Much as I hate to admit it, faced with the perspective of going back in to shop glare onto a car with ten headlights, you’re right. 
I’ve added some spark to the top six, which I think has indeed improved the picture.
LOL okay… i forgot just how many lights are on everyone’s car in this competition. sorry:P
I was just joking, that was a good catch, and thanks for pointing it out 
“…Jesus bloody Christ, it’s managed to get behind the sun visors!” said Andrew, shocked at the amount of mud that had ended up in the cabin.
“Well that’s what happens when you open the window while driving through a ditch!” shouted Jan-Bart, furiously wiping the dashboard with a heavily stained cloth.
“Oh come on, I just needed some fresh air” replied Andrew.
“You know you really sound like a teenager right now” said Jan-Bart.
Andrew was confused. “That’s probably because I sort of still am” he said in a cocky tone.
Jan-Bart paused and looked at him. “That wasn’t a compliment”.
Andrew sighed and gave up the argument. There was no getting away from the fact that he was no where near as experienced with life as Jan-Bart. “Well at least we got 12 points this round” he said after a while.
“Yeah” said Jan-Bart, having calmed down. “It was good going. And you nailed those switchback corners”
“Thanks” he replied.
Team squabbles aside, Andrew and Jan-Bart had become good friends over these past few days, and they were pushing this little jacked-up track car further than they’d ever anticipated.
3 Likes
Nooooooo… well it was sweet while it lasted
3 Likes
“We weren’t last!” Brian yelled, giving the dashboard a firm slap, then immediately regretting it as mud, which had gotten in through the defrosting vents, splattered around the interior of the Demon.
“Of course we weren’t, Brian. Our car just happened to be in better shape, even with the lifter tick and the rattles in the gearbox. That, and you know exactly what needs to be fixed now. We’ve actually got repair time to do this, let’s make the most of it.” John gave Brian the lightly-pointed look, the one he used when he was being serious. “So, let’s recap, what’s wrong with her?”
Brian looked contemplative for a few moments, before saying, “Well, she’ll need new head gaskets, and that clicky-ticky sounds like a broken exhaust valve. Smokin’ bad, too. That’s oil. Prob’ly needs a rebuild at this point. And we found out there’s no 40 weight left. Thirsty bitch.”
John chuckled. It wasn’t often he got to hear Brian swear, and yet this rally was bringing out that side of him. “Well, that’s to be expected. We’ve never done a rally before, and this V12 stuff’s pretty new to us. Wonder why they banned V8’s and not V12’s there?”
Brian gave a light grin. “Probably because we didn’t go driving through there at full-fuckin’-throttle with the Screamin’ Demon until now. Bet they’ll make everyone in Turul drive inline 3’s now.”
“Well, if they make another of these rally races and they’ve banned V12’s and V8’s, maybe we’ll enter an inline 3. Do something my way, the Storm way, put a 4 liter inline 3 in a car and shake-rattle-and-roll our way around the track.”
“Just as long as I’m not stuck maintaining it, John, I’ll be fine with that.”
“Why? It’s three cylinders. 12 valves at the worst.”
“Yeah, and you’re talking making it bigger than the Demon, and that’s even if they’ll let us put that big an engine in the car. Remember, 1800cc limit.”
“Well, that just fucked the bucket. That explains why we’re not winning. We don’t have our 4 liter V8 with us. That’d be a real ringer. Nothing would touch us then.”
“John, if we were allowed our 4 liter V8, then everyone else would have brought them. And we’d still get screwed because neither of us know how to tune a car for rally racing. I didn’t know it was this much dirt. I mean, there’s filth in this car we’ll never get out, I’ve got mud in my ass crack, and we’ve still got that shredded spare tire to fix or we’ll be driving on a rim when we blow the next one.”
John chuckled and waited a few moments for dramatic effect, then said, “She couldn’t handle any worse with four flat tires, Brian.”
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Wow, the first sprint where the H.A. doesn’t end up dead last.
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@abg7 pulls yet another clean stage and takes the victory with a solid lead.
@Faintingh also has a problem free stage, but the base time is a touch slower (in part due to fatigue) and an extra fuel stop costs another few minutes.
