Group N Vs. Open Class Subaru WRX STi Comparison Test - Rally

Race ReportSCCA Prorally Championship Presented By Hot WheelsRound #8: Colorado Cog ProRally, September 25-26, 2004* Location: Steamboat Springs, Colorado

* Details: Leg One; Nine stages, 63.79 stage miles. Leg Two; Seven stages 35.98 stage miles, Total; 99.77 stage miles. A new ProRally run up, over and through sagebrush covered open range in Rocky Mountain foothills west of Steamboat Springs. Challenging, extremely fast. Teams reported speeds of more than 125 mph in some sections, roads with variable surfaces, the 7,000 to 9,000-foot altitude, wandering livestock and snow-capped peaks in the distance made for a unique rally experience.

Pat Richard came to Colorado on a roll. He had wrapped up the Canadian championship three weeks before and having already sealed the ProRally Group N title, needed a second-place finish at Cog to clinch the Overall U.S. ProRally Driver's Championship. Leon Styles needed his second win of the season, and for Richard to finish third or lower, to keep his title hopes alive.

Snow and rain in the days leading up to the event made some of the clay and loam "minimum maintenance" roads nearly impassable and forced organizers to cancel SS2. The rest of the stages dried out nicely, and Richard, first on the road, set fast time through SS1. But Peter Workum and Alex Gelsomino started to really gel as a team and the Richards found themselves third behind the Open Class STi's of Workum and the son/father team of Coloradans Todd and Ray Moberly at the first service.

Richard felt the need to push and set fast time on three of the last five stages. Doug Havir and Scott Putman stayed in the hunt with fast time on SS7, while Pete Gladysz had the ride of his life when Dough Shepard set fast time through SS9 in their two-wheel-drive Group 5 Dodge SRT-4.

The Moberlys rolled on SS9 and the Richards finished Leg One up 23 seconds over Workum/Gelsomino, with Havir/Putnam just 7 seconds further back. Styles and co-driver John Dillon were languishing 34 seconds off the pace.

Only 17 cars started Leg Two. Once again the Richards led the way. They were fastest through SS10. Styles knew he had to step it up and suddenly drove like a man possessed, taking SS11 by more than 20 seconds and taking the lead going into service.

The Richards pulled in with no boost. The crew frantically changed everything it could in a futile effort to find the problem. Havir stayed in the hunt with fast times on SS13 and 14 until a broken rear halfshaft on SS15 slowed him. Shepard lost his skidplate on SS15, not realizing it was gone until the sweep truck showed up with it after the event.

Workum lost his center differential and with it his chance at a victory, though he still finished third overall. The Richards, struggling with a lack of boost and an engine sounding barely alive, also lost their center diff and limped into the finish control hardly moving. But it was enough, as their second-place finish clinched the Driver's title for Pat. Nathalie and John Dillon left Colorado in a fight for the Co-driver's title.

Back in the pack, Mark Brown and Ole Holter were locked in a tight battle with the Jettas of Brooks Freehill/Sean Elliot and CraigHollingsworth/Jason Grahn. Holliingsworth blinked first, but it wasn't until Freehill rolled on SS14 and then got a flat on SS15 that Brown could relax and savor the national title that came with his 11-second win.

Shepard won the Woodner Cup as top 2WD Driver of the Year to go along with his Group 5 title, Gladysz wrapped up the Overall 2WD and Group 5 Co-Driver's Championships and the team took home Manufacturers' Championship. By virtue of starting the minimum number of events and running virtually unopposed, Mark Tabor and Kevin Poirier won the Production titles in their Acura RSX. Hometown favorites Tanner Foust and Scott Crouch won Production GT.

SCCA Prorally Championship Presented By Hot Wheels

Race ReportSCCA Prorally Championship Presented By Hot WheelsRound #9:Lake Superior ProRally, October 23-24, 2004* Location: Houghton, Michigan

* Details: Leg One; 7 stages, 79.71 stage miles. Leg Two; Eight stages, 41.45 stage miles. 121.16 total stage miles. Proud successor to the infamous Press On Regardless rally. Run on sandy Copper Country forest roads in Michigan's hell-and-gone-from-nowhere Keeweena Peninsula, LSPR is fast-if the unpredictable and wildly variable autumn weather cooperates.

As happens every so often this time of year in Copper Country, Mother Nature decided to throw a hissy fit. Three stages in, the rains started, the wind blew and the trees fell-another typical LSPR. Perhaps it was a perfect metaphor, as the SCCA announced that after 40 years it would no longer sanction ProRally (or ClubRally) and turned responsibility for the series over to Rally America. The turbulent weather made one of the closest ProRally finishes in history even more exciting and, with any luck, RA will weather its own storm and U.S. rallying will emerge better than ever. Check www.rally-america.com for more info.

With the Overall Driver title decided and their respective class titles wrapped up, both Pat Richard and Leon Styles stayed home for the 2004 season's final event. But the co-driver title was still up for grabs so Nathalie Richard and John Dillon found rides hoping to score championship-winning points. Tim O'Neil and Seamus Burke joined the rest of the usual suspects and left everyone behind as they put on the best show of the season.

O'Neil, who retired at the end of last season, and longtime co-driver Martin Headland led the way in the same CPD Racing Subaru that carried Lauchlin O'Sullivan to victory in Oregon, winning the first two stages. Burke and co-driver Brian Sharkey in a Libra Racing Hyundai Tiburon answered, winning the next two stages. Downed trees delayed SS4 and SS5 was cancelled outright. Peter Workum and Alex Gelsomino, along with Doug Havir and Scott Putnam, drove cautiously through the night, waiting to see what would happen. Unfortunately for Havir, Dennis Martin and Alan Perry rolled on stage and Havir had to choose between Martin's rolled car and the woods. The woods won.

O'Neil stormed through the last two stages and was 22 seconds up on Burke and four minutes up on Doug Shepard and Pete Gladysz's two-wheel-drive Dodge SRT-4 at the end of Leg One. Among the eight DNFs on the first leg were David Anton and Nathalie Richard.

Leg Two continued wet and muddy with lots of standing water on the stages. Burke was fastest through the first three stages, taking over the lead after SS10. Shepard lost a driveshaft and struggled in one-wheel drive, eventually damaging the SRT's suspension. Some quick repairs courtesy of CPD's welder kept them in the event. O'Neil won SS11 and 13, Burke SS12 and 14 to set up a mad dash to the finish. O'Neil won SS15 but came up 3.3 seconds short, giving Burke and Sharkey the victory.

Matt Iorio and Phillip Ho finished third driving a Mitsubishi EVO instead of their customary Subaru. Shepard and Gladysz added their third top-five overall finish of the year on the way to the Group 5 victory. Jonathon Bottoms, with Carolyn Bosley co-driving, was fifth overall, winning Group N for the second time this year.

Mark Brown and Ole Holter capped their championship season with a Group 2 win, and Matt Johnson, with Marc Goldfarb alongside, scored a debut victory in his new Production GT Carolina Motorsport Subaru WRX. John Dillon ended up two points short and, despite her DNF, Nathalie Richard won the co-driver title.