The Great American Mountain Rally Revival will challenge 21st Century rallyists with the rallies of the 1950s. The original Great American Mountain Rallye ran from 1953 to 1957. This was the first American rally listed by the F.I.A.
In its day the Great American Mountain Rallye attracted top teams from around the world. The Rootes team entered Sheila van Damm in 1953 and 1954. Stirling Moss also competed in this rally in 1954. The great Maurice Gastonides, the 1953 Monte Carlo Rally winner, was a competitor as well. One year, multi-time world driving champion, Juan Manual Fangio was the official starter.
This fall a new rally, the Great American Mountain Rally Revival will once again challenge American car rally competitors. This 800-mile three-day rally will be based on a route used by the original rally, even using original course instructions where possible. All competitors will be provided with a copy of the two 1953 original Mobilgas Maps of Southern and Northern New England which were used by the competitors in addition to the written route instructions. Only roads that appear on these maps will be part of this rally.
The Great American Mountain Rally Revival festival will start in the evening of Thursday October 11, 2018 in the showroom of Churchill Classic Cars in Eldred, New York. There competitors will be able to view, and even purchase, the wonderful classic cars that are always on display there. Final registration will begin at 3:00PM and extend to 9:00PM with coffee and light snacks to enjoy. There will be a rally school at 7:00PM to 8:00PM which rally organizers will go over examples of the rally instructions, the timing, and scoring to be used. There will be time for some socializing, but not too much as the rally gets underway at 8:00AM on Friday October 12. Last minute registration will be available after 7:00AM. The Day 1 route will extend some 280 miles to the Willmington, Vermont area, with the first car expected in at 5:00PM for a welcome dinner with all of the competitors. During the day there will be timed regularity stages where competitors will be challenged to maintain a given average speed.
Saturday October 13, 2018 will be reminiscent of the old rallies as the first car will be away from Willmington, VT at 7:00AM. During the day the 320-mile route will take the rally competitors north almost to the Canadian border then back south to the famous ski town of Stowe, Vermont. After a long day on the road with some timed regularity stages, the competitors will be welcomed to a hotel in Stowe and treated to a dinner where rally stories can be exchanged.
Sunday will start at 8:00AM and take the competitors about 180 miles, through more competitive regularity stages, south to Bennington, VT where the competitive portion of the rally will end. The first car will be due at 2:00PM and prizes are expected to be awarded shortly after so competitors can leave for home no later than 4:30PM.
Cars will compete in three classes:
- Original: cars that could have competed in the original Great American Mountain Rally with model year 1957 or older.
- Classic: car with model years 1958 to 1980.
- Modern: Car with model year 1981 or newer.
All cars will be restricted to rally equipment that is similar to that used during the original Great American Mountain Rallye:
- Rally odometers with up to two distance displays are permitted but rally computers that provide average speed information are not permitted. The exception to this is that Halda Speedpilots are allowed.
- Electronic calculators are not allowed, but mechanical calculators and slide rules are permitted.
- Electronic speed tables are not permitted, but paper speed tables are permitted.
- Clocks and stopwatches are without restriction
- No GPS mapping assists can be used.
Competitors will be given an overall time to travel the entire daily route. Cars can only begin the day from the daily Start Control at their assigned time and must check into the Finish Control at their in time based on their start time and the daily overall time. In between, the crews must manage their own time for food, fuel, and other breaks. Competitors will be timed to the minute at the end of the day.
During each day there will be timed regularity stages where cars will be measured to the second. These stages will be self starting and competitors will be assigned an average speed, given in whole numbers in units of miles per hour to travel the entire regularity stage. There will be an unknown number of timing controls along the route where cars will be timed to the second as they pass the timing control line. The competitors will then stop at the timing control point where timing crews will quickly record the time that the car crossed the timing line on each car’s Time Card. There will be at least two miles between control locations and be located at least one-half mile after any stop signs. Competitors will be advised by signs of the end of each regularity stage.
There will be no Overall winner as awards will be based on the three car classes. For SCCA sanction purposes, the Great American Mountain Rally Revival will be considered as a New England Region Regional Rally.
The rally entry fee will include the following:
- Get acquainted night on Thursday October 11 at Churchill Classic Cars
- Route instructions
- All necessary maps
- Timing
- Accommodations in the Eldred, NY, Willmington, VT and Stowe, VT areas.
- Dinners on Friday and Saturday nights
- Breakfasts on Friday, Saturday and Sunday mornings
- Food and drinks at the rally end point in Bennington, VT
- Awards to the top three competitors in each class
During the year we will be providing additional details on this rally, but at this time please save October 11 – 14, 2018 to take part in this European style rally in the USA.
If you have any questions about this rally or to reserve an entry, then contact me at the following address: shanna12 at comcast dot net or you can contact Gary Hamilton at the following address: ghamilton.2007 at gmail dot com.
