Pete, so this program would be the same as the one I attended many years ago up at T-Hill?

Leo

 

The instructors aren't any more experienced, some of the people who teach at the CRS schools have been rallying since Paul was in grade school, as for more seat time, it all depends on what sort of turn-out you get, if its a typical bay area rally enthusiasts turn-out, you get plenty of seat time with either program.

As for RA coefficients, why not run NASA events? that way you don't have any of the silly RA rookie restrictions.*



Pretty much, they structured it over 2 days so that the larger turn-out they get in oregon all gets ample time on the driving section, but for the most part its the same program we give at Thunderhill, Ridgecrest and Palmdale, with a little bit of TSD basics thrown in.


*not to be taken as a dis on RA, they are a great sanctioning body, made up of a lot of great people, and run a lot of fantastic events are put on under their sanction, I just happen to disagree with some of their rookie policies.

 

Say what?!?

Damn, that's awesome

 

Are there any schools that are in caged cars on actual dirt roads? Non of this dirt lot rally cross crap.

 

BTW Pete rules. I loved your class a few years ago and look forward to your Redwood drive.

 

"this dirt lot rally cross crap" is where all of the top WRC drivers and an awful lot of the US rally drivers got started, but hey, if that's below you... well- yeah there sure are some "real" rally schools- just not "locally", but if you have 4G or so burning a hole in your pocket and don't want to trek across the country, you will want to check out Ivor Wigham's program;

http://gorally.com/erssite/


If your budget is a bit larger and you don't mind the trip, I can also highly recommend the Tim O'Neil school in NH;

http://www.team-oneil.com/index.htm

If neither of them are good enough for ya, you'll need to go to Europe.

But if you want to learn how rallies run, what you need to do to get through one and develop some basic car handling skills, either the Primitive or CRS program represent a couple of the best deals in the business of motorsports introduction classes.

 

im in fo sho!

i have been interested in the one in oregon for about a year.. and i will do it in my own car!

 

There's a difference between Paul and his instructors, keep in mind some of his instructors have been rallying since he was in grade school also. It will not be like what went on at Thunderhill a couple years back, even Paul didn't like the way it went on there. There's a reason why people keep going back to his school and from as well as repeats from as far away as New York. If you don't want to go, then don't. You don't have to nay say it all just cause you don't like it. This is one of the reasons why I don't come on I-club often. Fact is there isn't a decent rally school around here within a reasonable distance. I sure don't want to drive all the way to Ridgecrest for only a day, and this is a chance for a legitimate school to be here. On top of that it is more cost effective than Ridgecrest to boot, when you add gas to travel to and back, plus hotel costs, it adds up to or more than the cost of Paul's school done here locally.

BTW NASA will be adding in the rookie restrictions like RA has in 2009.

 

sounds fun. i would love to go if there was a local school. Oregon is just to far to go for a rally school.

 

i'd be down! i've wanted to get into rally-x's lately, just need to find a cheap awd subie beater to start out with. (the sti is too low right now). this sounds like a great way to start off on the right foot!
________
******* VIDEO

 

if this happens im going to have to buy a 2.5rs. no way my sti going to be rallied

 

Good to see a lot of interest. With all the yesses so far on here and DI, we already have enough people to fill all the class seats and then some. Even have Jamie 'SubieGal' Thomas wanting to come down to instruct. So it appears we are just waiting on venue details to get worked out.

Guys don't forget that a cheap and common way to start out in rally is with old VW Golfs. So if you find that you like it and don't want to run your sti's, then see how much fun it is still in a 2wd beater if you can't find an older awd subie.

 

Seb, when you say "Paul didn't like the way it went on there", have you talked to him? He's never attended a CRS rallyschool, even as an instructor. He came to the National Rallycross held at Thunderhill in 2006, but there were some issues going on there that didn't really have anything to do with rallyschools.

