Slipstream - March 2001

Go Back to School... Rally School, That Is
by Keith Olcha, Drivers Education
My daughter Kim and I ran the Roundup Tulip rally last year
in the pairs, novice class and came in first place through dumb
luck. Now, I could go on and on about Roundup and what a great
job the Davis’ have done over the last couple of years, but I won’t.
Instead we’ll just register early—and this year, Mr. Milton
Barley—we’re coming after you in the full concours class—got
that, big guy? But what does that have to do with this year’s rally
school on January 20, at Texas Motor Speedway?
Well Kim and I decided to go to school and get some real
training from the Jedi-Masters, Teri and Charlie Davis. Young
Skywalker and I showed up at the Speedway Club ready for a
great day. You know, everyone should do a rally or two if they
really love cars and driving. I am amazed that more people don’t
rally. Granted, with most Driver and Navigator pairs being
Husbands and Wives, we did observe two trial separations and
one actual divorce…but I guess that’s not bad for 30 or so attendees.
Many people think rallying is only the FIA Paris-Dakar type
of event where you race on dirt-roads or glaciers. The kinds of
rallies we’re talking about here are legal street-based. Our
Maverick rallies are competitive, rules-based driving events that
take place on normal roads. You must obey the traffic laws and
follow instructions. There are many types of rallies:
Scavenger Hunt, Word-Instructed Route, Tulip Instructed,
Poker Run, Hare and Hound, and Time-Speed-Distance just to
name a few. Bob Benson, that maniac who runs the MRPCA chat
list is an accomplished area-known rallyist. He and Joe
McGlohen have done some of those high-speed off-road rallies
you watch on Speedvision at 1:30 am when you can’t sleep
instead of Suzanne Somers selling her “Thighmaster”.
So the first rally we learned about and did was a Hare ‘n
Hound rally. The master car, the hare, leaves 5 minutes ahead of
the pack and drops a trail for the other cars, which leave at oneminute
intervals to follow. The rules were that anytime you came
to an intersection that contained valid, legal rally roads (no drive-
ways, etc.) 500 feet afterward there would be a splatter of white
lime on the side of the road (you couldn’t miss it). If you did not
see the lime, you had to turn around and then decide which road
to go down. If you then see the splatter after about 500 ft, you’ve
done the right thing and continue down the road until the next
intersection and the same thing happens- do you go straight, or
turn left or right? Pick a route—take a guess—if you don’t see the
splatter—oops, turn around and try another road… It ends at a
checkpoint and the car with the least mileage traveled (the least
errors) wins. Obviously there are odometer checks and calibrations
to keep things honest.
Does anyone remember an episode of the 1960’s mystery
show “The Avengers” where Steed and Mrs. Peel are in a scavenger
hunt rally with her Lotus, his Bentley, and the bad guys had a Jag
E-type? They had to follow instructions to find objects to collect
and bring back. One of the objects had secret-plans hidden in it
so that’s why the bad spies were on the rally. Great Stuff. Now,
does anyone want to put those three wimps from that recently
released “Charlie’s Angels” remake against Mrs. Peel in that
leather karate suit? I’m digressing (or is that regressing?) here.
But scavenger hunts make great fun rallies as they combine
driving and party-type activities.
The rally school also included a Tulip rally, which is a rally
that has specific drawings to follow for turns and landmarks.
There was even a section where we got to design our own rally
and then give it to others to drive. It was an all day affair with lots
of driving. It started at 8:00am and ended at 5:00 with a Poker
Run rally to dinner at the Prairie House in Roanoke. Of course
I must add that there were 5 Boxsters there including the beautiful
Biarritz White car of John and Suzanne Cochran. They’ve got a
stereo with as many buttons as the space shuttle (and it cost
almost as much). What a great day. Keep your eye out in
Slipstream for the first rally of 2001. May the Force be with you!
P.S. By the time you read this, we’ll have had our first Autocross
and the Driver’s Ed at Motorsports Ranch!
Two of the rally winners from the Austin area.
Keith Olcha and John Cochran
Dan Germain and son, the hounds
that caught the hare.
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