KCF Short Course Rally Series was on last Saturday. Its kind of unique in that they use 2 stages, run 3 times each. First stage was ~8km and the second ~11km.

The nerves didn't really kick in until half way through the first stage... I was taking it pretty easy just trying to get a bit of a feel for the car and everything... but half way through the stage I had pretty much decided that rallying was not for me - its absolutely crazy out in the forest! And it takes some big bloody balls! but by the end of the second stage I was feeling much more confident and starting to get a decent rythem up in the car.

second run through I dropped 23 seconds off my 8km stage time. It turned out to be a quite respectable middle of the field time which I was pretty happy with. The second run at the 11km stage was going in a similar fashion (ie lots faster!) as well until the fuel pump died about 3/4 of the way through... lost over 15 minutes fixing that... and I can tell you working on a car on the side of the road in the middle of a stage is not much fun!

By the 3rd run, I had seen our times on the board at Rally HQ, and was pretty pleased with how we were going. I started pushing a bit harder on the faster sections as well now because I was getting more confident, but that led to me overshooting a tight 4R at the end of a long straight and got stuck for about 6 minutes down a bank resting the belly of the car on a log... We managed to get back on the road (much to the surprise of the officials at the roadblock just down the road) after a bit of ramp building to get over that log. And then on the last stage, we had a BIG moment coming into a 3R with about a 100m cliff on the edge of the road, after a long fast section of 1 and 2 corners. I braked hard and late, threw the car into the turn sideways on the approach and it simply got no bite - just washed out across the road. I should have paid more attention to the advice from some of the old hands - "stay on the hard line". As soon as I turned it in I knew we were in trouble, and it was about that time I decided that drivers shouldn't have microphones on their helmets - because my navigator probably didn't need to hear the "oh ####, this is bad" comment... Anyway, i just managed to keep it on the road, but I took out the poles and the bunting at the edge of the cliff! Apparently in rally circles an inch is considered as good as a mile, but at the time I decided that I'd just back off and get my navigator Tim, and the borrowed rally car back to the service park in one piece, to be followed shortly by myself and Tim having a stiff drink at the pub...

But we did finish the event, albeit at the bottom of the feild due to our problems on a couple of the stages. But it was a bit of an achievement just to keep the car going and make it to the end.

It was a real eye-opener. And you certainly can't beat forest rallying for the adrenaline fix! The Supersprints and Hillclimbs I've done just can't compete on the heart-in-the-mouth adrenaline stakes! In the forest the difference between crashing and being fast on the perfect line is a pretty fine line... I had a blast though and so did my navigator. I'm even going back for more at the last rally for the year at Gallangowan in about 4 weeks. I might have been bitten by the rally bug... We'll see after the next event. Unfortunately, the Stanza's owner will be back in the seat next year, so i might just have to get myself a rally car if i want to keep going in the bush...