My Rim Job experience

[Dynobyte]

Hello everyone I would like to share my memories of the rim job I had the last few days. My captain was Justin and we worked the Liebre-Maxwell stage and it was really neat because all the rally cars were sitting next to me idling and reving and the drivers were taunting each other constantly! I was parking cars on the edge of a cliff and sometimes people would drive up with open beers in their hands. At first I was angry then they said it was lite beer so I wasnt so mad after that.

Anyways there are so many stories about the past few days but I dont think any of us feel like typing novels about it so I will just tell you this one story:
bruce lee is a psycho!! if you ever own a hotel dont rent him a room, he will try to beat you down!!!!

I worked for 9 and half hours in the forest and desert for food and a t-shirt. I demand your respect and gratitude!! I also demand a good deal on coilovers.

In the end I would say this was unlike any other rim job I have ever had and a lot more dusty. But I am glad to have served the drivers and make things run smoothly and non-lethally. We had a new record of ZERO fatalities on my stages. It was a wonderful experience and now I understand a little more what rallying is and why those europeans are so nuts about it.

-solnaut

[SevenStyle]

my rim job experience? Oh my god.

[RacingBlue]

I attended the victory breakfast this AM (Sunday) Most all the drivers thanked the course works profusly! The event simply would not happen without you. You made it work. The much larger crowds and entries this year presented bigger problems. I understand Denise had over 300 volunteers this year to get it done! I hope all had a lot of fun and learned some more about rallying if you are new to it. What a neat bunch of people!

[LateApex]

yeah, I'm not sure how many i-clubbers worked the stages, but all the workers were great! Thanks for volunteering!

[Zahnster]

Working any rally is a special thing. You've got to have the right kind of lunacy to be a rally spectator without enough lunacy to actually drive or co-drive in a rally.

Granted, you lose almost all spectating oppurtunity in order to be closer to the cars than you can without driving or co-driving one yourself.

[GreyBeard]

Worked three stage finishes with Val - Had a great time, drivers all seemed to be having a great time, even when they broke. Watching cars flying in to the finish was a blast, and working the timing was a lot of fun. I highly recommend working as a way to watch the race, primarily because it allows you to interact with people with years if not decades of experience and stories about rallying. Many dedicated rally racers take a race off and volunteer as a way of giving back and furthering the sport. You get great training, it's not difficult, and you get a more in depth understanding of the event. It also gives you an opportunity to have breakfast with the drivers & teams.

I think the I-club was well represented in the volunteer crews, but more would be welcome as well. Our stages had just enough help to cover all the needs, it would have been nice to have extra people to rotate through (especially when nature called .

The scenery of the Rim is awesome - it's run through the Angeles National Forest, as picturesque and awesome as many of the locations we see on TV in the WRC. I got to drive the entire Liebre Mtn stage that we worked with Val and Steve. We had a blast staying up with Sue Robinson, our stage captain on the way to the stage finish. The dropoffs without any berms or railings were unforgetable and we commented how hairy the route must be at night. There were a couple of jumps and really really tight switchbacks (challenging when you're driving quickly in a longbed crewcab ) I had a visualization of a rally race in Palmdale as a flat desert road event which it definitely was not. We were up at about 6400 feet in pine trees, meadows with wild flowers, shear dropoffs, and breathtaking views during the day and starry nights.

I was real pleased to see an I-club sticker on the factory cars, but was concerned when I overhead a Subaru tech guy indicating being less than pleased that it was there. Something for all of us to remember as members - we need to represent the club well both on the board as well as in public.

Next local rally is Gorman on August 24, and the stage I worked is included in that event as well. The local races and organizers to contact can be found at http://www.scca.org/amateur/performa...dex.html#sopac

Other links to check out :

http://www.rimoftheworldrally.com
http://www.californiarallyseries.com
http://www.scca.org/amateur/performa...lly/index.html

I'll be posting a link to my pictures elsewhere as soon as I find my PC cable

Rally ho !!

Greybeard

Originally posted by solnaut
...In the end I would say this was unlike any other rim job I have ever had and a lot more dusty....

-solnaut

I was thinking...maybe instead of calling me a "burby rapscallion" (an insult for someone who doesn't know) and talking about you're dusty rim-job on I-CLUB, you should keep you're mouth closed.

