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ROAD RALLY eNews — Fourth Quarter 2019 Your Road Rally Roundup of News, Views, and How-Tos

Under the Hood of the 4th Quarter 2019 Road Rally eNews ! • Smuncher's Attic - Wantland • A quattro of Winter Rallies • Johnny Appleseed Rally SCCA • Covered Bridge Rally by SCCA • SCCA Championship Standings • There's an App for That! And we hear from Richta GPS and MiRally • Upcoming Events Request • News from the SCCA Natl Office • SCCA Hall of Fame - Harvey • Pavement Ends Rally by SCCA • Ghouls Gambol by CSCC • GAMR 2019 • NNJ Teddy Bear Rally and a bit more! Coming in January • IMRRC Update by Ms Jennie • Walt Kammer Tells it Straight! • My First Rally by Robertson

Welcome to 2020, yet first a little unfinished rally news getting to you from 2019. We hope you'll read through the entire 4th Quarter edition of RReNews as there is much covered and much to be enjoyed. Okay! So I was vocal about the lack of a 25th Annual United States Road Rally Challenge in 2019, so I must share the good news that the 25 "Running" of the USRRC was sent to me in November! The Detroit Region has stepped forward to host the event and it will have Hell and Back National Tour, their Pavement Ends National Tour, as well as taking on a Divisional Course Rally in Are You Territorial?. The dates are set for November 13th - 15th, so be sure to mark your calendars today and leave that weekend open for adventure in Michigan! The RReNews clan is looking forward to 2020 and we are glad that you are choosing to join us for the adventures. We, like all of you, are hoping to run some events this year as well as get involved on the Rallymaster side of the game. Here's to a Healthy 2020 for All, a few Zero's along the way, and we'll see you down the road....CL

Winter Rally Season is Upon Us! It's Time to Rally!

Minnesota Winter Rallye January 18th MN: Twin Cities Rally Club From Rallymaster Tim Winker — Drive the back roads of Northeastern Minnesota. This year's MWR uses roads west and north of Duluth in Carlton and St. Louis Counties. The course goes approximately from Scanlon to Cotton and back. The total distance will be about 130 miles. Starts and ends at  The Rendezvous in S canlon, MN, ends mid-afternoon. This is not the route I had originally intended, but for some odd reason it was the direction I headed. About halfway through I realized it was a rally that Randy Jokela would have put on as the Sno*Fall. Randy passed away in 2019, so this has become " The Randy Jokela Memorial Sno*Fall Rally ". The Minnesota Winter Rallye Facebook Event page or Twin City Rally Club page may contain more up to the minute info, yet registration information is available here , on Motorsportsreg. This rally will use the MiRally GPS control system. The MiRally system is very similar to the timing used on the Historic Monte Carlo rally. Contestants need to download and sign up for the FREE MiRally Crono app at the appropriate place for your smart phone. This is MANDATORY if you wish to be scored. We have added a TOURING category for those who do not wish to be scored, but are just following the rally course. Ohio Winter Rally February 1st OH: SCCA Neohio Region From Rallymaster Greg Lester — Tanned, Rested and Ready: The Ohio Winter Rally is back after a 3 year hiatus. The approximately 150 mile route will traverse portions of northeast Ohio's Lake Erie "snowbelt" counties. Prevailing winter weather and road conditions will dictate the rally's difficulty. Competitors can expect an absolutely straightforward, gimmick-free Time-Speed-Distance (TSD) road rally, with emphasis on precise timing at well placed controls. A columnar "tulip" route instruction format will be used. The rally will count toward both the SCCA Great Lakes Division Rally Championship , and the SCCA National Touring Rally Championship (Divisional Rally). The OWR will be timed with the Richta automated checkpoint system. Each team must carry a "smart" phone (Android or iPhone) running the Richta competitor "app". This app is available, free of charge. Start/ Finish: Redhawk Grille, Concord Township (Painesville), OH Click here for more information about the event, registration, and lodging!

Minnesota Valley Winter Rally February 15th MN: SCCA Land o' Lakes Region From Rallymaster Clarence Westberg — Headquarters: Sticks Tavern near Chaska, MN The SCCA Divisional Road Rally will utilize a GPS based timing and scoring system and feature an electronic roadbook friendly to newcomers as well as experienced. We'll travel about 90 miles on paved and unpaved roads in the Minnesota River Valley. The rally will be run in accordance with the 2020 SCCA Road Rally Regulations (RRR) as amended by the events Additional Supplementary Regulations (ASR). Shortly before the rally you will receive the Roadbook as a PDF. You will also get an electronic Roadbook or RBK file. Those using the Rally Rabbit 2 app can load it on their device. The rbk not only shows instructions but manages your mileage, time, speed changes, and any other items needed to follow the course and get good scores. Timing and scoring will be done by the MiRally GPS Control system. An app monitors your location using GPS and reports it to a central Timing and Scoring facility in the cloud. The timing points will be essentially Passage Controls. This year we will also have some MiRallyGPS boxes. You can find more information about the event here , as well as more information about the use of the Roadbook, RBK files, and Rabbit 2. Winter Challenge Rally February 22nd VT: SCCA New England Region From Rallymaster John Buffum — The roads in Vermont are great! I can’t guarantee snow, but they are twisty and great to drive. The towns sand their roads quite well – when they are not sanded, they are really slippery! Those who have done Winter Challenge will know that my rallies always have some ‘thinking’ legs; I believe that a rally should be more than a ‘follow the leader’ tour through the woods. The first section in WC has a couple of these legs; but you won’t get lost – the route is fail-safe. The second and third sections are very straightforward – just brisk in places. To help mitigate the ‘tricky’ legs costing too much time, there is a 50 point max penalty on the legs and competitors may drop their worst score in each section. You can find more information about the event here , as well as a Sample Routebook, Practice Rally, and Registration information!

