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18th Annual Toys for Tots Road Rally By Peter
Schneider - Rallymaster On December 7, 2008 Northern New Jersey SCCA in association with the Subaru of Mt Olive, Motorsport Club of North Jersey and the United States Marine Corps Reserve hosted the 18th annual ‘Toys for Tots’ Teddy Bear Rally. Last year the Toys for Tots program reached 95,000 children in northern New Jersey and we are happy to be a contributing organization which helped achieved that target. The event was a very simple road rally using the back road of Morris, Warren, Sussex and Hunterdon Counties. The rally started at Subaru of Mt Olive and ended at the Pub and Brewery in Long Valley 58.325 miles later. The event required only a car or light truck with a working odometer and a pen to compete. For those that did not see the flyer in the prior issues of Pole Position the entry fee, per car, was a brand new Teddy Bear worth at least $25.00 retail which was donated to the USMC Reserve Toys for Tots Program. This year we had 32 teams competing in the event coming from several SCCA Regions, local car clubs and the general public. Awards for 1st and 2nd in each of 3 classes (Expert, Intermediate, & Novice), Best First Time, Best Subaru, Best Family, Best Husband & Wife, Best RVSCC, Best SCCA & Dead Last But Finished were supplied by the Region.
Stuart Lasser, veteran New Jersey auto
retailer and NNJR SCCA member has sponsored this local rally for each of
the 18 years. The starting location of the rally has included various
dealerships locations owned by Stuart including Saturn of Denville,
Morristown, Livingston and Mt Olive. The rally started out heading west on Route 46 towards Hackettstown. Once the team safely reached the other end of town, they turned on Petersburg Rd and started looking for Photo Clue A. Photo Clue A was a picture of a specific house number on a white post, they were instructed that if they could find the scene depicted in the photo they were to execute a right turn on the 1st road that they encountered. This Photo Clue was designed to test the team’s knowledge of the event’s Special Instructions, the Special Instructions stated that ‘vaild route following clues could not be located on Telephones Poles, Mailboxes or their supports or on any living animals.’ Photo A was very easy to locate but the teams needed to notice that the post in the photo was really a Mailbox support and was invalid. If they noticed this they ignored the Special Photo Route Instruction and continued along the rally route to execute the next route instruction. Those teams that did this correctly was greeted by an on-course checkpoint and were very pleased to confirm that had executed the trap correctly and avoided 240 penalty points. All teams found themselves back on a common route and heading north on Route 517 towards Allamuchy looking for the next route instruction. The second trap in the rally was associated with Photo Clue B. This photo clue was of a specific STOP sign. Along the rally route the teams encountered two STOP signs. The second STOP sign was the correct sign and this was in the center of a small town of Johnsonburg. The 1st STOP sign was at the intersection of Route 612 and 519. Since this was not the STOP in the photo the teams should have proceed across the intersection and about .2 miles later to find the correct STOP sign. This trap was designed to draw your attention away from the 3rd Route Following trap of the rally. Instruction #10, instructed the teams to PU (Pick-up) Warren County Route 519 North. This should have been executed at the intersection just north of the center of Johnsonburg. After you PU Warren County Route 519, you crossed over into Sussex County. Route 519 changed names to Sussex County Route 519, so the PU/onto rule no longer applied. (PU/Onto rule states that once placed onto a road by name or number you have to remain onto that road by name or number until the next active route instruction) Since the full road’s name had changed you should not have followed Sussex County Route 519 when it turned left, but you should have gone ‘as straight as possible’ until you were able to execute Route Instruction #11. This trap was worth 210 Penalty Points and most teams did this trap incorrectly. The rally then did a short loop in Sussex County and headed back south into Warren County. As you can see following the individual route instructions and understanding the “General Instructions” is what rallying is all about, and the objective is to be the team at the end that made the least number of route following errors in order to win. For each mile that you drive off course you collect 100 penalty points and missing an on-course checkpoint adds 200 points to your score. After traveling about 10 more miles along the scenic roads of Warren County you found yourself heading south on Route 613 looking to turn left onto Route 46 East. The teams came upon an intersection and had an option to either proceed ‘straight as possible’ on Ryan Rd or follow Route 613. Since they were not onto Route 613 by name/number they had to remember that per the “General Instructions” each time they encountered a new intersection ‘straight as possible’ was a valid option when the onto rule was not in affect or they could not execute the next active route instruction. Since these two options were not in affect the teams needed to proceed straight on Ryan. If they did this correctly they saved themselves 330 penalty points. Both Ryan and Route 613 joined up with Route 46 so no one got lost and continued on with the rally to the section. After two more route following traps the teams ended the rally at the Long Valley Pub and Brewery to socialize and get a bite to eat and await the results. The rally is scored in three classes (Expert, Intermediate, & Novice), and the winners from Southern NJ SCCA in the Expert class ran a near perfect rally with only 3.3 hundreds of a mile error over 58.325 mile route. (the second lowest score in Motorsport club’s 46 year history) Full results can be found in this issue of Pole Position and here below. Hope to see you at the next NNJR rally in May. Good luck and Happy Rallying. |
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18th Annual Teddy Bear
Rallye A Charity Rallye Supporting the Marine Corps' Toys for Tots Results |
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