@4LGE could have been gunning for second place in this one, looking at the raw time, but a crash 710km in adds 17 minutes of digging, checking and getting back into the groove to the clock.
@phale appears to have shaken the curse of tiredom and crashes, but loses a bit of time to the engine (bottom end, 95km in) and the suspension (260km in) needing attention during the stage. A solid raw time and very strong economy still bring in 4th place points.
@oppositelock, in spite of a red-hued raw time and relatively high fuel consumption, takes fifth place thanks to a clean drive and the lack of technical troubles.
@DeusExMackia has to attend to the fuel system on the 290th (muddy) kilometre of the leg. Fuel consumption in kg is second lowest for the stage, but four stops are needed to fill the tank - the last one less than 10km from the finish line.
@stensen shows the second best raw time, but the Wiseman’s suspension does not seem to like the mud one bit. Two stops are needed at 295 and 705km to declog the swingy bits.
@raduST has trouble with the exhaust system 70km from the start. Seven fuel stops and 314.6kg of fuel make this the third thirstiest car to take to the road this stage.
@AirJordan’s crew starts the stage tired after rebuilding the car overnight. They manage to avoid crashes, but tiredom is reflected in the time and fuel system hiccups at 285km cost some more.
@Der_Bayer has the best raw time, but suspension troubles at 70km and an unplanned jaunt offroad at 470km where snow becomes gravel cost a lot of time and leave the car’s reliability just outside the penalty threshold.
@thecarlover has a crash at 750km. The damage is not too severe, but with 36 minutes lost the event may have cost H.A. a podium finish.
@lysambrias’ team has an altercation with a tree on the side of the road at 650km into the race. It seems in this instance the tree won, because the Cascadia crosses the finish line with severe signs of wear.
@Madrias’ team also starts tired after repair works. At 195km into the race, sliding through a tight corner, a tree branch tears loose the rear spoiler. About ten minutes are lost getting underway. 795km in, the engine also requires attention. In spite of tiredom, the team manages to drive a clean race all the way to the 825 mark, just 20km from the finish when they spin off the treacherous mud into a ditch, and lose almost 45 minutes getting out.
@koolkei’s team begins the race with a crash just 25km from the start. The drivers hit exhaustion five km before Madrias’ crew, in spite of starting out rested, but manage to avoid further mistakes. At 785km in, a stop is needed to declog mud from the exhaust system.
Both pace cars crash and thus fail to show a strong pace. The Gnoo dents a fender on a rock just 10km in and the crew need to hammer it away from the tire, only to meet a bigger rock at the 560km mark. Meanwhile the Howler goes off track on the final 5km of the stage with the finish line practically in sight (having also needed to stop and mend the loose engine latch 335km in).
10 Likes
It was well beyond the half-way point in this competition now, and Andrew and Jan-Bart were really starting to get into the swing of things. Having had such a poor few rounds, both the guys (and indeed the whole team) had been hesitant to start celebrating. However, now, there could be no doubt that something was going right. This car, that shouldn’t even be doing as well as it was, was proving itself.
“I’m not going to lie” said Andrew, as they sat idle in the car, having just finished the stint, “This still doesn’t feel like a rally car”.
“I know what you mean” replied Jan-Bart, busying himself with some calculations “But, there’s a whole load of data that we’ll be able to send back to HQ”.
Silence fell. Andrew stared ahead.
“You know” he suddenly said, “I’m really glad you’re my team mate”.
Jan-Bart paused and looked up from his notepad. He contemplated what Andrew had just said. “Yeah. Me too”.
“You just seem to know what you’re doing, I guess” said Andrew, still staring into the distance. “I’ve got a long way to go in terms of learning how a car works.”
“But you can sure well drive” said Jan-Bart, the confidence in his tone making Andrew happy. “You’re seriously promising as a rally driver. And you still have a long way to go.”
Andrew smiled. He didn’t even have any idea how far he was going to make it as a rally driver; the victories he would eventually be getting in the next few years were but a mere day-dream to him.
4 Likes
Frank Harper confessed after winning the fourth endurance stage: “Our car, as it is right now, is too specialized to win the whole rally overall; however, in an all-endurance event, it would be more likely to win outright, while on the other hand, it would be outclassed in a pure sprint rally. Our stage wins should lead to improved sales for our roadgoing model, though.”