Covered Bridge Road Rally - November 3, 2019

From Rallymaster William “Bill” Stewart — We want to thank everyone who came out to our  Covered Bridge Rally . We got some national attention in the October issue of  SportsCar  thanks to  Rick Beattie , who comes up from Pittsburgh occasionally. Setting up the rally had several construction frustrations, and then Safety Steward  Dave Hammer   and I discovered a tree and power lines down on the first leg. It wasn’t fixed until  Mike Ahrens ’ final check Saturday afternoon. Starting at the Conneaut Burger King, as usual, the ODO check leg went South and over the State Road Bridge. Next we went up along the lakeshore to North Kingsville and the first checkpoint. Westward Ho to Ashtabula and the nation’s longest, Smolen-Gulf Bridge, then to Geneva and the shortest bridge. Heading South, we got around the construction at Harpersfield Bridge and then East to Jefferson and then North to a late lunch at the North Kingsville Covered Bridge Pizza. We went South towards Pierpont as the sun came out. North and East, we went into Pennsylvania and the Harrington Bridge, then to finish up at Madeline’s Restaurant, formerly Crowley’s South of Platea. The weather cooperated, and the bridges were beautiful. Congratulations to  Ken Swarm  and  Greg Lester , and thanks for their help with the scoring. WOW,  Ron   and   Jeri Nick ! First rally and First in Stock! Special Thanks to our Safety Steward and Checkpointer Dave Hammer, Mike Ahrens for the pre-run, and our Checkpointers Bob  and  Brenda Nick , and  Ron Madurski . Click here to read the standings and see a few photos from the 2019 Covered Bridge Rally!

Smuncher's Attic by Bruce Gezon

Many of you know that Bruce Gezon has been active in our sport of road rally for quite sometime and that he holds some wonderful archives in his collections, as well as having won many National Championships. Along with this submission, Bruce wrote, "Some good observations from a man of his times in SCCA rallying." Well, I knew Stan Wantland and his lovely wife Shirley, and I certainly wish times were such that I could have rallied with them "back in the day." They were so supportive of me when I started the Arctic Alaska Region! - CL This clip is from The Stopwatcher, and his A √. of View column, from August 29, 1980. Bruce wrote, "Should be an interesting topic some 38 years later." It makes me wonder just how did they finish on the Flight of the Phoenix? All of us here at the home office enjoyed reading this selection from the 'ol Smuncher's Attic , and we hope you do too! We tossed in the newsletter above announcing The Frostbite Road Rally as it seems to fall in line with our opening piece of four Winter Rallies. Such creativity!! We last shared that we would have some pieces on Green Mountain , yet we heard from someone involved with them who has something to add to the story, so we are going to hold off on that for now.

A Question for Penelope Pitstop! What is your Answer?

We have read that the Sports Car Club of America is eager and interested in co-sanctioning Road Rally events with local car clubs, and we are trying to learn what arrangements the two clubs share! We are hoping we can reach quite a few of you to learn the best means to do this. Does our club need to be a 501C documented club? We have learned that we need SCCA Members to serve as Rallymaster and Road Rally Safety Steward, and we can wrangle that requirement. Do you share the entry fees? And then the non-SCCA club is responsible for trophies and promotion? Does the SCCA Region retain all the entry fees and pay all expenses for promotion and trophies? We understand there would be co-branding and, of course, we would be fine with that. Before we contact a local region, we are hoping to learn how other clubs are working together across America. Road Rally eNews suggested we ask the question in their rag, as it would give them another article for an upcoming piece, so here we are! From RReNews — It has been quite sometime since we have had a Penelope Pitstop question. Can you help us out with how your club works with an SCCA Region? Or perhaps your Region works with a local car club? Send your reply and we'll post up the various suggestions in February! Click here and send your reply today!

