Agro,
Man, you missed a great day! We were pushing the limits of traction and gravity for more than 7 hours on some of the best roller coaster roads in Southern California. The views up at the snow capped mountains were almost as good as the views down from the top.
There was a good turnout. Teams with Porsches, Subaru's, Mini Cooper's, BMW's, Corvette's and even a new Mitsubshi Evo Lancer showed up. We upheld our Cobra tradition of passing all of the ones we encountered. The Turbo Porsche gave us the best run but we got him on a 1/4 mile straight (after a tight turn) before his Turbo could spool up.
This was a VERY difficult rally. The rallymaster wrote a course that was hard (for experts) to follow and tightly timed (read that as impossible to get to some checkpoints on time). Checkpoint number ten was found by only one rally car! The very best scoring team had over 1000 penalty points. We made miscalculations that earned over 2000 points (four missed checkpoints). Usually, I am very competitive about trying to win these things. This time, every time we took the wrong road, it was through some of the most beautiful landscape you can imagine! Very steep inclines up, down and through amazing rock formations, pushing as hard as could, I was a very happy camper.
The weather was perfect. I drove most of the day in my Dale Earnhart t-shirt. The car ran perfectly until we got to a checkpoint inmarker road 20 minutes early. We stopped in the darkness and waited under brilliant stars. When I tried to start the engine, it wouldn't! The powerful new lights had sucked the battery down. Ron gave me a push start, but it took three tries. By the time it started and he got into the car, we were late. We gained another 8 penalty points on that one. I'm looking for a better alternator, today!
I fully expected a resignation note from Ron. We were moving so fast that there were times I scared myself and I know that the passenger seat is MUCH more uncomfortable than mine. I burned up more rubber going sideways than on any rally I've ever run. When I talked to Ron earlier, today, he was excited, happy and ready for the next one, what a guy!
We all ended up in a Cowboy bar in Temecula. The BBQ was awesome! After some outstanding tortilla soup and medium rare Tri-tip, we listened as the rallymaster announced the scores and handed out big trophys to some very deserving people
Yeah, Agro, you should have been there!
Paul
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