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2001 Totem Stories

Thanks to: "Mark Nolte" <mnolte@uswest.net> for Steve and Ron's articles

  1. Steve Ricards - Wishbone Alley Gazette - December, 2001 - Rainier Auto Sports Club
  2. Ron Sorem     - Wishbone Alley Gazette - December, 2001 - Rainier Auto Sports Club
  3. Roy Lima

TOTEM 2001, By S. Richards

   P, R, N, D, one, two, three
   P, R, N, D, one, two, three
   D to R and woe is me.

This was to be the first rally in my new Subaru Outback Sport and first rally ever with an automatic.  The D to R scenario was certainly in the back of my mind throughout the event but the one time we needed the R in a hurry, I couldn't find it. My navigator, Gary Reid, gave me plenty of warning for the upcoming acute right, "very tight," he said, and when I couldn't negotiate it cleanly and when it was much too late for a handbrake turn, my only option was to back and fill. My praises of the neatly gated gear selector lever on the Sube turned to curses as it took me an agonizing 10 seconds to find the reverse slot.

The Totem has traditionally been an all-gravel rally but, due to conflicts with other events, has been held in late November for the past two years.  The weather can take many turns in BC this time of year, especially as far north as Merritt, the starting point. I had two sets of tires from which to choose.  The unstudded Cooper Weathermaster S/T, which I bought for gravel use and the studded Hakkapeliitta 10s.  I wanted to save the Hakkas for the Thunderbird in February, but a last minute change in the weather up north, prompted me to go with them for Totem.  This turned out to be the best choice by far.

There was an unbelievable amount of snow covering about 90% of the regularity sections.  Only a week before, Route Master Paul Westwick said that most of the route was bare gravel with a bit of ice on some of the higher sections.  But for the weekend of the rally,  cnn.com/weather was indicating subfreezing temperatures overnight with snow.

As usual, the speeds were very brisk.  In some places we were making fresh tracks in eight inches of fresh snow and in other places two or three inches of snow was covering solid ice.  On several occasions while on steep downhill sections with hairpins I was sure we weren't going to make it but with the anti-skid thumping away we somehow got around the corner. Finally I got to find out what left foot braking is all about.   I was never quite coordinated enough to pull it off with a standard transmission.

Gary and I have run numerous Totem Rallies in my '82 Toyota Starlet with varying success. The lack of power in that car prompted me to try to run early most of the time as the crafty Canadians are wont to put the controls at the top of unclimbable hill climbs or at the end of a series of unstraightenable hairpins.  With 165 hp, however, the Outback has enough power to make up a 20 second deficit in fairly short order.

Unfortunately I was mentally still driving the Starlet and, as Gary felt obliged to point out at the end of the rally, I had collected three times as many early points as late.  It was just such a thrill to be capable of being early for once.

Nevertheless we kept the car on the road and solidly in second place to John Fouse and Dennis Wende in John's Subaru SVX after the first ten hours on day 1.  On Sunday, my early syndrome continued to haunt me while John and Dennis turned in a remarkable 17 score for all of Sunday.  They finished first overall, first computer with 65 points (with unstudded Hakkas no less); Gary and I hung on to second overall / first in calculator class with 106 points.  Special note: The third place finishers, Novice class Subaru 2.5RS of Sid Kendall and Mikael Heidrich with 195 points and running only the stock odometer. Definitely a team to watch in the future.

A few other entries of note among the 35 starters were Bob Chandler and Mark Clemmons in Bob's ancient and tired old 240Z.  They were solidly in third, nipping at our heels Saturday night but had lost 3rd gear late in the day and decided not to start Sunday.  Roy Lima and John Rapson in Roy's Subaru Legacy Turbo had many offs and much difficulty maintaining the speeds due to choosing to run on gravel stage rally tires -which were not much better than slicks, according to Roy.  They decided to work checkpoints on Sunday.  Satch Carlson and Russ Kraushaar probably would have won it all in Satch's SAAB Sonnet II V4, consistently turning in some incredibly low scores, but suffered a broken throttle linkage on Saturday and missed a section as a result.  They ended up 3rd Historic and 12th over-all.