Great American Mountain Rally Revival by Greg Davis

2019 Great American Mountain Rally Revival – And They're Off! Saratoga Springs is probably best known for its rather legendary one-mile thoroughbred race track. Just up the road however, is another gem, the 2,500 acre Saratoga Spa State Park. Nestled here, down the Avenue of the Pines, at the park’s heart is the old Saratoga Bottling Plant. The beautiful neo-classic structure was built in 1934 and today is home to the Saratoga Auto Museum. The registered cars were numbered from 1 through 32. Museum staff was waiting for us as we started rolling in around 7:00am. They carefully aligned the cars in numeric order in preparation for the 9:00am start sequence. Each car was to go off at 9:00AM plus your car number. Lynn and I, as car #3 were destined to depart at 9:03am. Just as in year one of the rally’s revival, the cars registered were divided into one of three categories. There were “Original” cars, cars from 1957 or earlier. These are cars that would have existed at the time of the 1953-1957 running of the “original” rallies. Cars from 1958-1978 are regarded as “Classic” cars. Cars with a model year newer than 1978 are “Modern” cars. In the photo above you can see Car #1, a dark blue 1971 Volvo, followed by Car #2, a 2017 red Fiat Spider, followed by our Car #3, a 1952 Hudson Hornet. In this case, first off the line would be a “Classic” car, followed by a “Modern” car, followed by an “Original” car! There were a number of things I was excited about for this year’s running of the GAMRR. Chief among them was the fact that we were NOT the only Hudson registered for the rally. Noel and Cynda Renner are wonderful friends that we know through our membership in the Hudson, Essex, Terraplane Club. Noel is an expert mechanic in general, a transmission-specialist in particular and a Hudson lover through and through. It is people like Noel and Cynda who have inspired Lynn and me to do crazy things like setting out half way across the continental United States in a 67 year old automobile. Early this spring Cynda came to me and told me that she and Noel had read about our adventure in the 2018 running of the GAMRR. The more questions she and Noel asked, the more excited they got. In the end, they too registered to join us for this year’s rally! Thirty minutes before start time rally officials distributed the Day 1 Route Instructions list. At no other time are the differences between the driver’s and the navigator’s duties more apparent than at this time. Navigators immediately begin pouring through the day’s instructions looking for various pieces of the day’s journey. Early in the route will be an odometer check during which participants zero their odometer, follow a prescribed path, and, at the end, compare their odometer reading to the official odometer utilized in laying out the rally route. Any odometer discrepancies will need to be considered in every mileage calculation from that point forward. The navigators want to see where and when the assorted timed “Regularity Sections” fall within the day’s travels. Lynn has her own notation system involving a series of three colored highlighters and two colored ink pens. In a matter of minutes she had absorbed and digested the details of what was to take place that day. I spent time getting our clock synchronized with the official rally master clock, checking the oil and coolant levels, and getting acquainted with other fidgety rally participants. Lynn and I watched 9:01AM come and go with the departure of the Volvo. At 9:02AM the Fiat quickly disappeared from sight. The very moment we had been awaiting for months was upon us. We pulled up alongside the starter with the official clock clutched in her hand. It is amazing how long one minute can feel when you’re staring at a clock. But with patience, the clock turned to 9:03AM, my foot traveled from brake to accelerator, and our rally began! “Left at stop sign onto Avenue of the Pines”. All, Gary Hamilton , Rallymaster for the 2019 running of the Great American Mountain Rally sent along a wonderful piece by Greg Davis , a competitor. The file, with magnificent photos is too large to include in this edition, yet the link is not, and I encourage you to download it to your devices and read it cover-to-cover. Click here to download and enjoy!

Great Lakes Division Rally Rally Updates

Johnny Appleseed Rally by Ron Johnstonbaugh The 2019 Johnny Appleseed Rally was held on October 19, 2019 starting at the usual quaint Zoar Village location, and ran many of the great dirt roads used in the past. Rallymaster Greg Lester put together a nice route, and on a beautiful fall Ohio day, the scenery and leaf coloration was fantastic (the videos taken from my dash-mounted camera didn't do it justice). The lucky six entries (from OH, PA and MI), were treated to a well-paced route, utilizing newbie-friendly closed controls and time-of-day Key Times for restarts after each of the fourteen controls. The pace of the event is pretty moderate, with well-hidden controls that require an on-time-all-the-time mindset. Nicely spaced breaks, and a fun bar/grill location for final scoring and trophy allocation, were used. It really is an event that shouldn't be missed. I ran equipped with my grandson as the navvie, and even though I cost us some points due to bad math on my part, we had our usual great time. I hope you'll enjoy a video we put together of the Johnny Appleseed and Covered Bridge Rally . Be sure to check it out and increase our 27 views! You can find the standings here . RReNews — From the Rallymaster, here is the route of the rally with checkpoint locations. I know that I need to learn how to do this, as it would be helpful to crews and post-event answers! Click here for the link! Covered Bridge Rally by Ron Johnstonbaugh Bill Stewart's annual Covered Bridge Rally was held November 13, 2019, and started in the very northeastern tip of Ohio, near Ashtabula. Thirteen entries (again from OH, PA & MI, with five novice teams), experienced a great afternoon of driving over fun dirt roads (in timing zones), and paved roads (used to transit between the dozen or more covered bridges we traveled over). Another beautiful fall day made the it even more enjoyable. This rally uses open controls, with the transits timed for layovers at each bridge crossing, to check out the old structures. The pace for this rally is very relaxed, with very moderate speeds used into the mostly visible controls, but requires a lot of miles traveled to be able to hit as many ot the bridges as possible. A very nice restaurant in Pennsylvania was used for the finish (albeit a fair distance from the start location), but worth the travel. Bill always provides some nice door prizes, along with the trophies. Click here for the final standings! GREAT LAKES Division 2019 Championship Standings With many active Regions in their Division, the standings show the results of the hard work by Rallymasters, Organizers, Pre-Check, Road Rally Safety Stewards, Checkpoint Workers, Timing and the support of families whose road rally enthusiasts are away from home hours too! From Greg Lester , click here for the final 2019 Standings! The Road Rally eNews clan extends our thanks to Greg for keeping us in the loop about their events, and we hope we will be able to better serve them in 2020!

Detroit Region Pavement Ends is a Rally to the Finish!

