Jan Gerber runs his Neon at a rallycross in Nebraska.
He regularly beats the AWD’s with a stock Neon and a set of snow tires!
Check it out in our new feature – “Rallycross Your Neon!“
Need to find a rallycross in your area? Click here for the SCCA listings. Click here for CRS events.
Nahwatzel was the stage everyone was talking about at Olympus. Nahwatzel this year was a 19 mile stage. It’s usually 22-25 miles long… 
This is twice as long as some of the longest stages we’ve ever done. We did the stage twice and each time I took a deep breath before we started and a deep sigh when we finished. It covers every type of surface that Washington has to offer. I picked this particular 7 minute segment in the middle of the stage as it shows all that Nahwatzel is famous for. First, the wide open dirt highway that takes a hairpin left onto some tight twisty sections. The narrow sections become faster as we’re hitting 70+MPH down the straights. These tighten into hairpins and the surface changes and becomes loose in a lot of areas. Nahwatzel also likes to eat cars. Pay particular attention to 04:00 in – as I missed a downshift and couldn’t stop the car in time. 
It’s taken me a couple of weeks to decompress. We popped Ze’Neon off the tow dolly and parked it when we got home from Washington. I’ve only started it once after that, and still have a load of spares sloshing around the back of the Blazer. We have some time to do repairs and testing before Gorman Ridge in August. A little bit of a summer break before we continue the USRC season with Prescott and Laughlin.
Just before Olympus everything came together smoothly. A complete departure from the frantic last minute ‘oh crap we’re out of it’ Rim of the World in April. Struts were back on the car and tested. The subframe mounts got welded. The oil pressure sender failed in the parking lot and not on stage. Blazer packed up with the Neon on the tow dolly ready to go for the morning. We packed our clothes, got about 3 hours of sleep, and took off Wednesday morning at 4:00AM.
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This stage is called Summit Loop. First it’s quick, then it has some rough tricky sections in the middle and keeps getting faster. I was pushing so hard through the finish that it took me a few seconds to get the car back under the limit. You want fast in the woods video? – Here you go!
Video of SS4 – Summit Loop – 64.1MB WMV
A note about videos: I find it funny that other sites still resist posting a 60 – 80MB video of stages. If you’re stuck with dialup, you won’t really be able to enjoy an 8MB video, let alone an 80. Another thing I see is people shrink the video down to 320×240 and lower it’s quality to save space. On a 10 minute stage that only knocks maybe 15-20% off the total size and in my opinion makes the whole video look like crap. I have lots of bandwidth on my server and it costs less then $100 a year. I also have uploaded all the videos to Google Video for your enjoyment. Please enjoy and share these with your friends! If you have any comments – let us know!
Update: More!
Video of SS5 – Maxwell Loop – 46MB WMV
With seven production class starters on Saturday, the team knew they would have to be strong on the first stages to claim victory in the North West. The hard packed roads took a toll on tires and competitors the first day. “You either know how to drive fast on these roads or you don’t. The learning curve is steep, and there is a ditch filled with rocks and trees at the bottom of it,” said driver Kristopher Marciniak. “These are just like the roads I grew up on in New Hampshire and Maine. Driving fast through the trees is such a rush!” They set their mark by finishing 17th overall out of 33 starters and 2nd in the regional production class on Saturday. “It was fun to run with so many production class cars this weekend. The roads are great and we really enjoyed ourselves,” said co-driver Christine Wittish.
Not completely without incident the volunteer crew encountered a sub-frame mount that was cracked and ready to break. Some last minute help from the Kosmides crew got it welded and out of service with seconds to spare. Erik VanDyke, Matthew Laverty, Jason Sampson, and Jordan Luzader worked hard to keep the Dodge Rally Neon in the running all weekend. Unlike the regional crews, the car was impounded on Saturday night in Parc Ferme so overnight repair was not allowed. This is typical of an FIA event and the team was prepared for it.
On Sunday, with the other national production team out of the running and the sub-frame starting to give way again, the team took the last couple stages easy and brought the car back to the Little Creek Resort and rally finish intact. “I could have made a push for third in the regional on Sunday but the car was getting a little wacky to drive and the USRC championship is what we’re aiming for,” said Kris.
The rallynotes.com team finished on their Bilstein shock absorbers and the newly designed strut mounts. “I had no trouble at all on the harder stages. I took the jump at the ORV-park flat out. Bilstein helped us get it done this weekend.”
Next up for the team is Gorman Ridge in California, a regional event that marks their one year anniversary competing in rally. The team will return to the national events in October with the Prescott Rally in Arizona.
Kristopher is a computer technician and support analyst working for the Alteer Corporation in Irvine, CA. Christine is a graduate student at the University of California, Irvine in the field of molecular biology and the lab of Dr. Douglas Wallace.
We would like to thank the following for their support!
Bilstein
RallyDecals.com
The Southern California Neon America Club
Hankook Tires
Let’s start with all the awesome pictures the crew took. These are from Erik, Matt, and Christine’s camera we keep in the Neon. 2006 Olympus Rally Pictures from rallynotes.com.
