreciate that too.

Great event - thanks!!

(great photos too, Opal ;-))

[STeveD]

Okay, I'm way too tired and I'll attempt to be coherent tomorrow.

To our volunteers; such great effort; a wonderful thank you!

To our competitors, your attitude through the struggle against the adversity we created was a pleasure to watch.

Seeing novice champs save a seat at dinner for their co-novice champs from another club; priceless.

More later. Great event to host. WooooT!

[STeveD]

Okay Tim, share the secret; how did you manage to have the CLEANEST car in the whole rally? You used up your TA budget cleaning dust from the car, didn't you???

[madgen]

To all the competitors, I'd like to thank you for your patience as I tried to sort out the mysteries of Martin's Magical(?!) Scoring Spreadsheet under competition conditions and, hopefully, I didn't keep you waiting too long for the results.

I'd like to also extend a personal thanks to Dennis for helping me to figure out how to enter in missed CPs in the scoring sheet so that the results showed something other than #VALUE! in the score for some teams. Thanks as well to Opal and Stacey for their assistance in wrangling the piles of scorecards as they were coming in. You all helped to rein in the chaos and made my job go a lot more smoothly!

From being a Navigator (where I don't get to see the rally because my head is buried in the routebook) to becoming a Scorekeeper (where I don't get to see the rally because my head is buried in a spreadsheet), one of these days I'm going to have to enter as a Driver just to see what the fuss is all about. I've been told that there is all sorts of fun driving at these events, but I've never seen it... :-D

[Rotarygreg]

thanks to everyone who organized and volunteered to make this event so much fun. I had a great time and im glad this was my first event back from a 2 year hiatus from this great sport.

A special thank you to whoever was offering treats at their checkpoint. haha. my navigator greatly appreciated that (and so did i as it kept her happy, thus, keeping me on route and happy).

Thanks to the photographers as well. I've never experienced that at a nav rally before and it was very cool to see all the action after the event. Hopefully i gave enough of a show to keep everyone interested. There are quite a few pictures of my car, im trying to decide whether that was because i was interesting or because i was so slow you were able to snap more shots per corner. haha.

Also, my navigator pointed out that the pics show my worst habit. appearantly im a habitual line crosser and theres no denying it after being caught red handed in so many photos. at least im not the only one. :-D

Thanks again for a great event, and i'll be following the SPDAs news page to hopefully come out to some other top notch events in the future as well as volunteer for anything i can help out with.

[kpower]

Great event! Well organized and a ton of fun. Can't wait until next year.

Now where can I get those shots of my car in high res? There's some really great work in there.

[Opal]

@kpower - email me opal AT pointandshoot.ca with a link to the photo(s) you want, and I'll do what I can :)

[TrevorH]

Thanks to everyone who joined use at the 2010 running of the First Frost Navigational Rally, and made this a very successful event.

I was happy to see everything run so well, with most of the teams having a fun day. This event also set the final scores for the 2010 ORRC season, with battles for the season lead still running in both Expert and Novice classes. The Moore's managed to hold on to their lead, blocking the Leonard's from a tie in the expert season. Brownhill and Corbett made a great showing to take First place in Novice for the event, which gives them a tie for first with Burgess and Ford for the Novice season.

Nav Rallies are a hugely complex challenge to run, and we had a few snags. Somehow we missed stating the ET in the Novice Odo section. This cause for some early panic, but we quickly decided to change CP 1 to a route check for the novices to make it fair for everyone. Also, we somehow had one copy of an earlier version of the expert notes make it to Dennis which caused some issues for his EOL A ET calculation.

Beyond that, things went very well. We had a few novice teams end up off route and late. That's part of rallying and to be expected from time to time. A few of the speeds caught people up, with a low CAS on a fast road causing the one expert team to question their last turn. We added only one deliberate trick, that being a subtle change in instruction wording in section A5 "Bad Directions", changing the "From x to y" to "To y from X". This caught several teams, both novice and expert alike.

