Re: Wild West Pro Rally

[MICHAEL ZAMIKHOVSKY <mikez755@sprintmail.com>]

Mark Nelson wrote:
> 
> Hi All!
> 
> Well, I just got back from Washington tonight (yup did a nice 755 miles
> from Seattle to Reno in 10.5 hours), and thought I would post some of
> the things that happened.
> 
> I was only able to spectate Friday night, the first stage, due to time
> constraints, but it was interesting regardless.  An interesting note to
> Audi enthusiasts, was that the Sprongls were unable to make it to the
> event as they had planned.  They apparently did not have all the parts
> they needed for the car, and the weather was an issue coming from
> Toronto.  Needless to say I was rather disappointed, since he and
> Choinere were tied in points.
> 
> A couple of interesting notes on Carl Merrill's brand new '97 Escort
> Cosworth: in the first stage Friday night, he broke a front half shaft,
> crippling the car.  As a result, from the spectating position I was in
> (off of I-8 on the second Summit Lake Exit), Rui Brasil in his
> smooth-running 4KQ was only 30 seconds behind him, and was running quite
> fast.
> 
> In the second stage, Merrill broke a left rear suspension piece on his
> car, giving him a DNF for the rally.  An interesting tid-bit pertaining
> to this, was that on my way back home today, I surprisingly caught up
> with his car being towed back to Maine (now there's a long haul), just
> south of Olympia, and was behind him for a good 300 miles (or in some
> cases beside the car).  This was an unusual way of getting a very close
> look at an EXTREMELY fast and exotic rally car.  I didn't realize that
> he was out of the rally until I caught up with his car on the Freeway
> :-)
> 
> Anyone else out there have any other interesting info on the event?
> 
> Best Regards,
> 
> Mark Nelson
> ================================================================
> mnelson@brls.com
> SQA Engineer
> Borealis Technology Corp.
> Incline Village, Nevada
> http://www.brls.com
> 
> 1990 Audi "S2" Quattro (Building for SCCA Pro Rally)
> 
> Past Audis: 1987 5000CSTQ, 1987 5000CSTQW
> ================================================================Hi Mark ..
I can't wait to see it.

That must be one great car. I am scared to think of how much he paid for 
it. I heard somewhere that it is of World Rally Car spec, not GrA. 
The way to tell is WRC Fords no longer have that big double wing. They 
have a single wing on rear hatch. Ford has separate depatrment to service 
high budget privateers like Carl. The cars they get are slightly 
different than those Ford's builds for Carlos Saints and  Armin Shwarts.
I wounder if he actually had active front and center diffs. Ford still 
runs and sells Gr A cars for private entries. I wounder if he actually 
uses Ford's ability to adjust track width. It would be interesting to 
know what it does to drivability. 
I live in NJ and plan to run all Eastern events in my Toyota. Ski Sawmill 
divisional is first, than STPR and Main and selective Canadian events 
budget permitting.
Mike Z.