ADDRESS
PO Box 4304
Portland, OR
97208-4304
CONTACTS
rally@cascadesportscarclub.org
Saturday, May 13, 2023
By Monte and Victoria Saager
About the rally
The rally was about 100 miles from the start in northwest Portland to the ending location in Midway south of Hillsboro, and it took about three hours to complete. The odo check ended at the Tualatin River Wildlife Refuge in Sherwood. The route traveled through Chehalem, Scholls, and Laurel, and then up to Bald Peak Scenic Viewpoint for a break. The rally then continued through Gaston, to circumnavigate Henry Hagg Lake finally turning east through Blooming, and ended south of Hillsboro at Midway Firehouse Pizza.
What the rallymasters said
At the start of this season, we (Monte and Victoria Saager) knew we would be writing five of the ten rallies on this year’s schedule. We were confident we had four veteran rallymaster teams and one first-time rallymaster. By the time we completed the March rally, however, it became apparent we did not have a rallymaster for May. No worries. We can do that.
Our March rally had a few challenges, one in particular that resulted in a max leg score if you got it wrong, and all but two teams got it wrong. We were not popular that day. So we decided, given the short development time and our already overburdened schedule, that this rally would be easy, with straight forward unambiguous instructions.
This strategy was successful! No one wanted to kill the rallymasters. In fact, overall most teams did very well, staying on course and staying on time, with many single-digit leg scores and very low total scores.
What rallyists said
Had a blast and finally got a score under 100!!!
Feeling so great. First time under 100 points. First time "in the candy" in a long, long time!!! First time EVER scoring less than Simon. So, yeah, a very good day.
From David and JoAnn Gattman (with selfie): This is what Dumbasses look like. Currently on our way to Dealers Supply [the correct start location]. We’ve been to Lowe’s [the incorrect start location]. I’d say we’re bringing our A game, but clearly not so far. Enjoy the chuckle. Yikes! Can we already be failures? [Despite their mad rush to the start, Dave and JoAnn went on to finish fourth overall and second SOP, with four perfect zero legs and a score of 2 at the first checkpoint which they barely reached in time.]
From Dave and Kathy Sacry: We have a story from this rally:
History: After the first Richta-scored rally, I used my iPad (5th gen 2017 model Cellular enabled). It gets better reception than I had from my iPhone on our first rally, which skipped a checkpoint.
Scene: At the mid-break, Bald Peak, we both went to the outhouse, and when I got back, I checked the time on the iPad for when we needed to leave. The car was parked in the sun with the iPad facing up to the sky.
Moments of distress: After a few minutes I go to check the time again. My iPad was dark and had quit working! It had a red “Warning, iPad is too hot to operate”. We both jumped into the car and turned all our cooling apparatus on high, seats, vents, everything. We still had 9 minutes left in our break time. Could we cool it off or forfeit the rest of the rally?
I took it off of the charger (sometimes that creates heat as the battery charges). Putting it in front of the AC fans was the best we could do. It didn't help. We were still sitting in the sun. I finally figured out how to take the leather case off (I had put it on years ago and never took it off). That worked and my iPad came back to life without skipping a beat and we left on time!
I loved those fields. Simply beautiful!
Congratulate the top finishers!
First overall and first in the Equipped category is the team of Bob Morseburg and Cheri Eddy in Car #30 with a score of 25 over 17 scored legs, including seven zero leg scores and five ones. Very impressive.
Second overall and first in the SOP class is the team of Cody and Sabrina Garvin in Car #6 with a score of 40, including four zero leg scores and four ones, and all single-digit leg scores. Wow! That is quite an achievement SOP. Expect great things from this team. They are writing their first-ever rally for the June 10 Saturday Series. Don’t miss it!
Third overall and second in the Equipped category is the team of Robert Paxman and Chris Lane with a score of 68. This is another team to watch. They had one zero and six ones, and all but two leg scores were single-digit. This is the first season Chris has run with his dad, and they are already honing in on excellent scores.
Finishing second in the SOP class is the team of David and JoAnn Gattman in Car #1 with a score of 81.
Third SOP is the team of Torm Kelsey-Green and Kasey Klaus in Car #13 with a score of 82.
The team of Ryan Rink and Simon Levear in car #16 get Honorable Mention with a score of 84.
In first place in the Novice class is the team of Alex Castaneda and Eric Hanson in Car #15 with a score of 96.
Finishing second place Novice is the team of Chris Williams and Kenny Schroeder in Car #2.
The team of Matthew Svec and Antony McGovern finished third Novice.
Click here for the complete rundown
Click here for Rally Results
Current Series Standings
Saturday, April 15, 2023
By David and JoAnn Gattman
Saturday, March 18, 2023
By Monte and Victoria Saager
The weather was perfect for a rally – blue sky, temps in the 60s. Beautiful! Twenty-four teams entered the March 18 Saturday Series Rally. Four pre-paid entries sat this one out, and two registered entries canceled just before the rally started. So eighteen teams charged out of the starting gate. Before the odometer check section ended, one team headed home. Seventeen teams finished the course.
