FOr those without access to the blog with pictures:
Day 16: Stage 13
Sacramento to San Rafael (just barely)
Today, no new pictures here. This was REAL rally driving! We were up at 5 AM and left our hotel in Sacramento before 7. Out into the Central Valley for a super challenging run through the almond and walnut orchards. Major kudos to Rallymaster John Classen who found and laid out this incredible course. We were given 47 pages of instructions for the day! Turns, loops and crossovers, speed changes, and faded, tiny road markers in the fields! We did pretty well, overall, with a minute 39 seconds for this 9-stage day. That was good enough for 10th in rookie and 49 overall today, moving us to 48th overall and 9th in rookie for the whole race so far
I was a little worried in the beginning. When I tried to pull the car out from its hotel slot, that sticky left front brake was locked on like the car was up against a curb. I gave it some gas and then some more, and it popped free with a loud snap. The next application of pedal showed this problem is worsening. It stuck on again, though not so hard as before. I reversed and it freed – that’s a clue, it's the self-energizing shoe that’s hanging. I went back and forward a few times and the degree of drag diminished to where I thought it could be driven safely. But could it run a rally full of stops, starts, and speed changes? Dave and I agreed to go, but no heroism. One of the other rookie teams, the Johnstons in a 56 Chevy Belair also had brake problems yesterday, and this morning, we heard their master had died and they were dropping out. I think there were 8 DNF’s yesterday. Tough running!
Reliability has been our secret weapon. So far, with almost 4,000 miles of hard running, 13 cars (of 94 official competing starters) have had to drop out from mechanical failure - or crashing. I’ve only had the screwdriver out twice: once to turn up the idle speed at high altitude, and once to bring it back. We’ve added about 3 quarts of oil (and about 300 gallons of gas!). We did adjust spark timing a bit, and we tightened those exhaust bolts that were never tightened to begin with. Otherwise, our equipment problems have been limited to electrical glitches with the secondary and convenience systems (window lifts, horn) – and that brake problem. Still, we have lost no runtime and no sleep on mechanical or electrical problems. Few of these cars, even the very expensive big-team cars can say they have given their owners or drivers that! We have helped out two other racers in need on the road: the Caldwell’s 57 DeSoto with a flat, and Jeff Stumb’s 1916 Hudson, with 3 quarts of motor oil (his main seal is leaking badly!). I will really miss these good people when we're done!
Today, we hit the course and blew the very first checkpoint, which was placed right after two sharp turns. When we saw the check, we were at 12 seconds late (from slowing to make the turns). I hit the gas and blew through the checkpoint at nearly 70 mph! The reserve power of an Imperial helped there, as I bought back some of those 12 seconds in a few hundred feet! From there, we did OK. We seemed to have a more relaxed attitude through the day. I know I kept a wider tolerance on speed, and Dave remarked several times that we weren’t so wound up about our racing. I don't know that it was a net loss, though, as we made several very un-panicked corrections to problems (traffic delays and accel errors by yours truly).
It was SO hot. Our John ‘Duke” Wayne memorial thermometer (from Frontier Movietown stop two days ago) ran well over 95, and that Valley sun was intense. Dave’s window motor failed and his vent window has never opened, so he had no access to fresh air, except the faint zephyr from under dash vents – unless we ran top-down. We did that through the morning, but the sun can really melt a brain, so he elected top-up for the afternoon. We unzipped the back window and lowered the other three lites. It worked OK at speed, but we had some links at 15, 20, and 25 mph that got a wee bit toasty. Another 3-litre day of water consumption for each of us.
As we completed the first part of the afternoon run, we were getting dangerously low on gas, so we stopped at the first open station in a town with no name. So did several other Racers, and we ended up blocked in, unable to get to a pump or to move on. In the end, we missed our restart time call and had to put in for a 3-minute delay claim. It was allowed, so our score for that afternoon leg was 15 seconds. Close enough!
We had a tasty lunch in Colusa, CA, then a quick pit stop in Winters, CA, where we were greeted by Richard & Janet Hardy, from the IML and Southern California Imperial Club (they have a ‘new’ 62 Crown Southampton – NICE!).
We finished at Vallejo, CA, to a good crowd and a wonderful dinner party at the newly opened personal museum of Buck Kamphausen, the owner of RM Auctions (he’s running a 38 Ambulance, as well as one of the National Guard cars and a car for the Philadelphia high school teams. We had a beautiful, delicious dinner for several hundred people, live music, and an open house, including his back shop. I LOVE that kind of stuff and what other chance might we to get to experience a place like that from the inside? After we closed for the evening, we took some of the local kids (& moms) for a top-down cruise around the neighborhood. It is a classic California summer night, cool and clear over the sun-warmed Earth. It doesn't get much better than that! We cruised over to San Rafael for the night’s rest.
It’s almost over! Tomorrow is the end of the Championship Run – that’s these last three days of the Great Race, when no bad days can be dropped and any DNF is fatal. I am beginning to think we may FINISH! Then it’s time for a big party and back home to work.
Til tomorrow, jc
Back to the Home of the Forward Look Network