[ldivinag]

so here's my story, after getting there on friday and finding that motel 6 dont allow check-ins until 2PM (!!!), i checked in with the staff. did i tell you i've never done this before?

there i find my captain and tells me that we are working the aliso stage on friday NIGHT and del (something) stage on saturday.

i also find that aliso, we're gonna be there late...

so i show up and we caravan to the aliso stage. while the first car wasnt scheduled to leave the start at 9PM, we get there at like 6:30PM.

so we setup banners and parking zones. it gets dark (and cold) and while guarding a NO PARKING zone, i hear the distinct POP, POP sound.

oh crap! here they come. sure enough, they come whizing by. a few more cars pass by and again, they go flying by. remember this is pitch dark and i'm about 100 yards from the trail so all i see is headlights... cool HIDs...

anyway, radio my captain and tells me that i can come back and SPECTATOR MARSHALL this one cool spot. the cars are like now just a few FEET from this elevated trail.

the second stage of this nite would run the cars again same direction. they start at like 11:30PM!!!!

this time, the factory cars come flying, now even louder with their BOVs, wastegates and anti lag noises now even LOUDER. if you've even been at a gun range and took off your hearing protector, you kinda get the idea...

by the lastcar of the nite, we start to tear down everything we just put up almost 6 hours ago. i talked to the driver of the 69 chevy blazer that rolled. cool blazer, btw.

i get back at casa motel 6 around 2AM after getting some food. i find out later that the chili dinner that was suppose to end at 1:30AM was still rocking. damn. missed just about all of fridays stuff...

saturday morning comes that DEL (something)stage. did i tell you we had to leave holiday inn by 8:30AM?!? SS8 wasnt schedule to begin until 12:30PM-ish...

anyway, boquet canyon is a cool drive. get to the place where it was end of SS8 and start of SS9.

again, tons of banners to put up for the sponsors. wait a couple hours. worked on tan and ate tons of dirt.

i get reassigned to spot where cars stop at end of SS8 and line up to start SS9. COOL!!!!! did i tell you my job was to point spectators to the correct walking trail????

anyway, first cars come around. did i tell you it was windy and DUSTY!!!! crap.

the first 3-5 cars are factory sponsored so they are fast, loud and... well very cool. the lovell car looked like he rolled. the right side body panels were crunched up...

so the afternoon goes like this. cars stop at the end the stage. then they cruise by me at slow speed to make a U-turn and line up.

now this woulda been killer if each time the cars passed me, the dust kicked up wouldnt BE ALL OVER ME.

there goes the idea of video taping part. i was just able to grab a few dig pixs when there was no car in sight and actually shot some pixs of lovell's engine. that dont look at all similar to mine...

anyway, by the time all the cars left, we again took down everything and cleaned up. i was too tired to check out the latter stages. i just wanted to get to my room, shower and grab some sleep.

drive back home on boquet canyon was so slow i had to let other cars pass me by. i was that tired.

i got back to my room, and showered and fell asleep. missed the subaru event that nite - overslept - but did catch the top 3 cars get up on the podium. that was cool.

would i do this again? sure. volunteering was a blast. the rally was a blast. next year, i will be better prepared.

for example, nite stages? it gets cold. very cold... dust? no wonder why the subaru package for the owners included a dust mask...

see ya next year...


leo d.

[smp291]

Originally posted by SevenStyle
my rim job experience? Oh my god.

My thoughts exactly...

[Coati]

Originally posted by Zahnster
Working any rally is a special thing. You've got to have the right kind of lunacy to be a rally spectator without enough lunacy to actually drive or co-drive in a rally.

Granted, you lose almost all spectating oppurtunity in order to be closer to the cars than you can without driving or co-driving one yourself.

Well, maybe not all spectating opportunities, but I did miss out on most everything at the Subaru tents (got my goody bag, though), missed the chance to ride in Petter's car, missed meeting him at the autographing times, and missed both Holiday Inn stages.

OTOH, I did make it into the charity rallysprint (got to ride in John Nelson's 1st-place-in-class 2.5RS In2Deep filmed it and says you can see my grin the whole time) right before we had to leave for Saturday's Spunky Canyon stage. If you got there before the crowds, this stage was worth visiting just for the drive in. Worked press area parking at first, but once the event started I was working a part of the course that had a great view of the cars coming through. Dust was pretty fierce on this stage, but where we were it wasn't nearly as bad as for the people on the other side of the canyon (Whitt).

Friday night I worked the Magic Mountain start, which was on tarmac. This was interesting as a lot of the drivers seemed to have their feet calibrated for dirt, so the uphill asphalt start made a lot of them bog at first. Then they were faced with a sharp hairpin left around a solid rock outcropping. The yellow Volvo oversteered around the hairpin, then his tires hooked up and he stuffed his front left corner right into the solid rock.

Also saw some good sunsets and awesome cars, and got to cheer on all the i-Clubbers participating in the rally. We had a great time, and I ran into Petter in the bar Saturday night, where (after a quick dash back to my car to retrieve it) he was happy to sign my helmet, so it all worked out.
Thanks, Subaru!