The Totem and Thunderbird are two rallies I look forward to every year and again I was not disappointed at this years Totem.  The challenging and well run events, friendly organizers and diehard checkpoint crews make these must-make events.  We're now eagerly looking forward to Thunderbird in February.

2001 Totem Rally by Ron Sorem - Merritt, BC.  November 24 & 25, 2001.

Ken Kwong is conducting the Novice meeting and unfortunately I'm not paying close enough attention;  after all, it is the Novice Meeting.  Ken has asked the veterans in the crowd to impart some words of wisdom on the neophytes and I distinctly hear several phrases along the lines of "stay on the road, stay on course, and then stay on time" Excellent advice to all.

Then there was the admonition to be really prepared for the weather, surviving a BC Winter Rally, the eventuality that you may go off and have to wait quite some time for help.  Have water, juice, food, warm clothing, and something to start a fire.  "Start a FIRE" ???  He suggests buying a local paper and a lighter or matches.  Good advice- too bad we didn't heed it. Rally Master Paul Westwick directs the Driver's Meeting with further comments from experienced BC Winter drivers:  "First you have to finish; Stay on the course, Then worry about your score"   Seems to be a recurring theme here.  Well, we tried, but we didn't succeed.

We passed tech with the RX but we were still plagued by a small coolant leak.  The first car is out and we are car two.  Time to go.  The first transit is 39km out to Brookmere Road.  We hit the cattle guard in a cloud of steam, and zero the odo.  The steam seems to have come from coolant puddled up somewhere and falling out onto the exhaust. Still unable to find the leak, even with a crowd of onlookers and varying suggestions.  I'm guessing it is the weep hole in the water pump.

We're running in Calculator this event, instead of Paper, and the AlfaPRO is working great.  We have it set for km's and it's cranking out to three decimal places- right on.

The first Regularity is Highway 5 to Tulameen via Boss Davis Lakes and Otter Valley.  After starting late we take a 19, then three 0's, a 1, and a 0 into Princeton.  Third in class.  We're feeling really good about the change in class and it looks as though the coolant leak has lessened to a cup of antifreeze every 100km.  It'll hold, I hope.

The second Regularity starts at Hembrie Mountain Road and is to go through to Missezula Lake.  Then Kentucky-Alleyne Park, Sunset (with a caution at the start: "Very Icy"), Westbank, Beaver Lake, Big White Ski Area, and McCulloch.    We start our portion of this Regularity with the verbal instruction  from sweep that there has been fresh snowfall, with no traffic, at about 14km. The distance is about right and the Subaru SVX in front of us is plowing snow with the belly pan.  The road is just an outline with only John Fouse's tracks to follow.  We're 7 late at the first control, zero at the second, and 6 late at the third.  Not too bad!  The Hakkapelliitas are holding well. We are third in class by only 5 seconds.  We are right on time at the CG at 30.34km, then at 32.296km we missed a corner and found a rock.

The road was about a 1km straight, rolling downhill.  The corner was flat to off-camber and in the sun.  Absolutely sheer ice, with fresh snow covering it.  I braked early from 68km/h (42.3mph), maybe as low as 30km/h, turned the wheel-  car continued straight!  Brake.  Power.  Left foot brake and power.  Sawing at the steering wheel but just no contact with the road surface. 

2:30PM.  Tracks show the rear end was starting to come around, just not soon enough. (We just have to convert to a rear E-brake!)  Car 1 had made it OK, we were car 2 and after dinner Saturday night several competitors said our triangles probably saved them from the same fate on that corner.  We could hear them slowing, tires skid, recover, and proceed very slowly around the corner.

