Background Information.
01 July, 2020. Berlin, Germany.
Julius sighs as he gradually slouches into the plush sectional lined with maroon corduroy. The flatscreen before him is one of the few sources of light in his flat's living room besides the glass doors leading to the balcony, which are half-covered in shutters. As he waits for his next Apex Legends match to queue up, he longingly stares outside, only to find that the hue of the sky matches the ash-colored brick streets. Another overcast day, and quarantine is still going strong; most restaurants are closed, events have been rescheduled or cancelled, and there's not much to do in general. What's worse is the fact that the gyms have yet to re-open!
He never he'd thought himself thinking this, but Julius was starting to miss his family. After eighteen years of living with them, he finally got to move out of the countryside and live in the city with his own flat. But after being trapped inside for many months, he was seriously starting to dread his surroundings. The yellowed walls that stunk of mothballs seemed to close in on him with each agonizing day that passed. He missed going on road trips in the family diesel wagon and his mother's home cooking. He longed for his friends whom he could actually go out and do stuff with. He missed the quieter lifestyle away from the city, whose novelty had quickly worn off for him. Hell, at this point he was even starting to miss physical classes. At least he had someone else to talk to other than him.
"Oi, you shriveled fanny," came a muted shout from the next room over. A door was flung open and a lanky redhead strode through. It was him, Ronald, Julius's roommate. An international student from England who didn't have much of a filter. "Fahk you doing?"
"I'm damn bored, man. I'm losing my mind. Nobody's hiring and I'm sitting my lazy ass at home with nothing to do." Julius sighed and scrolled through his emails real quick. Besides the usual spam emails about the health benefits of CBD including the treatment of erectile dysfunction and premature balding, he wasn't hearing back from any of the places he applied to. His parents were still sending him money and he felt bad about flushing it down the drain.
“How’s this sound,” Ron proposed, rubbing his hands together. “Word around town’s that there’s this hot new challenge that everyone and their nan is doing. You take a clapped out lorry, diesel chav car-turned-caravan, or any cocked-up ride and go on this cross-country road trip rally. The whole thing takes a month or so. The route this year has you start here, go to the Swedes, and come back. Winner takes home twelve thousand quid in cold, hard cash. How does that sound?”
Julius raised one of his eyebrows. If it meant getting out of the house, he was interested. "Go on," he said, looking back at the screen as the next match loaded.
"Here's the fun part; we've only got two stacks to blow on a ride, including petrol and repairs."
"Is that so? Is that even possible to find a car that cheap, and go across countries with that much? What about food and other supplies?"
"Tesco stops are not included in the budget. But I hope you fancy dozing off in cars."
As soon as Julius's character landed on the ground, he was immediately one-shotted by another player. He clutched his controller in frustration, hanging his head in defeat. "Scheiße Fick dich du elender Sohn einer Hu.... Excuse me, yes, that's fine. As long as I can get out of this damn flat."
"Wonderful. I know some other fellows from my humanities class we can bring along to split up costs. A Swedish fellow and a Danish bloke, you don't know them yet. They're quite good fellows. Anyways, I'll be on the lookout for some cheap rides. We'll need something that's light on the wallet and the petrol. Nothing too posh, probably a low or mid spec. Needs a fairly big boot area, but nothing too big." Ron stretched and shuffled to the kitchen as Julius cursed, finding another match to join. "That was surprisingly easy," he remarked. "You're usually quite the stubborn bastard about things like these."
"How does that saying go? Hm... desperate times call for desperate measures. Let's leave it at that," shrugged Julius. Then, a familiar sound; the hum of the fridge's motor and the creak of its door as Ron opened it. "Hey, what's the name of this challenge? Let me look it up."
"ASSBLASTER."
"Damn it, Ron..."
About ASSBLASTER
ASSBLASTER (Annual or Sometimes Seasonal or Biannual Legislative Association of Special Tasks in Endurance Rally), a road trip rally adventure "race" in which contestants seek to race from A to B as fast as they can, completing a series of tasks along the way. The event is not about speed!
It's a fairly simple competition. The rules are as follows: total cost for the car, fuel consumed, repairs, and spare parts used during the trip must be under $2000.
As I mentioned in the background (which you should strongly read!), this challenge requires contestants to race from the starting point to a set destination and back. However, there are numerous checkpoints along the route, and each checkpoint has a task for the contestants to complete before moving on. These tasks are not to be taken lightly! In previous years, some of these tasks included carrying 75kg of cattle waste from one checkpoint to the next, or driving through the entirety of an autocross track in only the reverse gear (or neutral gear if going downhill).
