[MDBodnar]

I have a fairly reliable source that heard Hyundai may NOT compete in the 2003 SCCA ProRally Championship.

Of course I hope this is completely unfounded.

Do we need to start a letter writing campaign to Hyundai; expressing our great interest in seeing the factory team defend their championship?

Anybody hear anything similar?

Yours in the sport,
Mike

Who would we write?

 

[Gravel Spray]

I think it would be great if we had no factory teams at all. They should take their budget and pay out a meaningful prize fund to private teams.

1st place $10k
2nd place $6k
3rd place $4k etc. etc.????

Maybe have a smaller but similar payout for brand placings.

I bet Subaru spent enough money last year to support this type a program for a season. If they did a real payout to private teams I think they would have come away from a season like 2002 with a much better image.


Same with mitsubishi. They completely blew it with their budget.


This does not work with Hyundi as they don't sell the cars they race, but..........


I think we'd have a lot more talant(havas, patr, t-stow, streets, carl Y, etc.) willing to run the entire series with a program like that.

catch bees with honey..........


Peter

 

[MDBodnar]

Without the manufacturers teams we would never be able to elevate our homegrown drivers to an international level.

PatR now competes internationally to build the skills he needs to compete at that level.

Have you looked at MHiggins (the elder is Mark right?) stage times this year? When the car was running he was blowing away the rest of the field.

I have a lot of respect for our top North American drivers and don't disagree that the North Americans deserve a chance and funding to compete at the top level here. I have a huge respect for the gentleman's agreement the manufacturers have upheld to include one of our own on each team.

Paul, Ramana, and possibly O'sullivan would not/will not be competing at the level they are without the manufacturers teams.

Yes I'd like to see more of our own winning and earning at the top level, but we have to earn it.

The sport has grown and there are a lot of growing pains. I am looking forward to the best drivers competing in America to be an American (let the world come here to get their AS* kicked). I am looking forward to the sport growing even bigger so that I can win a meanigful regional championship on my budget, while cheering for the best of the best in our national program.

We need to keep challenging ourselves at the top so that the next young hotshoe can compete with the worlds best.

So WE NEED HYUNDAI's TEAM to bring the sport to the next level. We need more than three manufacturers in open class and 1.5 or 1.2 or .3 in the 2WD classes. We need to see improvement in the structure and organization of the events.

Yep I'll be pretty happy playing with my own toys in my own backyard, but I'll be ecstatic to root for young Johny AppleSpeed on the 2012 World Rally Championship (round #6 in anywhere, USA).

Yours in the sport,
Mike

 

[John Vanos]

I agree with you fully mike, they are essential if we want drivers to be able to compete. I highly doubt that after winning the Manufacturers title that they would pull out. It just seems improbable, it would be a waste of 2002's budget...

 

[Ray]

Gentle People!
We have nothing to offer for ANY "Factory Team".
The amount of spectators is not large enough to attract any sponsors.
We have no structure among ourselves. Anyone can start in any class. There is no extensive TV coverage. Sponsors and manufacturers want people to be able to see their product or "rolling billboard". We're losing events.
Lets face it. Too many chief's, not enough indians.


Whiplash RallyeSport

 

[Gravel Spray]

I see three peoples names up there that were helped to/by factory drives.

If S.O.A. were to run a program like the one I mentioned above I think we'd have quite a few more than three North American drivers willing to run the majority of the series.

It would help people like:

Paul E. this guy blazed the trail for Subaru
Pat R. this guy too
Mark U.
Nat T/S
Jason R.
Craig P.
Shane M.
the list goes on and on with Subies.
Can't forget Eric Eaton too!!!!!!!!!!!!
____________________________________________________

in the mitsu camp we have

Mark N.
Seamus B.
Tim P.
Rhys M.
and all those Irish guys back east.

It's pretty clear to me that a program that benefits the CLUB DUES PAYING MEMBERSHIP is has a greater impact on US driver developement. I also think there would still be plenty to market on the TV show. Pat, Burke, T-Stow, Nelson and a guy like....oh say, maybe Havas having a battle? That's a show.

I'm not saying keep out the euro boys, just put the money(the manu $) were it will help develope North American drivers.

I say outlaw factory teams!!!

pete

 

[Gravel Spray]

"Yes I'd like to see more of our own winning and earning at the top level, but we have to earn it."
______________________________________

that's what this is

1st place $10k
2nd place $6k
3rd place $4k etc. etc.????

you earn it you get it.