This now became the Primeval Rally, the Survival Rally--

While we are now stopped, high centered on a four-foot diameter rock under the radiator, both front tires hanging in air, and a three-foot rock holding the driver's door shut.  We have ample time to look at Vinson Lake, not too far further off our front bumper, and listen to the geese.  The only other sound is the occasional rally car continuing past.  It seems like there are substantially fewer than the 35 starters.  Sweep confirms our guess.  There are quite a few "offs" behind us, and the extrications have put sweep very late.  The tow strap is out and a couple of tugs only succeed in shining up more of the corner as all four wheels of the truck spin in vain.  They said second sweep was only about 15 minutes behind. Forty-five minutes later a caravan of 4x4's and rally cars show up.  All the cameras come out to document the recovery.  We position one truck down the road to keep us from rolling over left, and one truck straight back to pull us up and out.  Five minutes talking it through and a minute and a half later we're on the road.  Unfortunately it is deemed too dangerous to tow us out to the highway, or Kelowna.  What was it they said at the Novice meeting?

4:00PM.  Our recovery has the road blocked and a logging crew behind us offers to call for a tow truck.  40km from Merritt, 12km into the woods. Should take a little over an hour.  It is getting dark quickly.  We can't find any matches so we borrow a lighter from Ken.  They leave- asking a dozen times if we'll be OK here.  Five minutes later we have a warming fire growing, in a copse of trees near the road.  We watch the moon rise over the trees and try to gather more dry firewood.  Do you know how to start a fire without paper, in the snow, with wet wood?  If you plan on a BC Winter Rally, you should learn.  Also learn what to take as a survival kit, overnight, snow, below freezing.

Only one car passes, doesn't even come to a full stop.  6:00PM, the tow arrives.  He'd been stuck twice on the way up the hill to get us.  The driver says he'd prefer to disconnect the driveline rather than to dolly the car, so while I do that, Josh douses the fire.  We're all hooked up and ready to go.  Only four hours, could have been a lot worse.  We've been told that there is a Subaru dealer in Kelowna so we tow there, drop the car, and arrive at the MTC at the hotel in time to check in, two-minutes-early.

The initial plan was to see if Subaru could pull out the front air dam and sheet metal, replace the radiator and fan, within a day or so.  Plan B was discussed at length at the pub during the Blue-Gray game, and evolved into trailering the car home.  Fixing it at leisure with existing spare parts.

Monday morning we called Subaru to explain why they had a wrecked rally car, and found the parts manager was an ex-FIA rallyist, very interested in our plight, the rally, and as to who had participated.  Finally, a call to the rental people.  We have to go to Penticton to get a "one-way rental to the States".  Down and back to Anthony Subaru.  The ex-rally guy helps us load up.

We're headed for the border-the long way.  To avoid bad weather on the Coquihalla and 97C, we choose 97 South, Wenatchee and Snoqualmie Pass.  This was an hour or so longer, but the Border took about two minutes, so we figured it was about even, and on dry roads!

We had a great start, the middle wasn't as planned, and the experience in the snowy woods was quite the little adventure!  Even with the adversities we had a great time.  And we came away with a new list of things to take along on BC Winter Rallies.

By the way, pay attention at the Driver's Meetings
       Subaru RX Rally Team
       10835 SE 170th Street, Renton, WA  98055   ronsorem@hotmail.com
(Editor's Note: Brian Palidar's Sirocco went off so bad that it wasn't worth hauling back to the States.)
 

Totem 2001 by Roy Lima

It all started with numbers.

I tend to be as prepared as I can for most things I do, so as not to get any nasty surprises that life may throw my way. So with this in mind a week before Totem I contacted the organizers for road conditions as this year's event was scheduled later in the year than normal.

The conditions given were 90% gravel and 15% ice. Ahem … "That doesn't add to 100%", I thought. This should have served as clue #1. The day before leaving I stood in front of the different sets of tires and thought "90% gravel, I'll use the Legacy's AWD system to carry me through the 15% icy sections, no problem".

Friday afternoon with the car all checked out and competition rally tires in the trunk I crossed on the ferry and picked up John, my navigator to our uneventful trip to the start in Merritt. Once checked into the hotel the street tires were replaced with the precious rally tires because as you know, there was 90% of competition gravel roads ahead of us.

The next morning having to worry only about having breakfast and teching the car, I noticed everyone else had winter-type tires on either with or without studs. This should have served as clue #2. No matter. I had "nice rally tires on pretty wheels" to quote my daughter before I left home. After John was more or less satisfied he had enough time calculations done we headed out on our odo section to the first stage. Davis Lake was no problem and the day looked great with the odd blue patch of sky showing up.