Allow me to reiterate: this event is not about speed! These tasks are only revealed when the event actually begins, so really any type of car can be used, as no particular car will have an advantage over the other.
For this year, contestants will start in Berlin, drive to their destination Stockholm and complete five tasks along the way, then drive back to Berlin and complete five more tasks.
Things to consider.
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Looks and styling - they’re going to be driving around in a beater, so at least make it worthwhile by making the car cool or quirky looking!
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Body type (wagon, truck, van, crossover, SUV strongly preferred)
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Reliability
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Realistic engineering (ESPECIALLY with turbos) and design (lights, plates, fuel cap, etc. you know the deal)
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Value (price for performance)
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Fuel economy - gas in Europe is very expensive compared to America.
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Drivability (manual ok)
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Vehicle size - there’s 4 of them, and the competition is thousands of kilometers in length, so they’re gonna need some supplies along the way. They can use roof racks for storage if need be but don’t give them something with a wheelbase under 2.5m. Then again, they don’t need something absolutely huge like a full-size Mercedes-Benz Sprinter or Chevy Express.
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Running costs - they will sell the car after the rally but they still don’t want to shell out too much money for a tire change. One month’s worth of service costs will count towards their maximum budget of $2000.
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Safety - these are old cars, yes, but they shouldn’t be life-threateningly dangerous.
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Comfort - they’re not expecting S-class levels of comfort, but keep in mind that they’ll be riding in the car for hours.
- Fastness/speed - this event is not about speed.
Requirements.
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MODEL NAME AND ENGINE FAMILY - CSR131 - [forum username]
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TRIM - car make, model, trim
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VARIANT - engine name and variant
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PLEASE SEND YOUR ENTRY TO EITHER ME (@Tzuyu_main) OR RYAN (@Ryan93)
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Vehicle trim and engine variant must be between 1980-2000.
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Catalytic converters are mandatory.
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Minimum wheelbase of 2.5m.
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The length of the entire round trip is 3194 kilometers / 1984.7 miles. Yes, to go directly from Berlin to Stockholm is technically less, but the route we chose doesn’t include ferries, and it also includes about 120 extra kilometers (since you have to do some extra driving around for the checkpoint tasks).
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Fuel: 95 RON / 90 AKI. Unleaded. Price is $1.68 per liter, or $6.36 per gallon.
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Make sure your total cost (total fuel cost + vehicle price + service cost/12) does not exceed $2000! To make things easier for you, I’ve made this calculator here.
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Must have at least four seats. In the rear, “+” seating is allowed if appropriate for the vehicle.
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For the sake of having a fair challenge, imitation diesel motors (NA or turbocharged) are NOT allowed; there’s too many extra variables in a diesel engine that Automation can’t accurately reflect. Petrol/gas only
and it’s better than diesel anyways
Example cars.
A word about judging, plus some other things.
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Since you are sending cars from different eras, Ryan and I will judge their stats relative to other cars from the same era. Specifically, we will group cars into their respective halves of the decade (so 1981-1985 is one group, 1986-1990, and so on) and judge them together in the preliminary rounds. This is so some eco-carbed pickup truck doesn’t have to go against a 1990s hatchback with EFI when I’m comparing a stat like fuel economy. We will still compare them against cars from other eras, though!
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If you want to send your car in with a fleet livery (ambulance, taxicab, private business (MUST BE SFW), etc.), feel free to, but this won’t affect judging or stats.
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On that note, if you’d like to visually modify your car either with upgrades (rally lights, push bars, storage bins, etc.) or damage (dents, dust/dirt, rust, missing hubcaps), feel free too, but this also won’t affect judging or stats.
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Please remember to use the calculator to find your total costs!!!
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This is not mandatory, but if you would like your entry to be processed faster, send the car to me (@Tzuyu_main) if you live in the United States or around the Pacific Time Zone. If you live in Europe, send the car to @Ryan93. If you live anywhere else, send it to any one of us.
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This is my (Tzuyu_main) first time hosting and judging a CSR. Ryan and I will do our best to run this responsibly and smoothly.
Deadline.
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22:00 GMT, December 28, 2020.
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Entries will open at 22:00 GMT, December 21. I’m giving you a day to test the calculator out. Good luck!