Pavement Ends, the season-ender rally for the 2019 season held on Saturday, November 23, saw an excellent field of 25 teams come out to finish the rally season. A couple of things distinguished this running of Pavement Ends from the typical Detroit Region Road Rally. First, and most significant, was the introduction to the region’s rallyists of a new technology solution for time controls (checkpoints). Instead of physically located and staffed ‘open’ controls – the usual approach for Detroit Region rallies – competitors loaded an app onto their smartphone or tablet that was then loaded with the locations and timing of the control locations. When a competitor passed through one of the downloaded control locations, as determined by the device’s GPS receiver, the competitor’s passage time was observed and recorded. The device emitted a beep signifying control passage, and the resultant score was immediately displayed on the device screen. In addition, when the app had cell data or wireless access, it transmitted the competitor’s control passage information to a server hosting a real-time scoreboard, which was then accessible via a scoreboard application. When the rally contestants stopped at one of the section breaks, current scores were immediately available and displayed. Very cool! Big tip o’ the hat to software developer (and Detroit native) Rich Bireta; he envisioned and created this remarkable approach to TSD rally timing controls. And a nod to current SCCA RoadRally Board Chairman Jim Crittenden, who came to Pavement Ends to help the rally contestants learn about using the app. Finally, an acknowledgement to current Detroit Region Rally Director and Pavement Ends Co-Rallymaster Piotr Roszczenko, who sparked the effort to use this new checkpoint technology for Pavement Ends. Well done all! The second unusual aspect of Pavement Ends was a pitched battle for the SCCA National Championship for tour road rallies. Coming into the rally were three competitors who were locked into an incredibly close contest to win the national championship. Bruce Gezon, of Murrysville PA, and Bob Morseburg, of Seattle WA, came to Pavement Ends with 93 points in the series standings, while Detroit’s own Rob Moran showed up with 94 points. Pavement Ends was the last national championship qualifying event on the calendar, so this battle would be resolved by the results from Pavement Ends. This final 2019 championship confrontation was not without its drama. Gezon and Morseburg needed a third or better to win the championship, but a third would not be enough if Moran won. If Moran won, then Gezon and Morseburg needed to finish second to tie, but if they won, then they would finish alone in first place. Up to the end, it appeared that Gezon and Morseburg had their victory well in hand, but on the penultimate leg, they lost their wheel drive. They did recover nicely from that, but then made errors on the last leg that cost them the win. A classic case of “it ain’t over ‘til the fat lady sings”! When the smoke cleared at the end, 2019 saw a three-way tie for the Tour National Championship with Gezon, Morseburg and Moran all finishing the series at 96 points! Equipped Class saw Moran and Driver David Stone winning with 30.9 points, stealing the victory from Gezon and Morseburg, with 35.4 points. John Fishbeck and Laura Dawson rounded out third in equipped and third overall with 52.4 points. Limited Class saw the always fearsome team of Dave Harkcom and Greg Lester steal the class win with 98.9 points. The Stock Class win went to the team of Sawyer Stone and Alison Lee with an outstanding Stock Class score of 119.1. Sawyer, while relatively new to Detroit Region rallies, is no stranger to rallying. He has competed successfully in the Great Race vintage car rally, navigating for his grandfather – they won the event overall in 2006 in a 1916 Hudson! Keegan Helwig and Blattner Dakota took second in class, followed by Detroit Region regulars Chandra Koganti and Chris Weinig . Novice Class was taken by Jon Famurewa and John Houghton with a very respectable 177.2, followed by Patrick Burke and Joseph Kenney in second and Chris Zimmerman and Raven Rotsaert in third. As always, thanks to the rally organizers for putting in the time and effort to present another fine Detroit Region Road Rally – Chairman John Kytasty and Co-Rallymasters Piotr Roszczenko and Adam Spieszny. The standings can be seen here. This well done piece was from the Detroit Region website.

53rd Anniversary Ghouls Gambol Road Rally

Oregon — For over 50 years ghosts, goblins, spooks, spirits, the dead, the undead, and even the mostly dead have returned to haunt the Cascade Sports Car Club's Halloween road rally known as Ghoul's Gambol . In years past rally teams have had to navigate through cemeteries to find hidden clues, reach into a screaming victim's chest, or worse. There have been haunted locations - like the legendary barn on Pumpkin Ridge or the slaughterhouse. The slaughterhouse ... they say if you listen on a cold, crisp October night you can still hear the screams. This year rallymaster Paul Eklund explored Clackamas County’s farmland brightly lit with full autumn colors. Add to that some great driving roads, wonderful scenery and a hatful of tricks and traps and you've got the 2019 Ghouls Gambol. May justice be served. It all started innocently enough at the end of the odometer check when teams were told they should go to the church door and ask the Lord’s help in surviving the event. Those that followed up on this timely advice were met by our benevolent sister of the twisted route, CSCC's own Marty Lawrence decked out in full nun regalia. She dutifully blessed each team with a coupon for 50% off one of their leg scores. It would prove most useful as legs were long and scores would prove to be, well, large. Two notes were floated in and out as contestants followed the route instructions. Note Tricker y required a gain of 6 seconds at each sign reading “WITCH”. Note Treat required a pause of 6 seconds at each sign reading “CEMETERY”. Both were in effect upon arrival at the first checkpoint. Interestingly the Checkpoint 1 instructions cancelled Note Witch - which of course wasn’t the name of the note, so contestants should have continued looking for witch signs all the way to the last checkpoint where Note Trickery was finally cancelled. Alas, it mattered not as there were no witch signs. Note Treat was used a couple of times by teams that executed the correct half of an OR instruction. Off course cars never saw the cemetery signs. The legs were long with lots of main road following and uninstructed forced turns. A hard-to-see sidefacing no outlet sign and a recurring ONTO sent a few cars into off course route controls. Some of the many max leg scores benefited from the Lord’s help. With help from lots of off course markers and phone calls to the rallymaster, all contestants found their way to the ending location.  Sean and Tonia Andersen finished first SOP and first overall. First Novice and second overall were Dave and Sherry Wilson . Congratulations, winners! Costume winners were King Neptune and the Mermaid, Mario and Luigi, and Alice in Wonderland with the Mad Catter. Best decorated vehicles were the Wonderland Teapot, Under the Sea, and the Incredibles. RReNews thanks the Cascade Sports Car Club for their support. Click on the standings to head directly to their webpage, which is kept current with events, standings, and rally resources!