2 Likes
welp it has happened again.
Around 195km into the race.
BLAM!
“The fuck was that?”
“Spoiler!”
“Drive without it!”
“Can’t, Brian. It’s the only thing keeping us on the track.”
“Well, we can’t bloody fix it proper out here.”
“Chewing gum and duct tape. We’ll patch it in place. Hopefully we didn’t fuck up the mountings when we tore it loose.”
5 minutes later
“And just when I was wondering why you bothered bringing gum and tape. That’ll teach me to wonder why you’ve added strange things to the car.”
“Yeah, except this thing’s not bringing us any luck.” John said, as he unwound the air freshener from the rear view mirror and threw it in the dirt. “Just misfortune. We keep crashing the car, or we can’t get enough rest because we had to fix the car.”
Around 795km into the race
tick tick tick tick tickticktickticktickticktickticktick
“John! The valves are making that awful sound again. We’ve gotta stop and fix it. Or at least stop to shut it up.”
“Got it. Better to stop now than to blow the engine.”
“I’m going to be mean and pull the valve covers, dump a bit o’ 90 weight gear lube up in there. Should take about 5 minutes normally, so I’m asking for ten.”
“Better 10 minutes than three hours spent trying to rebuild it on the side of the track.”
About 2 minutes later
“Why the fuck? There’s a shop rag in our oil fill. John, did you change the oil or something, because I wouldn’t do that.”
“No, because I was busy fixing the damage the shredded tire did when we tried to drive on it.”
“Great. Then we got sabotaged again.”
“Check the dip stick, see what we’ve got.”
“Yuck! It’s full of coolant! Okay, we’re dumping the oil and starting fresh. And I’m still gonna pack the valves with gear lube. At least they’ll be happy.”
Somewhere around 5 minutes and an emergency oil change without a catch pan later.
“Think they’ll care about the 10 quarts of oil we just left there?”
“Probably, but what other choice did we have? Someone punched a bunch of holes in our catch pan with a screwdriver. Plus, it’s oil. It came from the ground anyway. Who honestly cares that we dropped 10 quarts.”
“Yeah, but our coolant isn’t just water, either.”
“Didn’t look like what happens when our coolant gets mixed with oil. Someone else gave us a little top-up with the wrong stuff, tried to fuck up the engine.”
“Waste of their time, it’s not like we could do much worse.”
“True, John.”
825km in, 20km from the finish.
“Oh, shit! Spoiler’s loose again, we’ll have to…”
SPLUNCH!
“…Digging the car out of the mud isn’t what I had in mind.”
“Think it’d be quicker to walk the last 12 or so miles, John?”
“Just about, but then we’d still have to call for a tow truck, they’d undoubtedly damage a bunch of shit, and we’d spend the entire night fixing the car with a broken radiator because they ‘found it like that’ on the side of the road. With any luck, we’ll be able to get the car out of this crap in less than an hour and be back on the way.”
“So much for getting rid of the bad luck charm.”
“To be fair, that gum-and-tape solution wasn’t going to hold up much longer, Brian. I’m surprised it made it this far, some 400 miles later, before starting to give up. You use the tape, I’ll try to get the wooden boards under the rear tires.”
“That involves using the trunk, right?”
“Well, fuck. We’ve already got to reattach the spoiler anyway. Cut the tape away from the trunk so we can get our supplies, wheel the car onto the road, then stick the spoiler back down.”
“So what’s the plan in the pits after this, John?”
“We find whoever put coolant in our oil and give them a bleach-and-sand cocktail in theirs. No more Mr. Nice Guy. We catch someone, we’ll put them in the fucking trees. And I’m driving with the fuckin’ off road lights on from now on.”
6 Likes
Yaaay I finally have a picture 
1 Like
Congratulations to @AirJordan, @RaduST and @phale!
I’ve put Sprints 5 and 6 up in the sharing thread.
8 Likes
That was a very close sprint stage - the top two were less than a second apart! Why can’t all modern-day real-life rallies be as close as this?
I actually had no chance of winning this sprint, but I was kept on tenterhooks about the results all the way to the end of this stage!