My thanks to everyone for making this years event such a great success! This wouldn't have been possible without the support of so many people behind the scenes. Thanks to Joe, and Ivano for the club support, Maurizio for your usual stellar artwork, Our checkpoint crews Christine, Gary, Tashko, Goni, Paul, Bryce, Andrew, Collett, Nuwan and Andrew. Special thanks to Opal, Paul, Stacey and Ted, for the pre-green crew run where you caught all those errors when I was sure you'd find none, and to Tim Laye for running the official Green Crew and finding so many more errors that I was sure didn't exist because "Ted and Opal already caught all the problems!". ;) Opal and Paul also spent their day freezing out on the roads taking great pictures of the event, and of course Ted spent yet another day with his head down (scoring), missing all the fun that goes on during the rally. If there's anyone I missed

We're looking forward to seeing all of you again next year. The SPDA hosted rally will be moving to an earlier date (Oct 1), using the new event name of the "No Winter Maintenance Rally". This will be up in the Grey County region, so we'll be back to some fun gravel roads, and great scenery.

[ddenisen]

I've just joined the SPDA forums specifically to thank all the organizers for hosting a wonderful event this past Saturday! This was my first nav rally experience, and I've been looking forward to it for a while.

Overall, our experience was great - I'd say the first half of the event was more of a challenge for my navigator, while the second half was a challenge for me, the driver - going up/down those narrow winding gravel roads while trying to stick to CAS 50-70 was quite an experience, and made me feel almost like part of a performance rally :lol:

Also we got lost a couple times, and fell prey to the "trick" in the compass directions section, but I think we managed to recover pretty well given our CP times.

Once again, thanks to everyone who planned and volunteered during the event, and special thanks to the CP team who provided treats for the driver and the navigator :-D

BTW, I'm hoping I'll be able to get high-res versions of images of my car from Opal's gallery. We were the team in the grey 2010 Honda Accord :)

~Dmitry (team Denisenkov/Brotherston)

[STeveD]

Final write-up on the rally is back at the original information page: http://www.caslube.com/rally/ffr2010/ffr2010.htm

Thanks again to all who participated!

Interesting tidbit:

6 Subarus
4 Hondas (Civics, Accord)
2 Mazdas (3, MX-3)
2 GM products (Envoy/SUV, Solstice)
1 Ford SUV, 1 Dodge Truck, 1 Suzuki SUV
1 modern Mini, and of course.... one Triumph TR4.

Mitsubishis entered in the event: 0. Though two volunteered in essential roles in the execution of the event, and it wouldn't have happened without them. I guess that outside the CRC, people in Canada don't like getting their Mitsus dirty. :-(

[STeveD]

Oh, by the way... MLRC put in a valiant last ditch effort to get the club championship with 3.5 teams entered in the FFR, but SPDA has secured the HSL RallySport Club Championship again in 2010!

Another tidibit: 9 out of 19 finishers had no club affiliation!

[madgen]

STeveD wrote:
Mitsubishis entered in the event: 0. Though two volunteered in essential roles in the execution of the event, and it wouldn't have happened without them. I guess that outside the CRC, people in Canada don't like getting their Mitsus dirty. :-(

Yeah, even more ironic now that L'Estage/Richard won Tall Pines and the rally triple crown this year. Whenever I look at the Mitsu forums like TLC on evolutionm or MCCC most of 'em seem to be either Show 'n Shine, Coneheads or Track types. The Mitsu is a rally car, dammit!

Ah well, maybe I can persuade Trev to take my Ralliart out for a spin on one of the rallies next season, give his Suby a break. I'd drive it myself but I want to focus on Navigator points.

Maybe I will drive it, though, after I've secured the Expert Navigator championship. ;-) :-P :-D (Famous Last Words...)

[TrevorH]

Trash someone elses car instead of my own? I'm in!