I know I'm running the risk of really boring everyone with too many blog posts, but it's therapeutic and helps me organize my thoughts a bit as the prep continues for our trip to 100 Acre Wood Rally in Salem, Missouri the end of next month.

As I mentioned in another post, we're relocating the battery to the rear seat of the rally car. This involves running new wires, removing old wires, extending wires, soldering, crimping, swearing etc. System upgrades seem deceptively easy when you're imagining them over your Life cereal in the morning, but the practical reality is often much, much different!

The engine has been torn down and it looks like our power issue is relate to bad rings. My engine man tells me that we rolled the edges of the rings and this is likely due to water in the engine. Some of you may recall we were excluded from Rallye Defi last year for max lateness after trying to fuel the rally car with 0 octane race water. That episode of bad fuel was the beginning of the end for those rings. We noticed the car getting progressively slower, and at New England Forest Rally we were significantly off the pace(although this made for a great scrap with Wyatt Knox).

So.....new rings coming from JE Piston in California. Turbo rebuild kit arrived today. Parts ordered from Subaru dealership. More electrical work on the rally car tonight, tires to mount this weekend. More work on the Sprinter service truck as well. You get the idea. The to-do list gets smaller, but then I sit down and realize it needs to get longer again.

Why expose this manic(and definitely dirty) side of rallying? For me(and most of you reading this), rally is a part of our day-to-day life. When we're not on event, we're either thinking about the next event or prepping for it. There is NO downtime for those of us who field a team over an entire season. It's a part of rallying that few see. Fans will see the X-Games and perhaps even see the rest of us out on a stage rally someplace in North America. Not many folks know how much time and effort it took to get us there.

Expectations about the season and the goals need to be laid out. "Let's race as often as we can and go like hell," is usually the LDR mantra. This is simple and intuitive, which I like. It's also the reality of the championship structure in North America and our geographical location. We can't contest the entire Rally America Championship. We can't contest the entire Canadian Rally Championship. Open Class Eastern Regional Champions three consecutive years....there's not much more to prove. Let's just go like hell and be faster than as many folks as we can!

So, the Regional Rally Championship is a somewhat odd event. The Rally America Regional Champions are invited to 100 Acre Wood to have a run-off of sorts. An event to see who's the best of the Regional teams at a centralized location in the country. Of course, it's an event that takes place in 2010 to decide the 2009 Regional Rally Championship. Really hard to explain that to anyone, let alone type it. ;-)

We've been twice. Won it in 2008, but lost on a penalty for speeding on a transit. In 2009, we were just plain slow(engine was likely ill at that point), but when the snow started to fall, we were having a ball! So, second place in the RRC two years in a row. Can an Eastern crew take the title for 2009?! Rally is a fickle mistress, but we'll be doing everything we can to show up with car and team that's ready to go like hell!

Stay tuned for more insightful, witty and completely nonsensical posts over the next few weeks as car prep continues. I'll try and add some photos to our flickr account by this weekend.

Cheers! John