About the rally
The rally was about 90 miles from the start in northwest Portland to the ending location in Scappoose, and it took about three and a half hours to complete. The route traveled along Hwy 30, then climbed up Logie Trail to Skyline and down Rocky Point Road back to Hwy 30. Then out around the Scappoose Dike, up into the foothills of the Coast Range to Yankton for a break at the Yankton Store and Restaurant. After the break, the course wound through Warren and around the Scappoose Dike the other way, ending at Fultano’s Pizza in Scappoose. The clear weather afforded some spectacular views.
What the rallymasters said
Just about the time we were finishing course development and starting to measure, calculate and test drive our event, it snowed. And snowed. A lot at higher elevations. For a few days, we were homebound, snowed in. When we finally did venture forth, we skipped the high spots on our route, knowing that we weren’t equipped for driving in the snow. When we did get on those roads, we found snow piled deep along the roadsides, but road surfaces were mostly clear except in a couple of the very highest locations. With expected temperatures in the 60s, we knew the rally roads would be clear by rally day.
Most of the roads on the March rally route have been rally roads before, but we strung them together a little differently this time. We did use one road new to us – Hankins Road – which connected west St. Helens to the Yankton area. And we used the Scappoose dike roads in both directions, first at the beginning of the rally and then again at the end.
Fourteen of the 17 scored legs were tour-like with no intended deception. There were three simple challenges. The first challenge involved a forced turn in Leg 12. Two teams navigated this challenge correctly, one of whom zeroed the leg. For all others, it was a very costly max. You are traveling on Smith Road looking for this instruction: L at “GENSMAN” (go left at a sign reading Gensman). You encounter a sign that identifies a sideroad on the left as Gensman. The road straight ahead is signed no outlet.
Since a road marked no outlet is not a valid rally road, there is no intersection here. Since you must be at an intersection to take the action L, you cannot execute the instruction L at “GENSMAN” here. You are forced left here (it’s the only way you can go) and you continue looking for a place to execute the instruction L at “GENSMAN”. And of course there is another sign reading Gensman a short way down the road at an intersection identifying a sideroad to the left as Dart Creek. This is where you execute the instruction L at “GENSMAN”. So you take Dart Creek, wind around a loop that takes you full circle, where this time you go straight at the Dart Creek sideroad and continue on.
Those who took the shortcut (used the instruction at the no outlet) reached Checkpoint 12 about 8 minutes early. As some consolation, they got an extra 8 minutes at the break at the Yankton Store.
The second challenge was in Leg 17. A route instruction directed you to CAST 35 for 1 minute then CAST 25. The next route instruction was L on CASCADE VIEW. Cascade View is a loop with two roads with the same name entering the neighborhood. If you accurately averaged 35 mph for 1 minute, you would drive past the first Cascade View entrance and go left on the second one. If you weren’t so accurate, you would take the first entrance. In either case, teams going around this loop in either direction went past Checkpoint 17. However, those who took the first entrance reached the checkpoint early, earning penalty points. Most SOP teams and a couple Novices got this one right.
The last challenge was a note inviting you to PAUSE 20 seconds at a sign with a deer on it. This note was in effect the last 14 miles of the rally. You had to continue to execute the NRIs while keeping an eye out for this deer sign. Just before the miles ran out, a deer sign appeared along the rally route. Unfortunately, the sign you were looking for had one deer while the sign along the route had two deer. The note and its pause were never used. Those who paused at that wrong sign earned penalty points on Leg 23.
What ralliers said
Nice baby deer. Reminds me of ducklings. [You had to be there.]
Thanks for a great event!
Was a fun day, thanks for the route!
Thanks for holding the exciting event.
Great job as always!
Exchange with a rally team, after no app controls were being reported from this team:
Team: Do you have us now? We were signed in to the April rally. We’re in the March rally now.
Us: Oh, that’s what happened. How were your scores in April?
Team: Nonexistent.
Congratulate the top finishers
First overall and first in the Unlimited class is the team of Bob Morseburg and Cheri Eddy in Car #30 with a score of 11 over 17 scored legs. Wow!
Second overall and first in the SOP class is the team of Ryan Rink and Simon Levear in Car #14 with a score of 91. The top two finishers were the only teams to correctly navigate the “Gensman” trap in Leg 12. In third place overall and second SOP is the team of Cody and Sabrina Garvin in Car #6 with a score of 120. The David and JoAnn Gattman team followed closely with a score of 126 to finish third SOP.
First-time ralliers Perla Zhu and Jacky Jing in Car #23 finished in first place in the Novice Class. Second Novice is the team of Hallie and Joseph Edge in Car #11. Steve Gieske and David Finch in Car #22 finished third Novice.
Congratulations to all!
Click here for the complete rundown
Saturday, February 18
By Monte and Victoria Saager
The morning of the Rally School Rally was overcast. The skies were grey, but the pavement was dry. Great road rally weather. Cascade’s first rally of the 2023 season attracted 28 entries, including 11 first-timer teams.
