Photos from Prescott Rally

Rally America Waiver Approved for Seed 9!

UP2MTNS Rally Team will be competing at Seed 9 Rally on December 5th, 2009! This 'waiver' is necessary to run our Open Class AWD rally car while Jon Burke still has less than 18 coefficient points overall at a Rally America sanctioned event.

Our co-driver is still up in the air as Tucker Heiner is not available for that weekend, but we're working on bringing in someone with a lot of experience.

The car is still under repair from Prescott Rally, but there is plenty of time to get everything ready by December, we're excited to ramp up and get it all done!


We will also be at FRX's NovemberFest RallyX event on November 14th and 15th at Prairie City OHV, Rancho Cordova, CA.
https://www.motorsportreg.com/index.cfm/event/event.advert/uidEvent/56B420A1-D8D7-AFF6-25C7A8EAB6263A37

UP2MTNS Finishes 22nd Annual Prescott Rally 2009!

Up Two Mountains Rally Team: Jon Burke and Tucker Heiner were pleased to finish all 8 stages of the 22^nd Annual 2009 Prescott Rally! We finished 6^th overall (out of 29 total competitors), and 2^nd in the Open AWD class.

The finish was hard fought, as we had a big 'off' on stage 6, and a flat tire on stage 5, we were running out of spares, fast!

We actually lost very little time with the 'off' and were able to replace the front right control arm at service with NO road points! The flat, however, cost us several minutes on stage, and then we got stuck in the dust of a slower competitor and couldn't get close enough to pass...that cost us 5-6 minutes and as you can see in the final overall results, that would have put us in the running for 2nd place overall (oh well, that's rally!).

Learned quite a few lessons about self-control, the 'mentality' of racing, and keeping one's cool...as well as learning to grow and pair and how to take corners at +75mph!

(Jon Burke and Tucker Heiner Come Flying out of a 'Left 3' on Stage 6 Ssaturday Morning. Photo by: Mustafa Samli)

Here’s the play-by-play that started late Friday afternoon went through Saturday afternoon:

Stage 1 - Drove like my grandma to get used to the car, the roads (BIG +200ft exposures!) and the brand new Lassa rally tires we've never used before.

Stage 2 - Picked up the pace a little bit, getting faster, more key experience.

Service 1 – Car and engine are running tip-top, but saw our times on Stage 1... time to pick up the pace!

Stage 3 and 4...put up top 3 stage times and drove very clean (See our youtube videos: search: up2mtns)

Day 2
Stage 5...got a little cocky on one turn and that's how we lost a tire. See the video here: Prescott Rally Stage 5

Stage 6 - Stage 5 in reverse, with the lesson learned, we drove fast but smart, a

mislabeled turn at the end (was labeled a 5, should have been a 4) and a lot of spectators

(lesson #2 learned: ignore spectators!) snuck up on us and we went off pretty hard, but the car took the abuse and kept on going...we finished the last 1/2 mile and put up a decent time.

Service - Went 9 miles back on a de-beaded rim....NO damage to the Lassa rally tire (other than the de-bead), AND it also protected my TD rim....I LIKE these tires. Replaced control arm and re-set the car in 40 minutes with help from DirtyImpreza crew member, Zach Dickinson.

Stage 7 and 8...had some alignment issues because we borrowed a GC arm and forgot the washers, car still drove pretty good and we put up respectable times to finish 6th over all.

Next…we’re trying for a waiver to compete at Seed 9 Rally this December 4-5^th, but the event is sanctioned by Rally American, and I don’t have 18 coefficient points required for all drivers in Open AWD turbo cars. If we can’t run Seed 9, this is our last event for 2009, and we’ll be making plans to run the full California Rally Series Championship in 2010!

Last…a big thanks to all our sponsors, Michel Hoche-Mong (HANS, Intercom and trailer), and Eli Gilbert (another HANS!).

UP2MTNS Rally Team is proud to be sponsored by:

Fine Line Imports

Cobb Tuning

Redline Synthetic Oil

L&E Fabrication

FEAL Suspension

Project Solo Gear

GrimmSpeed

DirtyImpreza.com

Up Two Mountains Rally Team Debuts at Gorman Ridge Rally

8/29/2009

Driver Jon Burke and co-drive Tucker Heiner made their stage rally debut this past weekend at Gorman Ridge Rally, pars of the California Rally Series (CRS) and United States Rally Championship (USRC). (Photo: Louie Minette)

Saddled up in an AWD Open Class 2004 Subaru WRX which was literally finished just days before the event, the detuned turbo engine was fitted with restrictor and tuned at Fine Line Imports; putting up 267wtq and 210whp was still a peppy and responsive car for the rookie team.

The weekend started on Friday with final adjustments to the suspension (raised 1.5” for Gorman’s notoriously rough roads) and several hours of recce. Jon had co-driven these roads at the 2008 Gorman Rally and was able to create accurate notes with Tucker who is new on the rally scene.

Saturday started leisurely with the driver’s meeting at 10:15am and our out time was just an hour away. Being new, we were lined up at the back of the pack; but Stage 1 was good to the new team…putting up a respectable 5:20 time, they passed one competitor and almost caught up to the next by the end of the stage….they were on their way!



Stages 2 was interrupted when a competitor rolled on a fast downhill section of Power Line Rd…everyone was safe, but most teams received the same bogie time. Stage 3 (same as Stage 1) was also good to the team, with a 19 second improvement.