His curriculum's pretty good, but it's about on par with the CRS school. The main difference is that he starts his school on Friday night, which gives more time for driving on Saturday. That'd be great to do, but when we ran the rallyschool up at Thunderhill there was no way we could get people there early enough in the evening to run a Friday night classroom session. It might be possible at Vallejo, but even then it's sketchy with traffic and all. I was considering running a school at Prairie Hills in Sacramento later this year, but that's up in the air right now. If we do that there, it might be possible to get people out on Friday night, but I wouldn't bank on it.

As for his instructors, they're about on par with the CRS ones.

-michel


Michel Hoche-Mong
VW GTI #31


P.S. Where do you play hockey?

 

I am not nay saying it- and I never said I "don't like it"- rather, I and several other local rally people DO offer the CRS school here, its been at Thunderhill in past years and if we can find a more local place, we will do it closer.

On the other hand, you clearly were implying that the CRS school is somehow inferior which is really kind of silly, seeing as the same people wrote the textbooks and came up with program that is being used at both schools.

But right now most of the local rally people are all working together on organizing the North Nevada Rally which takes place in 7 weeks, after that is done, we planned to start working on our "local" rally school.

If Paul does come down, I fully expect that he would be drawing on myself and a lot of other local people to staff his effort, as it is very unlikely that all of his OR. local "instructors" would be able to make the trip down here.

But also, if he makes the trip down and offers the $325 program, you can rest assured that there will not be the less expensive CRS school option offered again locally this year.

At $100 we were not quite covering the costs involved with the turn-out that we got the last time, although if we'd been charging $300+ we could have done better financially with half the participants, but we really want to encourage people to check out the school and we always felt that keeping the cost down was a good way to accomplish that.

even at $4.25/gallon, a round trip to Ridgecrest fuel costs less than $130, $100 for the Rallyschool still leaves you a hundred for a hotel, so yeah, with todays fuel costs it gets close, but to say its the same or more is not entirely accurate either.


Here you are sadly mis-informed on this point, there is an outside chance that the H&N requirement might be imposed next year, but even that is undergoing some very contentious discussions at the top levels of NASA Rallysport.

However I can state with a high degree of confidence that the RA rookie restrictions are not even in any sort of consideration at NRS for 2009 or any time in the foreseeable future.

Honestly- I'm really glad to see you are so enthusiastic about Rally, we need more of that around here, but please recognize that we do have local people here who also want to work to develop the sport and getting into pissing matches with them on the internet forums isn't going to help matters much.

Frankly I'd much prefer to see your enthusiasm channeled into volunteering for North Nevada, and maybe helping us organize a more affordable, more local Rally school with the resources we have here.

And let me state again that I have no issues with Paul or any of his instructors, in fact I consider him especially, as well as most of his staff to be very good friends of mine, they really are a great bunch of people, its just that bringing them down to essentially compete against a local program that is struggling to make ends meet, well that just isn't really cool...

 

Ok I misunderstood what Paul said about Thunderhill then, I was under the impression that he actually ran the school. I wouldn't know for sure as I've only been in NorCal for less than a year and at the time this occured I was in Virginia. I never said the Ridgecrest school was inferior, I said it was short and too long a trip.

I would be all for helping to organize a more affordable rally school here with local resources, but right now no one has stepped in to offer a local school and I'm tired of driving hours on end to get to one. At the cost of driving to Ridgrecrest and a hotel, even if it's just slightly cheaper I would still rather go to the closer one. It went simply like this: I saw a deffinciency in this area and asked Paul for help. What can I say I like convienience.

Keep in mind that this could be a wakeup call too that there is interest for a school up here especially for us wanting to get into stage rally. It'd be nice to see the local people step up and offer a decent local school and a more advanced school at that.

As much as I would like to volunteer for the North Nevada Rally, it appears as though right now I can't due to work. Which really is the biggest reason I want something local, but hey in 2 years it won't matter I'll be out of the service, going back home to the east coast and persuing stage rally avidly.



Hoche, right now I haven't been playing much hockey. I can't get into any of the leagues due to being underway during over 1/2 the season. I have been playing pickup when I get a chance over at the Dublin rink.