I Can’t Drive 35!

By popular demand; On Sunday November 2nd 2003, Psoper once again presents a Time, Speed, & Distance challenge adventure drive;

A 5 hour Run/Work TSD tour of western Marin and Sonoma Counties.


Entries were limited to the first 10 people who signed up by posting here.
Anyway- we do seem to have a full grid, although there are still some navigator seats open, here's who's down;



platypus/

huck/daredevil

gotwrx/the navigational unit

bushido/Christina

dropkick muppet/novice co-driver

daredevil's mom/daredevil's bro

rally wagon/

Tony Brown

Gunslinger

pcowan


So that is our field

(I told ya- the grid was filling fast!)






If you want to do the event but didn't make the cut, there are probably a couple of entrants that could use a navigator, like I said- I strongly encourage participants to have a navigator, finish is just up the road from where we'll start so getting back shouldn't be an issue.

The overall driving time will be based on covering the total mileage at an average speed of 35 MPH, in addition, there are 2 hour long breaks worked into the schedule.

There will be 3 timed sections where your ability to maintain an average speed of 35 MPH exactly will be put to the test.
Participants will start these sections on 2 minute intervals and there will be checkpoints along these sections where your passage time will be recorded to find out just how close to “on time” you are.

You will also be stopped once during the timed section, where you will time other competitors as they drive by your checkpoint.

After working your checkpoint, you will resume the section, now running 2 minutes behind the last car that went by you.

So if we get 10 cars, and you are the 4th car you will be assigned number 8 to start each section 8 minutes after the Car zero time-, you will stop at the 4th checkpoint to time the rest of the field as they drive by, then you resume driving, now running as 28 minutes after the car zero time for the remainder of the section.

There are two breaks scheduled for a full hour- the 40 minutes needed to get all the cars in, and an additional 20 minutes scheduled to get everyone a little rest break and back in order and “on time” before beginning the next section.

Apart from the timed sections, you will be free to travel the route at your own pace provided you start and finish the timed sections at your appointed time.

Timing will be in seconds, so bring a good digital clock or watch that reads in seconds, as I won’t have enough rally clocks to go around

We’ll meet up at the Washoe House on Stony Point Road north of Petaluma at 11, with the first car scheduled to start at 12 noon.

Finish will be about 5:30 PM in Sebastapol, at Mary's Pizza Shack.

 

hmmm... two days after i get my car back? hehe.. i think my gf will kill me!

 

cruise control anyone?

 

TSD? It's all about elapsed time, I tell ya...

 

You can ask any of the guys that ran my event last weekend how much the cruise control helped.....

 

I'm in.

 

i would so lose this thing... lol

"hey, where is Gagan taking off to?"

-Gagan

 

I look forward to seeing you there!

 

Cruise control? Hahahahahahahahaha....

 

I'm in!!

 

whoops. ignore this one.

 

This sounds like fun... except for the part where I actually have to go back to school and get my masters in computer science to effectively participate. What's the point of the whole stopping and passing and counting stuff? So you don't get too bored? Seriously, I don't understand the reasoning behind that part. If I could, maybe I'd sign up Heck, 35mph? My fiancee just might enjoy coming along

I'm really not meaning to rip on this event. Sounds like fun... to me just having a timed rallye-ish run through Marin is nice enough (esp after 100% city driving all the time). Maybe I'm too far in the camp of: "If I have to think too much on weekends it hurts".

jason

 

Gotta raise my weapon and straight hijack this one right now.

Yeah I wish someone would just organize another drive like the original "Geysers and Dirt" one.

My GF would kill me if I told here we were doing a TSD rally.

She flat-out just wouldn't put up with it.

I could get her to drive with me on dirt roads, even Nav for me, but all that other crap, including working it, no way in hell. She's european, and it's all about Elapsed Time! The most she would do is Nav & work a CB or 2way radio, and feed me.

I guess I'll have to organize this type of drive then, because the last time I asked about it, psoper told me that he would only do TSD's...oh well, if you gotta do it right, you do it yourself!

 

Everyone, seriously, these drives are so much fun! And dont be disheartened by the whole counting stuff. It's challenging, but does NOT require a physics degree. It's fun! No joke. And that's not the only part of the drive. The "traveling" sections usually end up being a challenge all by themselves. On one of our drives, I pretty much had to give up trying to keep up with psoper somewhere into turn 2 and never saw him again after turn 3.

Our most recent redwoods drive's first gravel section was wide enough to get sideways on most turns and the 2nd gravel section involved a 20+ mile gravel road up and over a mountain with no room for error (I know I dropped one wheel into a ditch). And then the asphalt... my god, the asphalt he led us on was divine. One lane twistys...

And if you've never done it, trying to maintain 35mph is NOT easy. If you hit a series of switch backs that require you slow to 10 mph for 30 seconds to navigate, well.... you have to make up that lost time somewhere else.

We have lots of laughs and ususally every stop involves one of the drivers getting out grinning from ear to ear going "oh my F'in god, that was so much fun!"

To wrap this all up, all I can say is, you don't know what you're missing until you try it.