Rally Weekend
by brian @ 10:06:54 - [perma-link]This weekend was a big rally weekend in Portland. We skipped the
Friday night TSD, which eliminated us from the "Triple Threat"
contest. It turned out not to be such a wise choice after Lesley and
I placed 3rd in the "Seat Of Pants" class on Saturday's "Mountains to
the Sea" touring rally from Portland to Astoria. Josh towed the car to Astoria with his work truck Saturday
afternoon. Having his truck makes everything so much easier. When
we loaded up on Friday, I was gazing around the garage and asked,
"what tools do we need to load?". Josh smiled and replied, "None!
Its all in the truck!" Saturday night we took Pickles (Suzanne's dog) to the Safeway by the
hotel. She was very good and no one in the store seemed to mind. Sunday was another rallycross. Josh and I took turns with the FX-16,
and Suzanne raced Lesley's Jeep Cherokee in the morning session. The
first lap in the Toyota revealed the first engine problem I've had
with the car. Up until Saturday, the motor had been the most
reliable part of the car. After sputtering back to the staging area,
we popped the hood. A couple of our competitors said it sounded like
water in the spark plug wires, and they were right! Some water must
have leaked into the valley pan when I washed the car, and rinsed the
engine bay. It was a quick fix with some spray Josh had in his
service truck, and the motor was singing again. In the afternoon session, the car was trouble free. I ended up
placing 4th (again) in the Modified 2-wheel-drive class. We had the
in-car camera working in the afternoon, so I'll chop up the videos
and post them later. Lesley hopped in as passenger for a few laps. Now she wants to sign
up for Rally School after Burningman. She was going to take a lap on
the Barbie Quad, but the battery died before she reached the starting
line.
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