Stage 4, Sunset. Just as car #1 was about to leave some hunters in a 4X4 ask if we've seen any deer. "Ahem, no we're not after deer, but if we see any you'll be the first to know" I said. Off they went followed by car #1 shortly thereafter. Our out-time come up and we started out great. Yes, nice gravel roads. Tires are biting pretty good until about 6 kilometers into the stage where an open patch on the trees allowed a small deposit of 2 inch-deep snow. Suddenly my left foot breaking technique decided to take a holiday as the car severely understeered on an easy left-hander. We made a quick tour to the rim of the ditch, a bit of power and we were away. "What the hell was that?" I said to John. "I wasn't even going that fast". A few kilometers along we met the first casualty. Car #2, the Sorem's Subaru was off into a slight incline. A definite sweep candidate, one of the four available in this event. From this moment on we were "riding the rails" so-to-speak, as I was finding what traction I could by riding shoulders and cutting any apexes. A bit of a straight comes up, give it a little power, suddenly we're doing a 360 in the middle of the road. Ok, let's take a deep breath and try again. Another easy left hander comes up and there we go again. Around and around we go. This time we do about a 540 coming to rest on top of the 12 foot embankment. High-centered, there we stayed as all, yes all other competitors passed us, until the hunters come by. "Hey have you seen any deer?" they ask. "Ahem, no we still haven't see any deer, but if we move from here I'll look for some" I said. Well, just a little yank from their truck did the trick and we were free.  "Don't forget to look for deer", said the driver. "You bet, as soon as I take my eye off the icy road I'll try and spot one for you", I said. A few more kilometers along we came to a downhill left hander with a goat trail going straight. John calls for a keep left. "That's a left Roy" John said. "Yes, I know, see the wheel turn that way?" as the car went straight up the trail. Well, another 32 more kilometers of this. No problem. Car #4 passes us and I gun it after him. Ooops, another 360, and I mean right there!!! We sure practiced our "being passed maneuver" as we just could not keep up to speed. There goes car #5 and a wave … car #6 and another wave and so on. As we descend the snow disappears and the tires start biting into the road like a pit bull to your butt. Great adhesion, but alas at the end of the stage we were 35 minutes behind.

We were 19 kilometers away from the start of the next stage, Bear Lake, on the other side of Kelowna and we had about 12 minutes to do it. We inconspicuously traveled through Westbank and Kelowna with their 23 traffic lights and numerous, shinny gas stations and made it to the start of the stage one minute down. A quick reset of the odometer and we were off as the other competitors looked on. Shortly after we pass car #4. Shortly after we start gaining altitude. Shortly after we start visiting the ditches. Shortly after car #4 passes us … wave. Car #5, wave. I was having a bad case of "deja-vous" … sigh …. Well, another 68 kilometer stage. No problem. Behind us we see lights coming up on us as the car decides to go on another unauthorized ride. "Its ok John, I think we can make it". The car starts turning towards the only snow bank I remember seeing. The rear lightly bounces off of it and we keep turning into another 360. Without losing a beat we keep going downhill. Wow, 28 minutes down before that "moment" and we're still 28 minutes down. The end of the stage came shortly thereafter. I looked at the gas gauge as I noticed it was hovering just over empty. I guess we should have stopped in one of those nice shinny gas stations. We made the decision to cancel the last 2 stages as we knew we could not make another 55 kilometers of stages and transits, so off we went to an early meal at the hotel.

Day 2 presented the same type of roads and this time I took this as a real good clue and decided to serve as checkpoint control for the rest of the event. This was ok too as John and I discussed the pros and cons of British comedy and tried to solve other world problems. Needless to say we were not contenders in this event, but we did encounter certain situations we usually don't find ourselves in. Being a rally event I will have to say that it was still fun, as I find any event fun.  As usual Paul Westwick's usually leaves something for competitors to remember and this year's Totem was no exception. Just one thing though, I have to remember that 90 + 15 is more than 100. Something just didn't add up. But it's ok because at least I had pretty wheels.

Roy Lima

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