Pine Barrens 'Off-Road' Excursion VI presented by the PCA Northern New Jersey Region

On November 10, 2019, the Northern New Jersey Region of the Porsche Club of America hosted its sixth Pine Barrens ‘Off-Road’ Excursion . This year’s event motto was “ FORGOTTEN ROADS .” The event is designed to provide PCA members with Cayennes, Macans, and other four-wheel-drive vehicles, a small sample of ‘life on the wild side,’ without putting the occupants at risk. That is not to say you will not get a little dirty, but nothing that a good car wash won’t correct. The ‘three-hour tour’ utilizes the back roads of The Pinelands National Reserve, which is over 1.1 million acres and the largest open space on the eastern seaboard between Boston, MA and Richmond VA. It is part of the nearly 2 million acres of sensitive Pine Barrens across Long Island, New Jersey, and Cape Cod. These ecosystems are all connected, due to their shared species, including more than two hundred bird and nearly fifty mammal species, and similar soil conditions that have encouraged the abundant growth of pitch pines, dwarf pine forests and scrub oak. These areas were all formed by the retreating “Labrador Ice Sheet” that was part of the Wisconsin Glacier during the last ice age. The glacier’s retreat was much different from earlier glaciers. As a result, the glacier distributed porous, sandy soil to these areas that laid the foundation for the creation of Pine Barrens ecosystems. Through this geological history, the Pine Barrens of Long Island, New Jersey, and Cape Cod are forever connected as ecological siblings. Due to the growth in popularly of this unique trek (possibly the only event of its kind hosted by the Porsche Club of America), which combines social activities (a live five-piece Jug Band at lunch), a little bit of history (Whitesbog Village – birthplace of the Blueberry Industry) and an off-road experience (sand trails and sandpits). Since inception, the event has grown from 22 teams and 50 individuals in 2013 to 72 vehicles and 180 attendees in 2019, including ten children under five years old — fun for the whole family. Due to the generosity of the event sponsor Paul Miller Porsche , individuals received chocolate-colored T-Shirts, with the event logo printed on the back, and an array of door prizes. The door prizes were provided each entry and volunteer with Pine Barren specific items. These items included Pine Barren Native Fruits products, Valenzano Wines (Blueberry, Cranberry and Jersey Devil Port and Jersey Devil Mead), Jersey Devil Moonshine, Blueberry Beer by Pinelands Brewing Company and CD’s by the Accidental Jug Band and signed copies of Paul Evans Pedersen, Jr. book ‘Legendary Pine Barrens’ and his CD ‘Lines On the Pines’. Paul was featured in an episode of Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown, which included a segment on the New Jersey Pinelands. This year’s route visited the Cranberry bogs and forest trails of Brendan T. Byrne State Forest and the private ‘sand storage area’ of a local cranberry and blueberry farmer. The trails selected had to be approved by the State Forest Service via a lengthy permit process. Each of the 72 vehicles were provided with a bound set of route instructions with turn-by-turn instructions for the 73-mile course. The 109 route instructions provided overall mileage to the hundredth, delta mileage (distance between instructions), notification of the official speed limits, Tulip Diagrams (like those use on Pro-rallies) and a written description of each turn intended to make sure everyone stayed on-course and did not wander off and get lost. Afterall, there are no street signs in the forest. The 56 page Route Book also included a history of the area and facts about the New Jersey Devil, a mysterious figure that has haunted the area for over 250 years, and not the hockey team. Each vehicle received a ‘goodie bag’ that contained light snacks and water for the morning trek and brochures of Historic Whitesbogs Village, Brendan T. Byrne the State Forest, and New Jersey Pinelands. A ‘sweep vehicle’ followed the pack, ‘just in case’. But with such a large field of vehicles, individuals were always willing to help those out that were a little too adventurous along the deep ‘sugar sand’ trails or in the sandpits that we visited.  The mid-morning break included a stop at the Whitesbog General Store.  The store was the heart of the Joseph J. White Cranberry/Blueberry business, which started in 1857 as part of the Hanover Furnace ironworks. In addition, it was the home of Elizabeth White, who in 1916, introduced the first commercially cultivated blueberries (wild “swamp huckleberries”) to the world. She would go on to make history in marketing, business, agriculture, and women’s heritage. The Whitesbog General Store/Post Office shipped out blueberry plants all over the world. ‘Pine Barrens Native Fruits’ is owned and operated by the fifth generations of decedents of the White family and has been in continuous operations for 162 years. This year we featured two sandpits, the first occurred just before lunch after vehicles traversed a relatively narrow one and a half mile trail at a speed of 5 mph due to bumps and deep ruts. The first sandpit was designed as a 15-minute photo op but took longer as most participants chose to take advantage of the hills and rugged terrain. This sandpit included a small pond that some teams could not resist testing their luck, trying to ham it up and make a big splash. After lunch, we headed over to what I call the ‘Sand Storage Area’ for about 45 minutes of free formatted playtime. Since the main pit is relatively flat, vehicles can get up to speed and maneuver in such a way to produce rooster tails of sand, at times obscuring the vehicles from view, make sure your windows are up! Once again, we would like to thank Paul Miller Porsche for their support and sponsorship, which has made the event possible in 2019, and the prior five outings possible. The 2020 event is tentatively scheduled for November 8, 2020, hope to see you there. Rallymaster Peter Schneider

