Tall Pines Wrap-Up

I'm back from what in my mind was a successful Rally of the Tall Pines: we finished the rally without major problems, and Luis got his 3rd place in Production 2 class in the Ontario Performance Rally Championship.

The weather forecast was all over the map leading up to the rally. In the end, the weather on the day of the rally was clear, with a fairly thick layer of snow from a few days before. The stages ended up being a combination of loose snow and powder early in the day, which compacted to almost ice as the day went on. This made tire choice difficult, and we were forced to compromise based on the tires available, but Luis did his best to cope with the poor grip we experienced at some points.

We were really running to finish, so caution was the order of the day. We passed plenty of cars that pushed a bit too hard and went off the road. When the Tall Pines TV broadcast airs in late December, watch for Car 41, the yellow Rabbit of Malo/Fudalej. They went off near the end of the spectator area on stage A5, the third run through the Iron Bridge spectator stage, and judging by the aftermath, it must have been pretty spectacular when it happened.

We were only entered in the regional portion of the rally, so we had a 2-or-so-hour gap in the middle of the day while the national-only stages were being run. After that, we re-joined the rally for the final four stages, including two runs through the always amazing Castledine's Corner spectator area.

Every year, I'm floored by witnessing the sheer amount of work and manpower (and by imagining the work that I don't witness firsthand) that goes into pulling the Rally of the Tall Pines off. This year was the best year that I've personally experienced, not only because of the "proper" Tall Pines snow that's been absent the past few years, but because the workers and organizers consistently manage to do the unthinkable of out-doing their performance from the year before.

Jeff