[Evaider]

Lets see... I almost got run over by a rally car at the magic mountain finish.. the guy was coming up from the road specators were taking. I was triyng to get him to stop thinking it was spectators car so he wouldnt hit one of the rally cars as it crossed the road. It wasnt until he was about 10 feet away that I realized it was a rally car I jumped out of the way, now WTH was he doing coming from that direction??

[lushboy]

It was quite an experience working at RIM.. and it was cold at night.. man.. 3 layers on top and 2 layers for legs and I was still cold.. granted it was 1am.. argh. And I've gotta say, working at the LAST stage for both nights SUCK! No food left.. missed all the partying.. cold and shivering.. only got one beer in the bin.. that's all it's left!

Though it was fun driving through the stages before and after the rally cars comes through.. get to see how badly the road gets chewed up. Leona Ridge was pretty rough.. so stinking narrow and water barrs galor! Grass Mountain was fun though! I did bottomed out 3 times going over them water barrs.. ack.. wasn't even going fast!

Hearing these rally cars coming around the mountain was indeed worth the time sitting at FTC waiting. Though the spectacular sounds of the Bronco rolling about 1/2 mile from FTC was something different.. Glad the Bronco was up and running again next day! Man, built Ford tough!

Glad to see so many rally cars up close in person.. Gotta say these rally drivers are pretty cool people.. Glad to have received some candy bags!

Lushboy

[WagonMonster]

I was gonna keep quiet about this, but I gotta say something.

They really need to be more honest to the volunteers about how much work it REALLY is (for example, we were freezing in the woods for 11 hours to work FTC for ONE Stage.) When I told them my Mom and I would work I was Very Clear that we didn't want to work the whole Rally and miss all the Spectating Opportunities, especially considering it was my Mom's first Rally. I told them this several times, but they still just signed us up to work the whole Rally. When my mom found out that she was gonna basically miss the whole Rally, she was PISSED, so I told them again that we were only going to work on Friday. Our Captian was very unpleasant about this, but he finally agreed that he would find other people to work for us on Saturday, and we got to Spectate on Saturday.

I also know several people who volunteered last year and didn't this year because they missed the whole Rally last year.

I understand the need for volunteers to make this thing work, and I certianly want to do my part to help, but if they continue to take advantage of the workers like they do, in a few years there's going to be no-one left to work this event.

Oh, and I didn't get my $20 for my room either!

[I am b]

I had a great time and apreciate all the hard work that was involved but................. for the rest of us that have been to a rally before know that this is not the greatest of all rally's in the way of organization. Don't mean to rip on them but it was pretty unorganized.

[WagonMonster]

Originally posted by blkwrxwgn
I had a great time and apreciate all the hard work that was involved but................. for the rest of us that have been to a rally before know that this is not the greatest of all rally's in the way of organization. Don't mean to rip on them but it was pretty unorganized.

Actually, having been to several rallies (Laughlin, Oregon Trail, Wild West, Treeline, Gorman.) Rim is one of the best organized rallies in the USA.

If we ever want to seriously attract the WRC, things are gonna have to get a LOT more professional.

[Jimmy S.]

Well this is my experiance,

after meeting a bunch of people at my house and waiting for hours on end for aaron, we watched the whole first 2 periods of the montreal / carolina playoff game. Supposidly aaron (i robot / solnaut) was going to arrive at 3 - 4 ish, well me, blkwrxwgn, gimmescoobysnacks, and doomequation waited till around 6 - 7ish for his laggy @$$. got some jack in the box and away we went.

so the drive up there was nice, almost getting pulled over by a cop, saw a billion wrx's....

so we arrive up there around 7:30 pm, caught the end of fridays holiday inn stage, drove to the mainteniance stage and watched as lovell drove in his rolled car...was pretty cool...

went back to try to check into the motel 6 but that wasnt happening...apparently brucelee changed our hotel reservations and they wouldnt let us in the room or anything....which was crap but whatever....

so we go chill with sid (gimmescoobysnacks) and were waiting for the big MOTEL 6 i-club party time but all you wussies SLEPT instead of drinking with us!!!!! boooooooo!!!!!

so we hiked over to the Holiday Inn once again to see wassup. After seeing a bunch of rally cars drive in to get their stuff signed, and finally meeting up with brucelee (who is a giant btw) we handed beers out to the passing drivers who accepted them whole heartedly

well, being only 12 at night we werent drunk enough yet and quite hungry so we decided to follow the drivers in to get some chili. With our fearless mod ryan shouting and waving us in, we grabbed some chili and free beer and sat down to munch on it. When in strolled subiegal (jamie) pointing at us and telling us we were the reason she didnt sleep at night.