"There's an App for That" – Two Views and News This Month

How to put on a TSD rally the easy way by Clarence Westberg A little over a year ago I decided to use the MiRally GPS timing system. Initially the idea of not having to round up checkpoint workers and plan courses with minimal help was my incentive. What I quickly learned was that the systems Roadbook Designer app and Rabbit Rally 2 app were the real stars of the system. Designer connects Roadbook editing, measurement, GPS locations and time calculation all in one app. You simply drive down the road and press a button when you need to create an instruction. Mileage is derived from the built in GPS, external GPS or you can purchase a Rabbit Box that connects to your current sensor and sends mileage to the app via Bluetooth. The instructions are all Tulip based. There is a generous list of Tulips to choose from or you can make you own. All this takes place as you set up the course. When you want to set a control location there is a button to do that. It records the mileage, and GPS location for you, no entering of data. Later I discovered there is an automatic control generation feature that creates controls for you. You specify the interval between controls. Once complete you send the roadbook file to the central server where it generates a roadbook pdf file, all the timing information needed and an electronic roadbook the Rabbit app uses. Using the Designer, you break the rally in Timing sections (TC) and Link sections (L). A link is similar to a transit zone. Links connect the TC. You create a Link by specifying it as a type L and giving it a time to traverse it. When you reach the end of the link the app calculates what speed a contestant needs to average so it’s easy to change if you gave them too little or too much time. Timing Sections (TC) are begun by setting the instruction to type S for speed. You specify the speed to begin and tell it to zero the mileage if so desired. It’s easy to specify speed changes and it does all the time calc for you. The editor contains most of the signs used in the US. If you don’t find the sign you need just send an image of it to the developer and it’s usually included within a day or so. You update by reseting the image gallery. This is a good place to mention that support for the app is incredible. The designer uses a 3 column format. Mileage and timing specified on the left, Tulips, text and images in the middle and text/images on the right. It’s very easy to make corrections while on the road. If you go by a turn, turn around, return to the last reference and press a button. It restores the app to that location, then you drive on. Inserting and deleting instructions is also easy. There is so much more, this is just a brief description to wet your whistle. The Roadbook Designer app is only available for Android. I found it so useful I went out and bought and Android tablet which you can find pretty cheap. Contestant apps are available for iOS & Android. Management, scoring and results are all web based. If you have any questions or need help contact me by clicking here! Richta GPS Checkpoints Updates and New Apps by Rich Bireta Today I would like to share with you several items of interest regarding Richta GPS Checkpoints . I am pleased to report 15 events have been held using this system. Over 860 cars have generated over 12,800 timeslips, all since April this year. Feedback has been very positive and often enthusiastic. I have been especially heartened by several Rallymasters who have come out of (organizing) retirement and are putting on events.  Over ten events for 2020 are already in the system. I’ve settled on a tentative fee structure for 2020 based on the event’s entry fee. If your entry fee is $30 to $49 per car, then I’ll ask for $3 per car. If your entry fee is $50 or more, then I’ll ask for $5 per car. The first event for a club will be free. If your entry fee is under $30 per car, then contact me. I think this structure is not an onerous burden for the organizers and will allow us to continue to develop and support the apps. If you feel these fees are excessive, then I would like to have a conversation and better understand your concerns.  I am planning a release (1.14) of the Competitor app, targeted for March 2020. We’ll roll up some minor bug fixes and enhancements. We’ll add the capability to set an optional opening time for a checkpoint; this will allow a checkpoint location to be used more than once on an event.  The Rallymaster app will continue to be enhanced through next year. We’ve identified the gaps in functionality in the Apple version and are actively working to fill these gaps. The other primary focus in 2020 will be on improving the functionality in scoring and revising scores. With 100 timed checkpoints and 20 cars on an event, the task of finalizing scores for 2,000 timeslips after an event can be a burden. A well-organized rally and a skilled scoring team should be able to post provisional scores by the time the last car reaches the endpoint. Android Rallymaster already allows you to drop a leg from scoring and to correct an ideal leg time and re-score all timeslips. Additional productivity improvements are planned.  In case you missed it: A new stand-alone app was released for Android called Scoreboard . This app allows anyone to follow an event and to receive score updates every two minutes. Leg by leg scores can also be checked. Enhancements planned for 2020 include real-time updates of scores with no “Refresh” button needed. The scores will always be current.  Recent updates to Rallymaster includes a Map of the route including the location of all the contestants, updated once per minute. While this may seem trivial, we’ve found the map of checkpoint locations to be a useful tool to Rallymasters to ensure that the checkpoint locations are actually where they were intended to be. I’ve also heard of a sweep car using the map to track contestants who have wandered off course. It is really cool to be sitting in my home office in Kansas and to watch a rally 800 or 1,000 miles away progress. I’ve had several requests for a web-based scoreboard or map. I’ve been using a free application on my desktop system call BlueStacks. Bluestacks installs on your Windows or Apple desktop or laptop and to load Android apps from the Google Play Store and run them. I am happy to report that Rallymaster and Scoreboard all work well on Bluestacks. It is now possible for the Rallymaster to set up a laptop at a restaurant, hook it up to the TV and display scores and / or a map of the event.  I plan to be at the SCCA Convention in January and will be presenting a session Saturday morning at 9:30 on the GPS timing and scoring system. Please stop by if you are at the convention.   I am open to improving the usability and function of the apps. If you have a suggestion, please click here and send me an email! Regards,  Rich Bireta

Upcoming Road Rally Events for YOU!

