Far North Rally

Here we go

If no-one lets us down we have the bods we need. To recap (again) we are supplying 3 timing teams, a start under Poko, a finish under Jamie, (more of that later), and the other finish with me.

Crews are:

• POKO • Leiton • Paige • Jahzaia • Leigh
• JAMIE • Connor • Mabel • Denise • Brandon

If Jamie can't actually make it at the last minute then RIMU will step up into his role

• WAZZA • Alex • Rachael • Brendon • Aaron

Poko will make her way to Paihia sometime during Friday 1 July

Leiton will collect Leigh from Putaruru and head up too

Connor will collect Mabel,and Rimu from Hamilton - perhaps Jamie too from Auckland

Rachael and Alex will come up from Auckland ( after work if necessary)

Denise and Brandon will come up from Auckland either during the Friday or again, after work.

If you look at stage map and itinerary (attached) you will note that the cars have their lunch break at Kaitaia, so it seems a bit silly to get Brendon and Aaron all the way over to Paihia on the Friday night.

So once the stage allocations are official I will let you know where and when you both have to be. However, as we will also have a stage in the afternoon you will end up at Paihia on Sat night.

For Far North Rally the various moteliers provide accommodation, which is why I do need names etc.

A couple of more things!

Essentially the cars leave Paihia first thing in the morning and proceed to Kaitaia.

The 4 sets of (start/finish) timing crews each do one stage in in the morning and another one in the afternoon.

The cars (obviously) finish back in Paihia Sat night. Where we again have accommodation provided.

In the olden days ( yes I really am that old), we needed at least 6 people for a start crew and 9 for a proper finish crew, but with the advent of Rallysafe this has helped radically reduce numbers required.

We still aim for 5 but if the Post Chief takes a job this can be reduced to 4- In point of fact for Big Targa, Alex Rachael and I did one stage with just the three of us, not ideal and still needs 2 cars.

One day events like this are ideal to show newcomers what fun it can be, and to bringback old hands in to the fold.

I'll keep in touch an dplan to see you all in Paihia on Friday July 1.

Hi team,

I'll do my usual 'writeup' in a couple of days but I wanted to extend my heartfelt thanks to the 14 of us that ensured that we (once more) fulfilled All our commitments.

Finish 1 _Jamie

As planned for as Jamie was unavoidably detained, Rimu (&Mabel) had agreed to step into the role. Mind you we lost not only a Post Chief but a vehicle too. But yes they coped. The rest of their crew Denise (an old hand at ROTN) and Brandon fitted in well.

Finish 2 – Wazza

Alex and Rachael are absolutely awesome – Thanks Brendon and Aaron although newbies fitted in marvelously

Start 3 – Poko

Poko came up from Helensville Leiton, Paige, Jashia all the way from Turangi (an old stronghold) Leigh from Putaruru.

Note just how far people have come to help!!

A heartfelt thanks to all of you!!

So another one done and dusted.

And yep we fulfilled all our obligations!

This time we fielded an overall team of 14 (should have been 15) made up of one Start crew (under Poko), a finish crew (nominally Jamie, but with his unavoidable absence - Rimu took over), and of course muggins Wazza heading the other finish crew.

Our people came from 'far and wide' the most distant being the three from Turangi and one from Putaruru. Not to mention Duck Creek on the Coromandel and Hamilton!!

Far North Rally (the old Rally of the North) is a 'little' one day 'car club organised' event where the 4 sets of start/finish timing teams each do a stage in the morning and another in the afternoon. This sounds easy, yeah right. As the morning stages are usually some

distance away from our base at Paihia, it does tend to mean fairly early out the gate time on the Sat morning. This proved to be the case this year too. Out of bed at 5 a.m. and out the gate at 6 a.m. - I really am getting too old for this nonsense!!!

Let's, once again start at the very beginning (a very good place to start!!!)

Being badly let down by Mr Helpful, it behooved me to collect Rimu and Mabel from Hamilton, and as I really did want to be in Paihia mid afternoon rather than arriving after dark , it meant having to leave Hamilton by 9 a.m. on the Friday - so I would need to leave Duck Creek no later than 7 a.m. making it a somewhat long day. Yeah!

