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Archives for February 2010
On Board with Travis Pastrana at 100 Acre Wood
A bunch of sporting organizations could learn a lot about how to promote their brand with social media by watching the efforts of Rally America. Not only do they update their Twitter feed constantly before, during and after each event but they also shoot, edit and publish videos constantly during each rally. They do a great job keeping the fans up to date using modern technology.
As I write this, Travis Pastrana is still at the front of the pack, followed by Block, L’Estage and Bacon. The video after the break is in car with Travis Pastrana during yesterday’s shake down run. It gives an idea how quick Travis is in the Subaru.
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Bacon & Watt in 4th after Friday evening stages
Bill Bacon and Peter Watt are sitting in 4th place on the road after the Friday evening stages at the Rally America 100 Acre Wood event. As the teams are about to line up for the start at the Missouri event this morning, Bacon is 1:46 behind leader Travis Pastrana. Not that far considering that a single flat tire could eat that up very quickly. Between Bacon & Pastrana are Canadian Antoine L’Estage in 2nd and 4 time event winner Ken Block in 3rd.
L’Estage is 22 seconds behind Pastrana thanks to a flat on stage. As Block is still feeling out the new Fiesta, he should get faster as the day goes on. Remember that Block is looking for a 5peat at this rally. If this keeps up, today will be a serious battle.
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Ashley Motors ad
Allan De La Plante’s recent Shutter Speed tale brought out some memories of Ashley Motors, a car dealership in Toronto back in the Sixties and Seventies. I was pretty sure I had seen an ad or two for the store in the archives, so I went digging. I found the program for the Mac’s Continental race for Formula A cars at Mosport in September 1970.
Interesting to note that Allan, Leighton Irwin and Gary Magwood were all involved with these cars on different levels and were probably at this race. In fact, Gary was racing in the Formula B class that weekend and the program has an article on Gary’s racing school. I’ll post that article later in the weekend.
Review: 2010 Cadillac SRX
The year 2010 marks a pivotal year for Cadillac and its luxurious people movers. On the one hand, you have the new CTS Sport Wagon, a “traditional” station wagon. On the other, you have our subject here, the all new SRX crossover. This second generation SRX is quite a departure from the original, which debuted as a 2004 model. That car was based on the rear-wheel drive CTS, while the current SRX rides on a heavily reworked platform shared by the Chevy Equinox and GMC Terrain. While the old SRX had the look of a big, tall station wagon, the current car cuts a more contemporary crossover silhouette.
The changes are more than skin deep. The SRX is available in front or all-wheel drive, as opposed to the rear/all-wheel drive setup offered in the last SRX. The car is also smaller-five inches shorter, and two inches lower. Options on the last SRX like a third row seat and a V-8 are absent on the new car.  Most of these changes seems to bring the SRX a little closer to what Cadillac considers its key competition, chiefly the Lexus RX350 and Audi Q5.
100 Acre Wood: ACP is out before he begins
“Sometimes you’re the windshield, sometimes you’re the bug…”
Bacon Motorsport gets ready for 100 Acre Wood
Yesterday we saw video of Ken Block prepping for this weekends 100 Acre Wood rally. The Monster folks aren’t the only team in the rally though! As we’ve mentioned before, old friend of The Garage, Peter Watt, is in the right seat of Bill Bacon’s Evo. The team spent yesterday going through tech inspection and all of the boring paperwork stuff that goes along with entry. The team has shared some photos of the day which are after the break.
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Ken Block shakes down the Monster Ford for 100 Acre Wood
If Ken Block and Alex Gelsemino can top the podium at this weekend’s 100 Acre Wood rally, it will be their 5th year in a row winning the event. As always, proper prep is a big part of success and pre running the car to make sure everything is where it should be is a big part of the formula for winning.
Another part of Block’s formula is promotion. Promote his own DC Shoes brand, promote Monster and promote Ford. One of the biggest keys to the promo team are of course the videos of Block doing wild and crazy stuff in rally cars. Today’s video is less wild and crazy and more hardcore performance as Block and Gelsemino visit SayersBrook Bison Ranch near the 100 Acre Wood site to put the little Ford through its paces.
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Shutter Speed: Motorcycles, Racing and a New Camera
1972 had it’s ups and downs for me. The emotional effect of my marriage falling apart had taken me to a serious low. I decided to move back to Toronto to be near my son. Suddenly one day my wife appears and wants to give it another go. I was delighted! We moved into an apartment just north of the 401 near Bayview. I got a job at ‘The Bay’ selling cameras. It was a natural. I still had my Duker for transportation. Naturally three on a bike in this country is not accepted as it is in some other parts of the world, so riding with our son was not on the agenda. When I did ride with him I strapped him in a rig much like a parachute harness. He was strapped to my back with his little behind sitting on the seat. Helmet and all, he sat behind his old man through many a ride rain or shine. He generally just fell asleep. I began to notice many women pulling up beside me slowly and smiling. I liked that. It did not take long for my wife to decide again that this marriage was not for her and she departed. This time she left our son. Fortunately I had my Mother living close by and without her things would have been very difficult.
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HSR and SVRA announce restructuring
Politics is nothing new in racing, nor is the division of a genre into two series. While the IRL & INDYCAR mess is fresh in everyone’s minds, there have been others that continue to this day. SCCA, IMSA, NASA all have somewhat different philosophies and have dealt with the split issue.
In vintage racing, there has long been 2 mindsets: those who feel period correctness to the letter of the rules is the way to go, while others feel period correct should include cars that are as raced including those touched by creative interpretation of those rules.
SVRA and HSR are two groups based more or less on those two mindsets. SVRA works with cars from the 1950’s to 70’s while HSR leans more towards the more modern vintages. It sounds like the ownership and management of both groups has been rather convoluted and difficult to follow. This restructuring announces that both groups will now be managed separately but will work together to move the sport forward. I guess I don’t know enough of the political history, but this just sounds like common sense to me.
The full description can be found at Sports Car Digest.
Photo credit: Al Wolford