CSCC 2020 Road Rally School and Rally Road Rally w/ Cascade Sports Car Club - Road Rally on Saturday, February 15, 2020 at North Plains Senior Center, North Plains, Oregon - Gear up for the 2020 rally season with Cascade's road rally school and rally. Learn to play the game that... Read more www.motorsportreg.com

Post Your Upcoming Rally Dates and Invites HERE? You bet ! We welcome you to Come Join Us! RReNews is not an SCCA Publication, yet produced in association with the Sports Car Club of America by road rally enthusiasts. Our goal is share news about our beloved sport of Road Rally across North America — be they sanctioned by the SCCA , PCA , BMW , Furrin Group , Cascade Sports Car Club , or any of the many local marque clubs or as community events! Please checkout our growing list of Road Rally events across North America ! Please send us news of your upcoming event dates and promotional materials to share, so as to make fellow road rally enthusiasts aware of your events . And post event — send your write-ups and photos to share news of the adventure! You can send information to Cheryl Lynn by clicking here !

29th Annual Teddy Bear Rally — NNJ SCCA

On December 8, 2019 Northern New Jersery Region SCCA, in association with the Motorsport Club of North Jersey, conducted our 29th Annual Teddy Bear RoadRally for the USMC Toys for Tots program. Thirty-six teams signed up for the event, 5 did not start and 2 did not finish. The entry fee was a new toy which was donated to Toys for Tots. This event is the longest continuously run charity event conducted by SCCA. Only one Expert Team ran the event 'clean' and did the four photo clue traps correctly.

2019 SCCA RoadRally Championships

The SCCA RoadRally competition season is based on a calendar year – January to December. As promised, RReNews publishes the standings for the SCCA National Road Rally Championships from Bruce Gezon , Points Keeper. We want to thank Bruce for being faithful to RReNews and for providing the Standings so timely each month!

2019 SCCA Course Championship

2019 SCCA Tour Championship

2019 SCCA GTA Championship

Subaru Takes the SCCA RoadRally Manufacturer's Title "Again" in 2019 The recent years of the Championship have shown team preference based on performance, whereas the early years were greatly influenced by sponsorship and contingency monies paid out by various marques to reward top finishing positions. The first three years, in the mid-60s, were dominated by Chrysler with their Chrysler 300 rally team. Volvo had one year of success before the Ford Rally Team and Competition Limited entries in their Ford Mach 1 team cars took the honors for a couple of years. Soon Datsun was paying out monies to top finishers, be they members of formal teams or not. After Ford dropped its program, Datsun (Nissan) swept the next eleven years. In 1977 SCCA Manufacturer Support Programs consisted of Chrysler, Datsun, and Toyota. Support money eventually disappeared, as did the Award. Revived in 1989 but separated into Course and Tour, it was mostly dominated by Toyota with one win each by Audi, Nissan, and two by BMW. Enter Subaru. They won their first in 1994 but lost out to Toyota and Pontiac for a couple of years during a brief rejuvenation of the Award. When the RoadRally Board brought the Award back to stay in 2004, Subaru was the rally car of choice and dominated the Championship while losing only once to MINI. In 2019, three hundred ninety-seven cars competed in the SCCA RoadRally Championship. Sixteen percent of them were a Subaru, the rallyist’s choice for the performance they required to win!

SCCA Matters — Words from the Wheel RoadRally Convention News, 2020 Insurance Updates, Rally Planning Calendar, RRB Minutes, SCCA Natl News

Words from the Wheel • News from the RoadRally Department A reminder that SCCA Waivers must be printed in black and red (which is easily handled by requesting the current form from your Region or the National Office prior to your events), and they must have the proper header information filled-in before participants sign them. Rallymasters and Organizers may download the latest Sanction and Audit forms for their 2020 events from the SCCA website. Much time has been put in to updating the pdf-forms so that they are fillable-forms for easy electronic submission and processing at the National Office. Please be aware of the minimum sanctioning lead times to avoid filing penalties or perhaps even a date shift of your event. We have received notice of the new 2020 Insurance information and Sanctioning Fees from SCCA National. You may download them below for the Participant Accident Coverage, Program Event Fees, and General Liability Summary for your upcoming events.

Participant Accident Coverage

Program Event Fees

General Liability Summary

SCCA National Convention – Las Vegas • January 16-18th, 2020

2020 SCCA Convention In July the SCCA RoadRally Board submitted seven suggestions for RoadRally focused sessions at the 2020 Las Vegas Convention. The Board approved them and in less than twenty-four hours many rally enthusiasts will be attending sessions with a myriad of presenters. We may have some of the clan at the Convention, and if able we will post up on our Road Rally eNews Facebook page.   Yet for many of us, the SCCA Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony on Saturday evening is a special time. Learning the history of those before us in the club, actually knowing many of them, and the honor of seeing them receive the adulation of the crowd. This year, the Ceremony is made even more special as Scott Harvey, along with Joe Huffaker, Kat Kizer, Dave and Sherie Weitzhenof, Bob and Patty Tunnell, Walt Hansgen, and Bill and Jane Goodale will be honored. From the SCCA website bio on Scott Harvey — While attending UCLA in the 1950s, engineering student Scott Harvey began rally and racing efforts in an MG-TD. By 1956, he had joined the Sports Car Club of America and was working as a Chrysler engineer in Detroit where he managed to convince superiors to loan him a 300D for motorsport activities -- the first in a long string of Chrysler products he competed in over the years. And while some know Harvey for engineering high-performance suspension parts, his real impact came through advancing the sport of performance rally.   It is Harvey’s early adoption of the European idea of high-speed rally that landed him in the SCCA Hall of Fame. He helped form a club, called The Ralligators, that worked alongside SCCA’s Detroit Region to create European rallying in the United States. Harvey was instrumental in creation of the MONY (Michigan, Ohio, New York) rally series, with most MONY events being SCCA rallies. This eventually led to creation of the SCCA PRO Rally series in 1973, which Harvey became first overall champion. Before that, he had participated in traditional Time-Speed-Distance (TSD) rallies where in 1963 and 1964 he won the SCCA National TSD championship.   In 1968, Harvey served as Chairman and Rallymaster of the Press On Regardless Rally , a milestone event for the sport in America and the longest running rally event in SCCA history. Under his leadership, Harvey and the Press On Regardless were awarded the prestigious Arthur Gervais Rally of the Year in 1968 by SCCA, the first time a "performance" rally had been selected for the award. Harvey was also instrumental in bringing the World Rally Championship to the United States with his involvement in the 1972 Press On Regardless Rally, an event in 1973 and 1974 with World Championship status.