2 Likes
An interview with Storm Automotive’s team, the Raceworks Division, after the 5th sprint.
Interviewer: “With how powerful your car is, are you surprised at how poorly it seems to be doing overall?”
John Storm: “No, not really. Neither myself nor my partner Brian have ever run a rally race. We had no idea what we were getting into, and this much power seems to cause more trouble than we anticipated.”
Brian Shade: “As John said, 200 horsepower to the rear wheels on dirt is disaster on every curve. We’ve got nearly twice the power of the least-powerful car in the rally, and yet it’s beating us at everything.”
I: “So, what’s the deal with running with the off-road lights on this stage? Your team hasn’t seemed to use them before.”
J: “Let’s just say that we’re trying something new.”
B: “We’re seeing if lack of visibility was why we kept wrecking the car.”
I: “I see the spoiler on the car is held on by tape and, what is this sticky pink stuff?”
B: “That’s chewing gum.”
I: “I see. Why?”
J: “Field repairs after an incident early in the last endurance stage. That’s three packs of Bubble Trouble, two rolls of heat-resistant tape, and half a pack of Min-T-Fresh. Which, mind you, doesn’t taste so minty or fresh with a helping of dirt.”
I: “What’s with all the tools in the car?”
B: “I’ve had the valve covers off the car on the track. The Demon, that’s the car, is a maintenance pit at the best of times. Even less reliable when crashed, dumped in the mud, or sabotaged.”
I: “Sabotaged?”
J: “Coolant in the oil. Missing oil cans, catch pan full of holes.”
B: “Flat spare tire.”
I: “We’ve heard that many competitors have also been sabotaged. Any idea who might’ve done it?”
B: “Probably the team with the weakest car. Sabotage everyone else, make it seem like they’re better.”
J: “Alternatively, a team that’s run the most flawless races so far. Whenever people are being sabotaged, look to those who don’t get hit to find your culprits.”
I: “So, what’s the plan for the next Endurance stage?”
J: “Fix the spoiler, first, and then we’re going to drive a good clean race.”
B: “Exactly. No point in taking unnecessary damage if we can avoid it.”
I: "Well, that’s Storm Raceworks Division. Two guys who never saw a rally, but decided it’d be fun.
Once the interviewer was well out of earshot, Brian spoke up. “John, are you serious about that clean race?”
“Fuck no. I get the chance, I’m putting someone in the fuckin’ trees. Got more of that 90 weight to pack the valves with?”
“Yeah. She’ll need it, the oil galleries are full of shit.”
“Good. Guard it well, because we’ll need it. That, and we’ll need to find a safe place to make a cocktail for someone else’s car. Don’t get fuckin’ caught, and don’t fuck with the pace cars this time, Brian.”
5 Likes
Wohooo on top again and another beautiful paper.
It looks like fight for the first place is out of my reach with only one sprint and a lot of endurance still to go.
3 Likes
“I still think we’ll be 10th overall” said Andrew “Though you never know, this car has surprised us a number of times”
“Mmm” replied Jan-Bart, contemplating something. “I mean, 9th would be fantastic, but it would require Sikora to cock-up big time”.
“Well, look at their points. They haven’t had the most consistent run”. Andrew paused. “But then again, we haven’t exactly been raking in the points”
Jan-Bart sighed a little. “Could be worse. And hey, there’s still Nutsoring to come”.
“And this is a track car at heart. I think our chances are good there” said Andrew, his face showing a confident expression.
6 Likes
@abg7 continues in form for the endurance stages. The best raw time of the group comes thanks to a combination of Medium tires on relatively good roads and excellent comfort ratings. A jump on the 75th kilometre sees a door latch break and 13 minutes are lost rigging it closed… But there’s still a solid lead at the end.
@DeusExMackia claims second place with his little racer. There is a scare on the 215th kilometre with loud noises coming from the front of the car, but it proves to be just a small rock rattling about. 3 minutes are lost inspecting, leaving about a minute and a half of lead in front of third place.
@4LGE runs a perfectly clean race. In spite of starting tired, the car’s good comfort stats mean the drivers still have some juice left when they finish. With a slightly better fuel economy, the Tare may have been able to threaten second place - but 16 points is nothing to shake a stick at.