 

[CrazyEric]

Yea don't forget Crazy Eric Eaton!!!

I'm dying to kick some Euro Butt - but I can't afford to compete in a High profile car - John, let's get em in a merkur}>

If the manufactures were to reward USA talent with $$ and Parts Programs instead of high $ teams, Rally would be much more exciting.

As it is now, Euro's 1st-3rd then the pace usually drops off sharply to Not so fast chaps in casual slacks (businessmen)

When I finished 2nd O.A. in the 500cc national MX series, Yamaha funded the season entirely with contingency $$
(top 20 each moto made $).

I made $10,000. winning the Washougal National and it went directly to travel and mechanic needs.

I would never been able to fund the season without the $$ from Yamaha.




>I see three peoples names up there that were helped to/by
>factory drives.
>
>If S.O.A. were to run a program like the one I mentioned
>above I think we'd have quite a few more than three North
>American drivers willing to run the majority of the series.
>
>It would help people like:
>
>Paul E. this guy blazed the trail for Subaru
>Pat R. this guy too
>Mark U.
>Nat T/S
>Jason R.
>Craig P.
>Shane M.
>the list goes on and on with Subies.
>Can't forget Eric Eaton too!!!!!!!!!!!!
>____________________________________________________
>
>in the mitsu camp we have
>
>Mark N.
>Seamus B.
>Tim P.
>Rhys M.
>and all those Irish guys back east.
>
>It's pretty clear to me that a program that benefits the
>CLUB DUES PAYING MEMBERSHIP is has a greater impact on US
>driver developement. I also think there would still be
>plenty to market on the TV show. Pat, Burke, T-Stow, Nelson
>and a guy like....oh say, maybe Havas having a battle?
>That's a show.
>
>I'm not saying keep out the euro boys, just put the
>money(the manu $) were it will help develope North American
>drivers.
>
>I say outlaw factory teams!!!
>
>pete
>

 

[RallyBrat]

PatR was helped tons by his factory ride. It helped him go to rallying full time and now he's in Europe competing creating a name for himself. If he didn't get a factory ride in 2001, he probably would have ran that 2.5RS again.

Thanks,
Alex

 

[John Vanlandingham]

PVB and Gravel Spray! youse guys are both right. Eric Eaton, too!

Once again truely revolutionary suggestions come out of the NW! And PVB and Gravel Spray aren't really NW natives! It must be the spirits of those old IWW organisers shot to death in Centralia and Everett by the stooges of Powerful Interests that haunts us out here.

Boys, the real problem is the immense competitive advantage that essentialy limitless spending can bring to even rank and utter beginners when the cars are modern turbo 4wd cars.

And before everybody blabs the tired platitude for the 50,000th time about money will always dominate in CAR motorsport, I'll say yes it will but it the resposibility of the Motorsport Governing Body to craft rules which _mitigate the effect of essentialy unlimited spending_.

And to make Rally a contest of drivers, co drivers skill.
And not merely of writing checks

As we all know, the regime of Kurt Spitzner has been marked by both _de facto_ and de jure facilitation of all the manufacturers councils wishes, and as such the SCCA proRally Series is in some circles devoid of any shred of credibility.

I agree wholeheartedly, ban the Official Teams and restructure their expentitures would be a fantastic plan : if the MFGs (they ain't Factory teams) wished to see the sport grow and encourage competition.

They don't however. They don't even really use the US results in their US advertising in any significant way. It seems to me that they are just making money off some rich kids.

Ray is right on in this, we aren't a viable method for them being seen.
Bill and Ted said it right in that Epic Motion Picture Waynes World:
"We're not worthy!"


Nothing will change as long as guys with $100,000s of their own money can buy a car and instantly be in the top 7-8, nobody can seriously think that sort of result displays driving skill, do they?

If the so called factory teams want to play Spitzners game,
then go away,*
make their own series, and
pay the tech guys,
pay the scoring crews,
pay the routemasters,
pay the timing control crews,
pay the road blockers and crowd control people,
pay the hams
pay the photographers, even Morgan
pay the road useage fees

and then when nobody wants to watch 8-10 cars then
PAY US AS EXTRAS in your advertising.


IF WE'RE SO PRO THEN WHERE'S THE DOUGH?


