Neohio Region

NEOHIO Region SCCA, with support from the Saturn of Mentor Car Dealership, presented the Ohio Winter Rally 2007 -- click here for previous winners

This year's Ohio Winter rally was held on Saturday, January 20th 2007, as part of the NEOHIO Region and CENDIV SCCA Rally Championship series. 13 Cars started from the Dealership, to experience the finest snow that northeast ohio has to offer. They were not disappointed, as the conditions changed all evening, from ice with snow on top, to dry roads. This made for fun for both driver and navigator, and is the one of the reaons this rally remains after 37 years of running.

Once again the workers made the event possible, and I want to list them here, without them we don't have an event.

TOM KIMBALL KA8BZB, LISA HINKLE, CONNIE PEPLOWSKI, DAWN SMITH, MARK KUNDRATH KB8FKM and Sue, JOHN HINKLE, PAT KARL - N8ONI, VALERIE,
RON JOHNSTONBAUGH, IAN ABBOTT, BOB MAGREE N8KBX, BRYAN BARTZI KF8G, JIM VANZANT , PAUL BELL, DIAN SWARM,
STEPHANIE EISLE, SCOTT IVANCIC KD8DZM, KEN KANE, DOUG, GREG LESTER, ALEX QUIRK N3WRJ, BOB NICK KC8TNI, JOHN LESTER, BRENDA NICK, AND KAREN

Jaeger's straight claimed another victim, but all in all the competitors were once again well behaved and we received no complaints and there were no incidents. Thanks to the competitors, as this makes it easier to concentrate on managing the event, which is usually challenging enough. Bob Magree came through again saving checkpoint #7 by giving out times for #6 which I messed up on.

For the first few controls it looked as if Benham and Hinkle would run away with the Limited class, scoring only 5 points for 5 controls, but then they had some difficulty with the slippery conditions on 7 and 8. They recovered and took first place in L with only 35 points. A similiar situation existed in Novice class, with Gary and Carlo scoring higher on the slippery sections of 5,7,8 but recovering to take the win in the second half. In Stock class, Adam and Piotr seemed to have the advantage, with excellent scores in the first half, and they remained consistent throughout the event scoring only 77 points to take first place. Placing second in Stock, car 10 manned by the 'buick' guys (Eric and Jon) took some big scores early in the first half, but got their act together in the second half (144 pts. only in second half) to take second place with 502 pts. Close on their heels with 559 pts was car #12 for third in stock class.

We had 5 E class entries and they showed us what superior technology could do again. Third in E, with only 25 pts for 15 controls, was Michael H. and , with an especially strong second half. They were equalling or bettering the scores of cars 4 and 5. Car 4 was crewed by veteran Audi pointer Dave Harkcom and Greg Lester navigating, and they put on a strong showing beating or tying Car 5 on 7 of 15 controls. But in the end the consistency of the team in Car 5 crewed by Tom Bell ( in his really nice WRX STi) and Jack VonKaenel proved to be too much. Tom and Jack scored better than everyone else on 2 controls, and tied for low score on 8 other controls. Tom and Jack scored only 14 points total for 15 controls, while Dave and Greg ended up with 20 pts.

The award for best driving on a ridiculously splippery road has to go to the guys in Car 8, who somehow managed to zero checkpoint 7. No one else got a zero there, and it was difficult to stand on this road, let alone drive on it.

So there you have it, we got snow and went out and had a blast playing in it. Hope everyone had fun and hopefully we'll get snow again every year from now on.

Here’s the results overall:

CAR #	overall position	Cls position	class	Driver	Navigator	total	1	2	3	4	5	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	CAR #
5	1		E	Tom Bell	Jack VonKaenel	14	0	1	0	0	2	1	0	0	0	1	6	2	0	1	0	5
4	2		E	Dave Harkcom	Greg Lester	20	1	0	1	0	1	4	0	1	1	1	4	2	1	2	1	4
9	3		E	Michael Hordijk	Jesse Graves	25	2	1	3	1	1	3	2	1	0	0	5	1	0	1	4	9
2	4		L	Thomas Benham	John Hinkle	38	3	0	2	0	3	5	5	2	2	3	4	3	0	3	3	2
3	5		S	Adam Spieszny	Piotr Roszczenko	77	5	0	7	1	11	1	4	1	8	6	11	5	6	10	1	3
8	6		E	Dan Harkcom	Justin Miller	129	2	88	0	6	0	0	5	5	1	1	5	11	2	2	1	8
1	7		E	Dave Sellers	Janice Ford	223	2	0	83	22	1	5	0	1	1	1	5	100	0	1	1	1
10	8		S	Eric Grothaus	Jon Bartles	502	100	15	14	44	23	34	100	28	7	8	100	6	6	15	2	10
12	9		S	B. Jeffery Arendas	Matthew Arendas	559	18	45	100	100	100	100	14	39	2	3	3	23	10	2	0	12
14	10		S	Mark Adler	Tim Walker	777	16	100	100	100	43	58	100	6	59	12	3	100	9	8	63	14
11	11		N	Gary Kennegiessser	Carlo Matos	848	100	51	88	12	100	100	100	37	21	5	56	3	27	77	71	11
13	12		S	Mike Foster	Gary Hickman	872	48	61	100	100	22	30	100	73	58	83	65	59	50	19	4	13
6	13		S	Jeff Colah	Jamie Thorrat	1388	100	100	100	60	100	100	100	92	100	61	100	100	100	100	75	6

Here’s results by class:

CAR #	overall position	cls position	class	Driver	Navigator	total	1	2	3	4	5	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	CAR #
5	1	1	E	Tom Bell	Jack VonKaenel	14	0	1	0	0	2	1	0	0	0	1	6	2	0	1	0	5
4	2	2	E	Dave Harkcom	Greg Lester	20	1	0	1	0	1	4	0	1	1	1	4	2	1	2	1	4
9	3	3	E	Michael Hordijk	Jesse Graves	25	2	1	3	1	1	3	2	1	0	0	5	1	0	1	4	9
8	6	4	E	Dan Harkcom	Justin Miller	129	2	88	0	6	0	0	5	5	1	1	5	11	2	2	1	8
1	7	5	E	Dave Sellers	Janice Ford	223	2	0	83	22	1	5	0	1	1	1	5	100	0	1	1	1
2	4	1	L	Thomas Benham	John Hinkle	38	3	0	2	0	3	5	5	2	2	3	4	3	0	3	3	2
11	11	1	N	Gary Kennegiessser	Carlo Matos	848	100	51	88	12	100	100	100	37	21	5	56	3	27	77	71	11
3	5	1	S	Adam Spieszny	Piotr Roszczenko	77	5	0	7	1	11	1	4	1	8	6	11	5	6	10	1	3
10	8	2	S	Eric Grothaus	Jon Bartles	502	100	15	14	44	23	34	100	28	7	8	100	6	6	15	2	10
12	9	3	S	B. Jeffery Arendas	Matthew Arendas	559	18	45	100	100	100	100	14	39	2	3	3	23	10	2	0	12
14	10	4	S	Mark Adler	Tim Walker	777	16	100	100	100	43	58	100	6	59	12	3	100	9	8	63	14
13	12	5	S	Mike Foster	Gary Hickman	872	48	61	100	100	22	30	100	73	58	83	65	59	50	19	4	13
6	13	6	S	Jeff Colah	Jamie Thorrat	1388	100	100	100	60	100	100	100	92	100	61	100	100	100	100	75	6

Information: Chairman: Ken Swarm e-mail: kswarm_2000@yahoo.com
Rally Info Web Page : http://home.neo.rr.com/kswarm/Owr2007_flyer.htm