National Events Committee from Michael Thompson, Co-Chair

Well, the 2019 National RoadRally Championship season is over and the Champions trophied. Thanks to each and every one of you who competed in 2019. And super-double thanks to all of the Rallymasters and Organizers for their time and effort in making the the 2019 National RoadRally Championship season possible. The 2020 season is beginning to take shape with over twenty events on our calendar. Check out the Road Rally Planning Calendar for more details, and Bruce Gezon's 2020 Championship standings in the next RReNews. Should you be planning a National or Divisional Rally, please calendar it with Jeanne English by clicking here to email her the details. The Richta GPS and MIRALLY GPS timing systems are working out well. I highly recommend that you consider using one of these systems on the next rally you put on. The NEC is working on a document that will include all of the Sanction Exceptions needed for a GPS-timed rally. Organizers can simply copy this document and include it with the event’s General Instructions. The 2021 RRRs will be updated to allow GPS based timing. That’s AZICIT Mike Thompson

Road Rally Planning Calendar from Jeanne English

Straight from the West Coast, we have the most current Road Rally Planning Calendar produced by English and is built with formally sanctioned SCCA RoadRally events, calendared events and even a few in the "maybe" category! Click here to download your copy. Contact information for English can be found on the calendar.

SCCA RoadRally Board Minutes

RRB Minutes September 19, 2019

RRB Minutes October 10, 2019

We apologize, yet we were unable to obtain the balance of 2019 RRB Minutes, we'll be working with SCCA to get them through FastTrak and the RoadRally Board for 2020.

From the Home Office on the Kenai...

Soon, the new year begins and I can say that I have what is trendy to call a "woke" moment regarding Road Rally eNews. We have heard from many of you who enjoy the stories found within, the how-tos passed along, the history in Smuncher's Attic surfacing and revisited, news of upcoming events, and those My First Road Rally or My First Time as a Rallymaster tales shared by fellow rallyists. We are back on track, and we will not allow a former stumbling block to stall us any longer. This edition was a bit jumbled with news as we sent out all that was collected this last quarter — wonderful event wrap-ups, the video from Johnstonbaugh, the "quattro" of winter rally events leading us off (there should have been a "run all" Championship and winners got tickets to Alaska or Hawaii). Remember, our pages are about you and your events - promotion months out and a share about it after! And as each of you are a "library" of stories and anecdotes, we hope you open your doors and share them in 2020! Thank you to members of the Cascade Sports Car Club, Greg Lester and the SCCA Great Lakes Division, and fellow rally enthusiasts Bruce Gezon , Rich Bireta, and Peter Schneider for their continued support this past season. Jeanne English has kept us supplied with SCCA matters, as well as Bruce keeping the points most timely! And Bill Demming for his efforts, depending on work schedules and timezones, to do a bit of proofreading for us. Thank you for your time. Here is to a Healthy New Year for All of Us! Safe travels, Cheryl Lynn and the RReNews Clan #comeroadrally #wefoundtheroads RReNews Are you navigating around RReNews okay? We don't want to presume that all of you know that a red/green links ( send your event listing to us ) mean "click" to open a document, website, or email. Did you give the event listing link a click? A reminder to all that while we have produced RReNews in association with the Sports Car Club of America since 2013, our effort is to provide a community for all Road Rally on North America — independent car clubs, community events, and marque clubs — which SCCA has supported as it brings awareness to the sport for all. To those of you receiving this edition as your first Road Rally eNews , welcome to our motorsports family! We are a collaborative effort. Should you be a Rallymaster, please send in your information months out (as soon as you have the details 'n date), send photos 'n standings 'n post-event write-ups! Rallyists write your experiences, write of a method or style of rallying, contribute to our There is an App for That, My First Road Rally (as competitor or Rallymaster). Join us and be a part of this road rally community! Rumor is we may have a new column in 2020, which may be called Starr Maps ? Stay tuned.

‌ It's Here, so Let's Use It! We encouraged all of you to start using the #comeroadrally hashtag in your posts about rallying. One reader wrote to ask what that meant and how it could help! It is a means to easily find information on the internet for common causes. Perhaps you have attended a seminar, wedding, or motorsport event where they have asked you to use a hashtag in your posts? Hashtag is # for those unfamiliar. So should you enter #comeroadrally into your browser, you may find a similar page such as this where you can find articles, images and more about road rally (and a few oddities beyond)!

Road Rally eNews, produced in association with the Sports Car Club of America, since 2013

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