I therefore went to Hamilton on Thursday, stayed with them that night and we almost made our 'out the gate time' of 9.a.m. and with Rimu driving my car, (thanks Rimu) got to Paihia early afternoon.

1st problem there was no accommodation booked for them - I was able to produce my schedule clearly showing they should have been and this was sorted - a bit worrying all the same.

That afternoon Rimu/Mabel collected the gear for all three crews, using my master gear check list, and Rimu then made individual gear lists for each crew - and yes the Rally safe gear was actually available there and then. We found the Rallysafe gear to be already fully charged and ready to go - thanks Buck.

Each crew's gear was then placed in their rooms ready for their arrival later in the evening. We did need to collect Road books etc from Rally HQ much later that afternoon though.

Our people were by now starting to arrive and on learning that Jamie had, indeed, been unavoidably detained we had to implement our backup plan for Rimu/Mabel to step up. But we hadn't just lost a post chief but we had also lost a vehicle - so I handed Izzy (my car) over to Rimu /Mabel and had to rely on Alex to look after me.

Each crew really do need 2 cars (particularly in case of inclement weather), Start needs one at Start Control, the other at actual start.

Finish crews need one at Finish control and another on at flying finish. It is true that once set up the beam only has to be 'baby sat' in case of the beam becoming misaligned for whatever reason but it really does need a car there.

Although it had rained Friday evening, I am pleased to report that Sat July 2 was fine. The three crews all had to be 'out the gate' by 6 a.m. so it meant out of bed at 5 !!!!!!! (See my earlier comment).

After some peregrination (look the word up) relying on a cellphone based GPS rather than my own (Rodney) and 'doing a Zac' - driving right through the gravel stage, we eventually managed to meet up with our Kaitaia based crew complement.

I cannot relate too much more of the other crews efforts but can explain ours in a bit of detail. So do read on!

SS2 Finish Wazza (Post Chief/ Senior advisor) really just supervised - great job Wazza, you make a good Capt Peacock!

Alex/Rachael/Brendon/AAron set up the flying finish beam (yep got the green light) then Rachael babysat the beam and reinstated the sign each time it got hit!

Alex did the cards (and yep the start orders were pretty good) Brendon wrote up the log and did the crisscross sheet. Aaron did what we call road (collecting cards from co- drivers, handing through open car window to Alex, then when processed, back to the competitor.

After the stage finished and cleared by the sweeper vehicle we proceeded to SS5. Set up again and it was mutually decided to keep to the same roles as SS2 but at one stage it looked like Rachael might have do do her job without a vehicle - this too was sorted (thanks Brendon/Rachael)

This time the start orders were something of a shambles. Speaking to the Stage Manager later she explained that their start crew really had problems at the start - yeah we noticed.

A word about the importance of start orders. It is an area that Rallysafe does not do well (actually not at all). As a car enters the stage it is given a starting order number which is written on the card they carry. at the finish we check off each car that has entered has actually exited. Missing start orders, or duplicates could well mean a car 'lost in stage'. Correct start orders are important !!

Once cleared from SS5 by the sweeper Brendon/Arron headed back to Kaitais for a very important meeting, the rest of us headed back to Paihia, where Rimu, Mabel and I went to the pub for a meal.

After returning all the gear ,I think all the others 'had a few beers' as the phrase goes !

We all headed home again Sunday.

Some final Comments

As always the accommodation provided was first class. But not having Rimu/Mabel listed despite having been provided their names in writing was a bit disconcerting.

Also the 'overflow' motel refusing to give us the room numbers allocated to people arriving later in the night was, in my opinion. political correctness gone mad.

Although the organisers did, once again, supply satellite phones, I am Delighted to report that we didn't even have to take ours out of its bag.

By carefully repositioning the car we did manage to get Spark coverage, Vodafone not quite so good though!!

You will note that we aimed for each crew to have 5 bods. 4 is enough but having the extra person does allow lots of extra flexibility.

Crews This Time Were

Finish 1 RIMU Mabel Denise Brandon

Finish 2 WAZZA Alex Rachael Brendon Aaron

Start 3 POKO Leiton Paige Jashiai Leigh

Thanks ever so much EVERYONE !!!!