Raindrop Rally 2004

Presented by Rainier Auto Sports Club

Ron Sorem © 2004

Silverdale, Washington.  April 18, 2004.  The view from 8 minutes back, beginning at the beautiful but breezy Silverdale Waterfront Park. 

What would be Raindrop without rain?  We nearly found out…  About a mile into the odo check the rally passed under a thundercloud and a rain-hail mix for 4.5 miles on the freeway.  Exit the freeway and end the rain, transition into brilliant blue skies with a few puffy white cumulus here and there for contrast.  The odo check ended at the Undersea Warfare Museum in Keyport, next to the sail of retired US submarine number 637.  The sail (conning tower) is impressive, about two car lengths long, maybe two car lengths tall, and maybe a whole car width wide.  Very slippery in the water and surreal on land.

Just under ten miles later, in just over 18 minutes, Section One is behind us.  We have a one second penalty (we think we have zero).  We are fairly happy so far.  The Transit to the Peninsula is next, and as we approach the freeway interchange we had left earlier, there are wet roads to the South, dry roads to the North.  Raindrop goes North, to cross the Hood Canal Floating Bridge and enter the Olympic Peninsula where no rally as gone before, well… not for decades.

  Rallymaster Steve Willey put together an out of the way route through Port Ludlow, Mats Mats Bay (where checkpoint worker Jim Hogan could have sailed from Shilshole to the boat moorage just a few feet behind him—although it would have limited his mobility).  Continuing past Oak Bay, the Indian Island Naval Munitions Depot, and onto Marrowstone Island to our first of many well scheduled breaks with views, at Fort Flagler State Park.  Fort Flagler is one of several gunnery or mortar batteries in the area built to defend the entrance to Puget Sound from enemy warships a long time ago.  The rest stop overlooks Port Townsend, west to the historic city of the same name.

Exiting Fort Flagler and Marrowstone and Indian islands, Raindrop re-enters the North American continent to explore more of the peninsula.  Briskly past Anderson Road, Lake, and State Park in that order.  Speed 49, into Acute Right, speed 19, on a narrow twisting downhill, into a checkpoint.  Loads of fun for drivers; loads of instructions in short miles for navigators.  Probably several folks early at this one on the shores of Discovery Bay!  Out onto Hwy 20 and 101-south, then a twisty little section through farmland to 101-north toward Sequim. 

So far there have been sightings of bison, cows, very wooly sheep, llamas, trolls, big trolls, and a castle.  Now a route book caution for deer (one of which wandered across our route just on cue).  Where does Rainier find these things?  Eric Horst was introduced as the “Worker Wrangler” but no one took credit for deer wrangler, or “Beast Master”.  Raindrop would later get reports of a covey of quail, and at least one Ring-necked Pheasant.

A scenic tour of Diamond Point followed, with a very well hidden checkpoint, including a phantom decoy checkpoint car.  Parked in the control’s logical spot, the decoy caused check-pointer Mark Nolte to “hide in plain sight”.  I’m not certain yet as to whether anyone saw him, but he saw all of us.  Back onto the Olympic Loop Highway, halfway home, skirting the south end of Discovery Bay one more time, with surprisingly sparse traffic for such a sunny Sunday afternoon.

The last TSD (timed section) begins at speed 54, dropping to 39 for a short distance then up to 49 for the long and winding road past Dabob Bay, Camp Discovery, Thorndyke Bay, South Point, and Shine.  We think we have all zeroes (we will be penalized two seconds).  We are pretty happy.

The last two sections are Transits, one ending with a Main Time Control with a declared arrival time (everyone who checks in early or on-time is awarded a zero).  More cows, some goats, ostriches, and with “one lump or two”, a pair of humpty backed camels.  But sadly no unicorns... 

To the finish and awards in Poulsbo.  A 4-hour rally, 32 cars, 19 scored controls, covering 164 miles.

Accommodations for the finish party were “comfy” but afforded excellent fare presented by comely lasses, and camaraderie was great, new friends and old, teens and retirees.  Dan Comden and Marvin Crippen brought scoring forth in a timely manner, putting a pleasant cap on a fun rally.

“Something that never happens” on a Rainier event is a tie score…  We (Ron Sorem and Max Vaysburd, in car 8) were looking at First Unlimited, in the Turbo Legacy  …until Pat Biggar and Jack Heppes, in the blue WRX wagon, car 4, pointed out a ten-minute error on their score, and catapulted right onto our score… a tie!   After a brief discussion, a quick solution:  The tiebreaker was chosen as the greater number of zeroes…  Congratulations Pat and Jack with 37 points, ten zeroes-- only 5 seconds behind First Overall/First Equipped, Esko Mannisto and Peter Mannisto in their white WRX wagon, car 17, with 32 points.  This is the second year in a row that Raindrop has been won by Equipped Class, over the rally computer Unlimited Class.  First SOP, seat-of-pants, no equipment at all, went to Paul Cho and Greg Leege in their 2003 GTI.  First Master SOP, a new NWRC class for the touring championship series, that allows the use of an auxiliary odometer, was won by the masters in Car 1, John Humphrey and Derris Humphrey in their Volvo S60, running strictly SOP without the additional odo.  First Novice, out of eight cars in the class, went to Kenneth Lindsey and Michel Lindsey in their 2003 350Z.  Finally, Vintage was won by Dan Morley and Quinn Morley in an orange 1974 SAAB Sonett 2, complete with “For Sale” sign.  A proven rally winner!

Raindrop was well planned, well attended, well reviewed, and maintained

its growing reputation as an excellent tour in the Pacific Northwest.

Full results, detailed scores, and stories at www.RainierAutoSports.com

Spend some time traveling around the site enjoying NW rally lore.