@Der_Bayer’s crew are the fourth most tired team to start, but keep a good pace nonetheless. Minor troubles with the engine cost 5 minutes at the 1030km mark. Third is left a bit too far to challenge and there is a fairly good 3.5 minute lead to Wiseman.
@stensen, starting rested, posts the second fastest raw time, but is thoroughly let down by technical niggles and, to a lesser degree, fuel economy. 445km in, the bonnet latch undoes itself in a rough corner. The speed is thankfully slow enough that it stays intact and 2.5 minutes later (after choice words and a good slamming perhaps) the car continues. Troubles with the chassis cost 16 minutes at the 595km mark and finally, just 20km from the end, the bonnet lets go again.
@AirJordan has to settle for sixth place after starting tired and having repeated engine problems along the way. Stops are needed at 560 and 855km of the race.
@phale is in a good position to give AirJordan a fight for double digit points. Hard tires don’t give quite enough bite, though, and a long stop to fiddle with the suspension at 635km leaves Team Adenine in seventh.
@RaduST has the right rubber for the road and shows the third best raw time, but almost twenty three minutes refueling and technical difficulties take their toll. The team goes wide in a corner 90km in and cracks the front splitter. This comes back to haunt them at 1010km when the whole front bumper assembly comes loose, shreds the left rear tire and gets thoroughly wedged in/around the wheel well. A stop for the engine at 705km also costs time.
@Madrias starts very tired, and ends up going two thirds of the way completely exhausted. In spite of this, they keep it together and drive a clean stage. The fuel economy of the car is comparable to that of RaduST’s and time lost on tires is made up by reliability. In the end only 40 seconds separate the team from Apulum.
@thecarlover goes off the road on a patch of wet leaves at 295km. Though the damage done is not too severe, there is still a long way to go and the car finishes a bit under the weather due to decay. Regardless, the second best economy figures and solid driving bring home a couple of points.
@Faintingh takes the final point after a minor crash at 615km and repeated technical troubles. The Colibri’s suspension needs fixing at 135 and 765km of the stage and there’s trouble with the drivetrain at 430km in.
@lysambrias’ team is the most tired pair to start the race. Their hard lfe is made harder 130km in by a sneaky branch on the inside of the turn coming through and getting stuck in the windscreen on the passenger side. The team has to stop and wrangle it loose, but jumps and rattles spray safety glass everywhere and the cracks spread to inhibit visibility, so they have to stop at the side of the road at 245km and remove the rest of the windscreen.
@koolkei’s car unfortunately proves difficult to control and the tired driver is unable to stop it from going for a jaunt in the underbush at the 270km mark. As the crash happens fairly early in the race and causes enough damage to compromise even this car’s very high reliability, deterioration takes a heavy toll by the end. Exacerbated by the crash, regular technical troubles crop up the rest of the way (Body 595km, aero 925km and drivetrain 1005km).
@oppositelock’s luck is even worse than koolkei’s. The team has two crashes in quick succession at 295 and 310km, leaving the car veering badly to the right and crumpling plenty of bits that make it go. Less than 27 reliability is left after the second crash and it ticks down fast. A stream of troubles results (drivetrain 530km, chassis 655km, exhaust 680km, brakes 760km and drivetrain again at 940km) and the car finishes almost four hours after the leader - though remarkably, still under its own power.
Both pace car crews start very tired after the earlier crashes, but manage to drive clean races. The Howler drinks more than half a ton of fuel.
BRC holds on to the lead, but Wiseman and Smooth are very very close and neither Apulum nor Adenine are too far back to be discounted.
8 Likes
Jan-Bart blinked aggressively, doing everything in his power to stay awake and go through his notes. He was struggling to read them correctly at this point; the endurance run had really taken a toll on him.
He paused. “Screw this” he huffed, putting his clipboard on the dash. “You did really bloody well today Andrew”.
Silence. “Andrew?” he questioned, turning to his team mate.
Andrew was fast asleep, his heading bobbing slowly up and down and his hands barely holding onto the steering wheel.
Jan-Bart smiled. “I’ll go find out where we’re staying tonight”, and he got out of the car.
2 Likes