I’ve been busy with RoadRally stuff lately but have yet to have the chance actually to compete in a rally for over a year. So, when Rallymaster Chuck Hanson said that Sam Crites would Safety Check the Indy Region Dogwood Daze Tour Rally so that I could run the event, I was overjoyed! This gave me a much-needed rally boost and let me practice what I’ve been teaching about running Seat of the Pants (Stock) for a Tour rally with GPS checkpoints, and it worked out pretty well.
Chuck Hanson designs his Tour rallies with the Novice rallyist in mind. He has good instructions with mileage for each action and identifies where the checkpoints will be. In addition, he runs a series of several checkpoints between each re-start point so that you can speed up or slow down as you get feedback from each checkpoint to score better on the next one.
I asked one of my Indianapolis Region friends and Women on Track promoter, Velma Boreen, to navigate the rally with me, and she quickly agreed. Velma’s husband, Raleigh Boreen, found a Navigator, and they ran Novice Class. Velma and I ran Stock Class; other rally entries were a Novice and an Equipped car.
On the rally day, Velma jumped into my car with a notepad and calculator. I told her, “We won’t need either of those,” and she put them aside with an eyebrow raise. Our equipment consisted of the car’s stock odometer, a GPS unit mounted low on the driver’s side windshield so that both of us could see it, a center mount for route instructions made out of a recycled Christmas wreath door mount, and a cell phone with the Competitor – Richta GPS Checkpoint App running on a windshield mount on the passenger side of the car.
At the rally’s start, we used the odo check to get used to the instruction layout and check the car mileages against the route instructions; we then set off on our first timed leg. Velma concentrated on looking for landmarks and keeping us on course. She also checked off the instructions on the centerboard as we completed them and patiently answered my ever-repeating question, “What was CAST again?” Also added to her duties was reminding me to zero the odometer at each re-start after I zoomed off once without doing it. I concentrated on keeping us on the road, maintaining speed, and counting off seconds when we felt we were running a little early.
Velma and I followed a simple routine. We left the start points 6 seconds before the top of the minute and maintained a speed a couple of miles per hour above CAST until the first checkpoint. The app would announce the score, and Velma would confirm. If we were early, I slowed down. If we were late, I sped up. Using this method, we were able to hone in on perfect time and scored a lot of low numbers and zeroes. After one rough leg start, we scored a maximum late at the first checkpoint and put a time allowance into the Richta App. We were still late at the next checkpoint, so we entered another time allowance, and within a couple of checkpoints, we were hitting low numbers and zeros again. This method left us time to look at the scenery and actually chat a little bit as we drove. It was one of the most enjoyable rallies I have run. When the event was over, we were thrilled to learn that we had placed First Overall, beating the Equipped car by just one second.
In the past, I might have suggested that a newcomer to RoadRally would feel more comfortable running a GTA event for their first rally. After this experience, running a well-designed Tour rally with GPS checkpoints is enjoyable and suitable for novices and experienced rallyists.
Click here for a copy of the General Instructions for the Indy Region Dogwood Daze Tour Rally.