The Rally Gods struck early in Stage 4 with a broken drive shaft which put the team out of contention for CRS points, but started a service crew frenzy to replace the drive shaft and keep competing under USRC ‘Super Rally’ rules. With key help from Aaron Ekinaka (founder, www.DirtyImpreza.com) and other DI volunteers, they were able to swap out the aftermarket drive shaft (whoops, don’t fix what ain’t broke!!) with the OEM one with time to spare to eat some Rally BBQ!

At this point, the race was on to just finish… a loose battery cable almost kept them from starting Stage 8 and small boulders took off their exhaust, but they were able to start Stage 9 with literally a minute to spare. They finished Stage 9 (same as stage 1 and 3) with a very fast 4:44….only 12 seconds slower than the stage record of 4:32 set by Keith Jackson and Marra Estep…showing that the rookie team has what it takes to be fast! (Photo: Zachary Dickinson)

The next obstacles were a faulty co-driver light and a flat tire on stage, but the Jon and Tucker prevailed and rolled across the finish at Stage 12!

We’d like to thank all of the help from individuals and sponsors who made this rally happen for us:

Ray and Donna Hocker and Mike and Paula Gibeault and all the volunteers for putting on such a fun event!

Lars Wolfe – for building us a great cage, and the tons of rally advice.
Michel Hoche-Mong – letting us borrow the intercom, car trailer, and HANS device…oh, and for scrutineering my cage, and passing us at tech! (and for tons of advice)

Miles, Ryan and Steve at Fine Line Imports (www.finelineimports.net) for building us a great engine with a great tune!

All the help we received from individuals at www.DirtyImpreza.com, www.RallyAnachy.com and www.SpecialStage.com

COBB Tuning (engine and interior parts)
GrimmSpeed (engine parts/porting/coating)
Redline Oil (all fluids)
L&E Fabrication (quick steering column)
Safe Drives (ALL our safety gear)
Metropolitan Motors (tire mounting/balancing)
Project Solo Gear (skid plate, which did its job!)

Jon and Tucker will be at Prescott Rally (http://www.prescottrally.com/ ) the first weekend in October, with the goal to finish each stage and take home some CRS points.

http://www.facebook.com/UP2MTNS

coming soon....

Its been a while since the last post/update...a lot will be coming soon...car is almost done, Gorman Ridge Rally is next week....lots of pics and video...

2008: A Tough Start

September 5^th, 2008

For Immediate Release:

Team Up TwoMountains had a rocky start in the first half of 2008. The year began with a blown turbo and engine due to a broken air filter (cold air intake) allowing dirt to be sucked up at an event (another good reason to not use a CAI) and destroying the turbo and wrecking havoc on the engine and heads.

Time for upgrades!! Including…

Blouch 20g Turbo

FLI Stage 2 WRX heads w/Jun 256 cams

STI 2.5L block

COBB Intake and Cold Air Box

Custom Cusco catch can

Act flywheel and 6-puck race clutch

GrimmSpeed ported/coated headers and uppipe

GrimmSpeed 3mm phenolic spacers and coated intake manifold

APS TMIC (coated by GrimmSpeed) w/recirc BOV

APS Turbo Intake

Two months later and a lot of rides into work with Krista (thanks, honey!), Fine Line Imports delivered a tuned 2004 WRX that pumped out 320wtq/325whp. The power came on early and pulled all the way to redline! The best part was, during this time, COBB TUNING and BLOUCH TURBO stepped up as sponsors and helped with Cobb’s new intake/cold air box and the 20g respectively. Thank you Trey Cobb and Mike Malin!

Miles Hetchman (FLI) even came to NorCal’s first FRX rally event at Prairie City OHV Park in March and helped tune a few extra maps for running high revs on slick/dirt surfaces.

However, at about 4K miles in, disaster struck again as a faulty stock ECU caused over boosting at high rpms during a rallyX event and cylinder 4 had a catastrophic failure… pieces of the STI stock piston broke off and went through the turbo…umm, more upgrades!? And to make a long story short (too late!) FLI stepped up to the plate (again) and rebuilt the engine with Supertech forged pistons and a 100mm bored out STI block w/race main and rod bearings. Blouch Turbo stepped up again and rebuilt the practically brand new turbo that still needed a once-over to make sure this engine would still be in top shape. The results came out the same on the dyno, with some key differences.

1) More area under the graph from 3400 to 6100rpms (see dyno)

2) Temp. was 10degrees hotter on the 2^nd engine’s dyno pull, so peak WHP should be higher

3) This engine also includes a Link G3 ECU to replace the wrecked stock WRX ECU.

Click on image for larger dyno graph

Red/Purple: 1^st engine torque/hp

Blue/Green: 2^nd engine torque/hp

On top of advanced data logging controls and gear base boost maps, the G3 includes launch control, flat foot shifting and anti-lag…we’re sure at least two out of three will be utilized in the future!

This of course is all a precursor to the tuning necessary for stage rally next year, but in the meantime, it’s a great daily driver and rallyX vehicle with way too much power! A huge thanks to the team at Fine Line Imports, without them, this project would have ran out of steam a long time ago!

Despite a rough beginning, the 2^nd half of the year is looking good…a ‘new to me’ set of DMS 50mm suspension has just gone on and is being dialed in. The car will also make an appearance at SubieFest with the DirtyImpreza crew in September.

Lastly, Jon Burke made his Stage Rally debut at Gorman Ride Rally co-driving for Keith Jackson in his open class 2006 STI. Keith and Jon came in 3^rd in their class and 5^th overall! The two will also be competing at Prescott Rally October 2^nd and 3^rd. This experience is critical to next year’s entry into rally driving!

Upcoming events/schedule:

September:

Glenn Helen 3 RallyX

SubieFest

Antioch 1 RallyX

2007 Team Up TwoMountains Promo Video!