*And take Spitzner with you, he's your man.



John Vanlandingham
Seattle, WA. 98168

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

 

[John Vanlandingham]

>PatR was helped tons by his factory ride.
Actually Alex, Pat was helped by strategic spending of his own money,



It helped him go
>to rallying full time
Selling his business helped him go full time a wee little bit.


and now he's in Europe competing
>creating a name for himself.
Because Pat is a very astute guy and recoginised that if he can do what he did in essentially his first year, then there wasn't a lot to prove staying in at least the US SERIES.



If he didn't get a factory ride
>in 2001, he probably would have ran that 2.5RS again.

No, he bought a WRX STI verIV motor and box and me and John Lane and Dave Clark busted äss to install it and he ran several US "Pro" events, Pat is very competitive, he knew he was getting beat by guys with vastly less talent and drive on simple Torque.

His fully rebuilt, way better than original STI motor has been done and sitting on the bench 15 feet from right here since April, Pat has chosen to take a step back in car to take a step up in competition.
>


Beating 35 other guys on equal terms is way fun!
>Thanks,
>Alex
No Problemo muchachito.





John Vanlandingham
Seattle, WA. 98168

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

 

[Gravel Spray]

Hey Now..........

I meant no disrespect to Hyundai, or the team which operates their cars. Hyundai has made the biggest and the longest investment in US rally of all the car companies.

I only meant to suggest that those companies with huge rally budgets on two drivers(w/one N.A. native) could actually get the same if not more exposer buy paying a realistic prize fund. There are two companies with an exellent opprotunity to do it.


pete

 

[Topi]

RE: Hey Now..........

Respect for Hyandaui? Sorry, NON...They've been buying and cheating and manipulating SCCA ProRally series since day one.
A history lesson:
- When Buffum run ProRally series, got AUDI 4x4 and kicked everybodys you-know-what life was good.
- Then Rod Millen built 4x4 RX7 and kicked Buffum's butt
- Buffum changed rules to out-law "home built 4x4s" - life was good again (There's an exellent home built Corolla FX16 with AllTrack 4x4 turbo running gear sitting in the garage - thank to Buffum's rule change)
- Enter rich business man:" John, I want to rally. Build me a car I can win". John builds a 323 GTX 4x4 for Carl Merril. Merril doesn't win. "John, I said I wanna win. Build me a winner!"
- Buffum changes the rules. Now it's OK to build and rally non US sold car. Even a turbo 4x4. Almost anything's OK if it comes via him. He imports Cossie 4x4 in thousand pieces and builds not one but two 450HP monsters. (I asked Buffum's right hand, Mr Duncan, how to get a Lancia Integrale in the series. "Give a piece of pie to him. That's all it takes". I said - No thanks...)
- "Now I'm winning!" thanks Carl. Life is good again.
- Buffum is hungry, he needs a bigger meal ticket. Enter Huyndai with the lowest self esteem in the world (Excell's oil smoke hasn't cleared in the US. Cars are known to be POS. Not even Rodney King's "100+ MPH", claimed by a female CHP officer, can't boost the sales and image....)
- Buffum makes a deal. 100% Mitsu everything including a kitchen sink helps. Life is good.
- Did Buffum do wrong? Hard to say. He just looked after himself, his son and his team. Besides, if it wasn't for him we didn't have SCCA rally program at all for few years. So, he just took "a salary" for his hard work. Can't blame for that.
- And the "SCCA ProRally" saga continues....

 

[Jim]

RE: Hey Now..........

You say Hyundai has been cheating since day one. Post some facts that can be proven. All you posted is a bunch of things John Buffum may or may not have done to win. None of which appears to be cheating according to the way you wrote it. Remember, this is written word here and you are responsible for what you write. Make sure your contact information is correct so that any party that feels they have been falsly accused can get in touch with you.

Thanks!

 

[Jim]

RE: PVB and Gravel Spray! youse guys are both right. Eric Eaton, too!

"Nothing will change as long as guys with $100,000s of their own money can buy a car and instantly be in the top 7-8, nobody can seriously think that sort of result displays driving skill, do they?"

John is right and this applies to everything in life. As long as money will give you an edge, someone else will complain about you doing so. They will want you to leave. Reality bites.

 

[Jon Bogert]

FX16 Alltrac?

"an exellent home built Corolla FX16 with AllTrack 4x4 turbo running gear sitting in the garage"

Where?