(all these wes are me, solnaut / aaron, blkwrxwgn / aaron, gimmescoobysnacks / sid)

so we got drunk and watched ryan jump around and be drunk

so we got tired around 2:30 am and decided we needed to sleep. So away we went. well when we got there we got the surprise of a lifetime.

apparently brucelee and the hotel manager exchanged some words (cant post it here cause it will just be all ********) and she called the cops on him after he spit at her. well the cops came and opened the room so he could get his stuff and bone out but now we didnt have a room to sleep in. So we had to convince that lady that was pissed off to let us in the room. She finally let us in at about 3:30am and when we go in we see that brucelee had torn apart the room. There were no towels, no soap, no sheets, no pillows, everythign was on the floor and the beds were scattered everywhere. So we grab our sleeping bags and hit the sack.

We wake up the next day a bit hungover, eat some denny's, and say our goodbyes to sid and aaron. So me and the robot meet up with our captain and away we went to the stage. the road up was dirt and it was quite fun getting sideways on rocks and sand. I messed up my bumper a bit when i took a bump a bit to fast and tested my bumpstops eheheh (luckly didnt break anything)

so i spent the next 9 hours watching rally cars almost hit people and parked cars....also chasing people up a giant hill and having to force them back down into the spectator area....pulling kids off the track when they are trying to play dodge the rally car...and living off snickers the whole time.

so after the stage is all over we tear everything down and follow the spectator king down the hill to the last maintinance stage where we evesdropped on the subaru team meeting

so we drive back to the inn and have to find a place to sleep, something to eat etc etc.

so we find lateapex (todd) and he says we could chill at his pad for the night so problem one solved. we get directions and start looking for food. btw, we are covered from head to toe with dust, we had dirt in our eyes and were runing on about 4 hours of sleep. So we head to the drivers food room and crash it once again. grab some tacos and some beers and walk to the hotel bar where they have tables and what not.

so we walk in and who do we see? none other than solberg himself, we say sup and chow down. we boned out to lateapex's pad and chilled there for a bit...then who shows up? drunken ryan. he started giving tips upon tips to todd for about an hour....saying the same damn thing over and over and over till about 2am when we finally told him to **** and leave hehehe so everyone left, but me eli and aaron slept....we slept till around 10ish when i drove home...

took the fun route, boquet cyn, and showed off my superb heel toe and double clutching skilllzzzz

got home, showered, and slept till 6pm when i had to get up and play some hockey...

overall, i had a blast. I met so many people, they all found out im not a dick in real life...took 95 pictures which ill post someday....

great times!!!!

-SF

[LateApex]

When you say it was unorganized, in what way? On my side, it was quite smooth. I really felt for some of you workers on the night stages. I always did my best to be polite to all the workers I encountered. It is hard work, and I'm sorry to hear some of you were possibly taken advantage of, but you definitely were appreciated.

Will, you might bring that up with the Gibeault's next time you talk to them.

edit: some of you, I know, are new to rally(I am fairly new as well...), but it is a very hard sport to spectate. To know what truly is going on, you really need TV coverage or something. Otherwise, it's just watching cool cars drive by.(which isn't so bad.)

[Zahnster]

I'll have to chime in on the organization thing. As I heard some organizer type people discussing. It's not so important how well organized things are so much as how well organized things appear to be.

[Evaider]

I know what you mean wagon. I missed a lot of the stuff, all of the subaru hospatility events, dinner with my friends. The stage I was at saturday they were doing 2 runs by, I asked if I could go after the first round and my captain let me go (we had an excess of workers at that point) so I got to have dinner with my friends saturday. They should space out the workers more I think. If you work 2 days they should have you work the first half of the day one day and the second half the next day that way you can still see a lot the events. I didnt really get to see anything. I didnt get to see the start or finish both days.

[Jimmy S.]

read my previous post damnit....

-SF

[Zahnster]

I'll concur with Evaider on how little free time volunteers get.

A thought on organizational lackings: If cars parked at the east end of the road next to the hotel are going to be a problem, block off that road sometime earlier than a few hours before the cars are supposed to start racing through there. From where I was I couldn't be sure if they towed any cars and how many, but with proper setup, nobody should be able to be in the way.

[Jimmy S.]

hahahahaha



-SF

[Porsche914boxer4]

Add 10,100 to brucelee's member number and get Solid Force's.

Subtract brucelee's member number.

Add 1,000 to that 10,100.

Divide by 20.

Get 555.

Man, I am so clever!


Eli

[LateApex]

Originally posted by Porsche914boxer4
Add 10,100 to brucelee's member number and get Solid Force's.

Subtract brucelee's member number.

Add 1,000 to that 10,100.

Divide by 20.

Get 555.

Man, I am so clever!


Eli

weird... does that mean they were meant for each other?

[Jimmy S.]

no it means i ownZ him..........

-SF