After reviewing their assigned homework, teams gathered at a Friday evening Zoom meeting for a rally school review of rally rules, procedures and protocols. Questions were answered to prepare for the practice rally on Saturday morning.
About the rally
The rally course was about 85 miles from the start in northwest Portland to the ending location in Forest Grove, and it took about three and a half hours to complete. The route traveled through Washington Park, along Skyline and into Washington County, on roads used for Cascade road rally for decades – West Union, Helvetia, Jackson Quarry. The route then made its way down Mason Hill and into North Plains for a mid-rally break, ending at the Jessie Mays Community Park.
After the break the course headed out Pumpkin Ridge, through Roy, up Clapshaw Hill and down Hillside, through Verboort, and on to the ending location at the Prime Time in Forest Grove. Several teams met up at the restaurant and shared stories, some true we suppose. Some teams went from the end of the rally to Mike Nagle’s Celebration of Life.
What ralliers said
From the rally winners, David and JoAnn Gattman: This was a fairly easy straightforward rally, but did give exposure to ITIS, Notes, and generally reset the mind to get rally season officially started.
From second SOP, Russ and Kate Sherrell: Great roads, as usual. Good challenges without being so “trappy” that we felt like we couldn’t do it. It was a great start to the year. We’re really looking forward to learning to rally together more consistently. Rally school was a good reminder of the basic rally rules, and the differences between CSCC rules and other rallies we participated in when first learning to rally.
From the first place Novice team, father and son duo Jeff and Nicholas Crews: Thanks for the fun event. I was going to wait a bit to see if my son wanted to do another one, but he suggested we do it again as we were driving home, so we will hopefully attend more!
From third Novice, father and daughter Isaac and Scout Miller: We were on the way home when the email came in with the results. We rolled the windows down while stuck on Hwy26 and started whooping and hollering. It was pretty exciting and unexpected.
From other ralliers:
Thank you for all of the work put into keeping this sport alive and encouraging new participants. It was really great to see so many new (to us at least) faces. Looking forward to the next one!
Thanks for offering the rally school -- it's obvious how much work goes into it, and we appreciated the opportunity to participate!
The rally was awesome and exceeded our expectations! We really appreciate all the hard work that must go into creating a rally course and putting together the notes and instructions. The rally course had a perfect balance of straightforward and challenging -- it kept us engaged but never so frustrated that we wanted to throw in the towel.
We like solving puzzles, learning new skills, driving, and exploring new areas -- the rally offered all these and much more! We enjoyed talking with the other teams at the start location -- everyone was so friendly!
The school taught us everything we needed to know to run our first rally together. The most helpful aspect was probably learning how to understand and work with the route instructions and rallymaster notes (via all the handouts and the Zoom meeting) -- it's a whole new language that would have been a real struggle to learn any other way.
What the rallymasters said
Some of this event may have seemed familiar. We reused parts of an event we put on a couple of years ago. Since rally school is a teaching opportunity, we retained some “tried and true” rally challenges.
A number switch (numbered route instructions printed out of numerical order) had some cars traveling through a rural neighborhood in one direction, while other cars went the opposite way, providing opportunity for rally cars to wave and wonder...are we off course or are they?
A spelling trap offered another opportunity for some teams to go one way while the others took a different route. Everyone rejoined a common route, with those who didn’t notice the spelling error getting a few extra penalty points.
Two instructions offered a lesson in defined terms vs signs. Both opportunities occurred at railroad crossings:
PAUSE 15 seconds at STOP ITIS
PAUSE 15 seconds at “STOP” ITIS
In the first case, STOP is a defined term, so you’re looking to pause at an intersection with a legal highway stop sign at which the contestant must stop. Since an intersection is defined as a crossing of rally roads at which the contestant could proceed in more than one direction, and since no such intersection exists at the railroad crossing, the correct action is to skip this ITIS instruction and its pause. In the second case, you’re looking to pause at a sign that reads stop. There is clearly a stop sign at the railroad crossing, so the correct action is to do the pause there and not skip the ITIS instruction.
Two notes were included. One was used only by cars who fell for the number switch. The other note was a sign hunt to pause every time you saw a particular sign. The note was introduced near the end of the rally and was correctly used three times.
Congratulate the winners
There are no prizes for this practice rally, but we do recognize winners. Fame and glory!
First overall and first in the SOP class was the team of David and JoAnn Gattman with a score of 118. With just 3 more points, second overall and second SOP was Russ and Kate Sherrell with 121 points. Lee and Patricia Nielsen finished third overall and third SOP with 178 points.
All three of the top finishing Novice teams were first-time Cascade ralliers. First Novice with a score of 233 was the father/son team of Jeff and Nicholas Crews. Second Novice was the team of Gene and Sandy Buzzelli with a score of 244. Finishing third Novice was the father/daughter team of Isaac and Scout Miller with 321.
Congratulations to all the rally school rally teams! You are all winners!
Click here for the complete rundown
Click here for Rally Results
Current Series Standings
ADDRESS
PO Box 4304
Portland, OR
97208-4304
CONTACTS
rally@cascadesportscarclub.org