 

[Gravel Spray]

RE: PVB and Gravel Spray! youse guys are both right. Eric Eaton, too!

I like freaky cars.



Pete

 

[John Vanlandingham]

RE: PVB and Gravel Spray! youse guys are both right. Eric Eaton, too!

>"Nothing will change as long as guys with $100,000s of their
>own money can buy a car and instantly be in the top 7-8,
>nobody can seriously think that sort of result displays
>driving skill, do they?"
>
>John is right and this applies to everything in life. As
>long as money will give you an edge, someone else will
>complain about you doing so. They will want you to leave.
>Reality bites.

Jim et al,
Years ago I guy I thought of as a friend, Sam Bryan and i were in conversation about the corrosive affects of unlimited spending on motorsport.
And that's the catch, and there's always a catch, Yossarian.

The catch here is the second half of thr word MOTORSPORT. See the word SPORT buried there?

This IS supposed to be a contest of WHO can DRIVE the best on a variable route, under difficult conditions in terms of surface and duration.

Many of the new-comers to this sport either don't understand what a Rally is, realative to other car competitions, or have forgotten.

Look up the word, folks.

The reason we call it Rally, and not "Forest racing" or Gravel Racing is because by near universal mutual consent and 70+ years in the last century a car Rally was just that, a Rally, a gathering.

The word comes from the French and it's roots are :
're'- again, and 'aleier'- to join.

It has always been a gathering of people for a specific kind of car competition, and even the Webster's New World Dictionary I have here, a decidedly NorthAmerican slanted dictionary, the define it as:

"an organised automobile run, esp. of sports cars on public roads, designed to test driving skills."

And that is what it has always been, until very recently driven by the visions of a few people who believe it should be a MEDIA SPECTACLE primarily, and parentheticly a media spectacle that they will control, and to make it look mahrevlous they feel they need to change the essential nature of rally from an open gathering of competitors, to something most closely resembling so called
Reality TV. A few people in un-real situations doing made up and wierd-äss things.


The problem comes when some people, mostly new to the Sport for the last 3 or 4 years, have no self restraint when it comes to spending, and the sport is destoyed.

I liken it to this>
Say we were having a test of target shooting with off the shelf bolt action rifles, target at 100yards. We are all happy campers firing away,and spending 9 cents a shot, then along comes some guys whose daddy bought him a nice MG42 and said to us he wants to play, and opens up with it at 1200rounds per minute ripping the target up.

We are all dismayed.

Then comes some real dud, who has had some 'vision' about what he fantasises targetr shooting should be to be really successful despite the fact the guy has never held a rifle much less shot one,
and all of a sudden we see guys showning up with Vulcan mini-guns and they rip loose with their 6,000 rounds per mintue shreading the tagets to tatters and plowing the ground all around the target to something resembling snus.

They say "well, John is right,and this applies to everything in life." money has always played a key role.....etc

I say that unrestrained simple expentiure or the ammuntion completely altered and destroyed the sport for the 99.5% who were using those rifles that eveybody could afford, and it is no longer Target shooting.

Spectacle, maybe. But not target shooting except in a superficial way.


If some people themselves have no restraint in theeir spending and no qualms about destroying the sporting aspect of the sport, then it is the responsiblity of the Motorsport\s governing body to take steps to assure the SPORTS future.

Jim,
In the end of that conversation with Sam, I was stupmed inl ooking for an answer to his statement:
"Well it's not their fault they have a lot of money!"

So after a lot of thought, I came up with this:
this is not life and in Sports, WE MAKE UP THE RULES, and part of the long struggle in _sports_ is to craft rules which emphisize skill, and mitigate the advantages of simple budget.

Then those with more money than skill can say "This sucks!"









John Vanlandingham
Seattle, WA. 98168

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

 

[Topi]

RE: PVB and Gravel Spray! youse guys are both right. Eric Eaton, too!

Why SCCA sucks, case# 124 784 578 459 866 45

http://www.trs-usa.com/images/t-tavares-fx16-4wd.jpg

 

[Bob C]

RE: FX16 Alltrac?

Why would a Toyota with Toyota drive train be illegal in open class? I don't think there is a rule that says you can't convert an open class car from 2wd to 4wd.

Bob Campbell
[email protected]
BCR Rallysport
Colorado Springs, CO