For video – I was able to snag the ORV park stage (with the jump) SS3. I overlayed video from the crew. There is a lot more to come, I just have to get through it.
Video of SS3 – ORV Park – 8.6MB WMV
Sunday: We did it! Today we settled in for some long stages and took the USRC stock class win! The crew kept the car together and Christine and I kept the Neon on the road. This is our fourth finish and we did well on these roads which moved my speed factor up. (no more starting in the back) The in-car looks awesome with the trees going by at 70. We’ll have lots of pictures and video soon! We’re on our way back to So-Cal tomorrow.
Saturday: We got the rougher stages out of the way in the morning. It took its toll on the right front subframe and we started to notice it was moving under braking. The Kosmides crew lent us a hand and a welder. You know it’s a good time in service when welding becomes your only option. We set some fast stage times and ran a clean / smooth first day. I’m trying to make sense of the online scores. Our USRC competition – Kris & Ed Dahl went out with rear suspension problems. 
I hope they can restart tomorrow. We’re in second place in production amidst a whole pack of Tabor cars. Long day – need sleep…
Friday: It was a long day of recce. Christine will be burning the midnight oil writing her notes for tomorrow. At first she was going to mark up the stage notes prepared by Pat Richard but his notes are just not what we’re accustomed to. She opted to re-write the whole book and notate it exactly how we want it. The crew is here and the car is ready to go.
Thursday: We arrived at 4:30 to the Red Lion Hotel in Olympia, Washington. The last 30 miles seemed to take forever! I was mentally done with driving once we were out of Portland. Christine did drive a litte bit yesterday and today which let me nap and recharge. The press stage was fun and was a good ‘warm up’ for what to expect here. We’ll be out all tomorrow doing recce.
Photographer Jim Culp captured us at the press stage – check out his other photos here.
Today we knocked out 684 miles on our way up to Olympus. We’re getting better then expected gas mileage and making good time. We should arrive tommorow in time for the press stage. Our only 2 crew members convinced friends to come along last minute and we’ll have lots of help in service.
I’m not sure if we’ll get another update up during the rally – so keep an eye on the scores as they come in at: Olympus Rally Results.
We’re in great shape for the Olympus Rally in Washington this weekend. The front end has been welded back on. 
*hehe No, seriously, the sub-frame broke all the robot welds and was hanging on by the automotive equivalent of a paper clip. The front skis (as we call them) were warped and bent and also needed to be replaced.
Harry’s buddies Todd and Mike told me that they were up to the task of rebuilding the front skidplate mounts (seen on the right zapping some steel together), but not able to weld the front subframe bits. I went to another local shop and had the work done. I’m still having some issues with one of the control arm bolts as the nut is welded INSIDE the unibody and is starting to break free of its mounting point. I’m not entirely sure how to go about fixing that one, but it’s strong and safe for now as I managed to thread it and get it tight one last time.
Crisis averted #381: The car was leaking oil pretty good after Rim of the World and Harry and I both had a good look at it and determined that it was coming out the oil sender plumbing. Yesterday I reached up and felt that it was actually a little loose. I twisted it to see how loose it was and it sheared off in my hand. Easy as that and I’m holding the dummy light sensor, the Autometer sender and the brass T. Oil shooting out the back of the motor = bad. This brings me to my next point…
Ground School: When you learn to fly aircraft (I flew a little after High School, maybe 20 hours. It got too expensive.) one of the first things you learn is how to do a ‘walkaround inspection.’ You don’t just hop in the Cessna, crank the prop, and go! You spend 30 minutes looking over the craft. Really looking! Is that grease coming out of the rudder? Are the tries worn too much? Is that a crack in the engine cover? Can I move the flaps without any resistance? Fuel status, oil status, instrumentation check, etc. You do this because any sort of failure in the air is a problem. A big problem. A rallycar should be treated the same. Are the lugs tight? Do I have fuel? Is the suspension making noise? Is that a new rattle? Are the hood pins in? Are they in? The pins are IN right?? Oil pressure, engine status, rally computer, etc. We use a check list that I created for our first rally and it works pretty well. Pre-Flight Checklist.xls Some of the information is Dodge Neon specific, but good to have on hand, like capacities and torque settings. Let me know if you use it!
There was a huge sigh of relief from Christine and I when we primed the fuel pump a couple times and turned the engine over. She returned to life with no sign of other damage to the engine. After taking the skidplates off and the fuel pump out, it looks as if the following happened: Big fresh dent in the gas tank. Fresh crack in the plastic fittings inside the pump housing. The 10 gallon tank is now a 9 gallon tank. The in-tank pump housing got a good knock and came loose. So, Saturday night at Rim, we effectively ran out of gas. 
Good to know as we’re prepping for Olympus and the heat is on. We need some cosmetic pieces, and fresh skidplate material. The re-engineered struts need to be on the car by next weekend. Tires good, engine good, driver crazy. I’ve been told that the roads in Washington are a lot like Maine. This means hard packed, tough on tires, roads with ‘rock-a-dillos’ popping up to claim car parts. It will be weird to see trees again…