----- This blog post was written by Dave Brown of Racer Dave racing for Flatirons Tuning -----

If you like speed, the Rally in the 100 Acre Wood is for you! With the highest average speeds of any rally in the country and cars topping out at well over 100 mph on tree lined twisty gravel covered roads, this race tests drivers' courage unlike any other. This year saw some of the biggest names in rally competing for the coveted win. David Higgins, Ken Block, Oliver Solberg, Barry McKenna and Peter Fetela to name a few.

The Rally in the 100 Acre Wood was our very first rally just 2 years ago and we finished very well but finishing was all that matter to us at the time. Last year we only made it one mile into the first stage when a new experimental motor let go and it was a major disappointment. We revisited these roads at the Show-Me Rally with a new motor from Ecotech and it absolutely ripped and ran flawlessly so we were looking forward to running this same setup this year. To help give us the best chance at a solid finish this year I worked extra hard to be as prepared as possible. I spent several weeks and many late nights working hard to make sure even the smallest details were taken care of. With some new performance parts from Flatirons Tuning and a new tune from The Boost Creep, the car was set to be the fastest it had ever been. On top of that, Mike and I had been doing our homework and we were mentally prepared to tear it up!

We started the race seeded in 10th place out of 80 competitors. Stage 1 was the traditional super special stage that did a couple laps around the local park. We have raced this stage a couple times previously and even though Ken Block pulled a hay bail out into one of the turns we still completed the stage with our best time yet and we were up to 9th overall and 1st in class. Stage 2 was the first really high speed road and it was going great until we hit 90 mph and a bad vibration started shaking the car. Rather than push it and risk hurting the car I decided to just cruise at 90 on the long straights but luckily there were still plenty of turns for us to hit at maximum attack. We moved up to 8th overall. Stage three was even faster and had more sections that we were limited to 90 on but that didn't stop us from moving up to 7th overall. On stage 4 we maintained 7th overall but we ran over a large rock that had been pulled onto the road just before the finish. The sudden jolt knocked something loose and caused the timing belt to skip a few teeth. We determined a valve was bent because we lost compression on one of the cylinders and rather than risk breaking a valve and blowing up the engine we decided to call it a day.

Even though our race was cut short we have some great memories of cooking through the woods sideways over blind crests and showing that we can run amongst the open class turbo cars in our little naturally aspirated car. Plus it didn't stop us from immediately prepping for the next race. We pulled the engine out of the car by hand right there in the pits and we loaded it into a friends SUV so we could get it to the motor builder as quickly as possible. I have yet to determine the real cause of either the vibration or the timing belt slip but you can be sure that both will be fixed and the car will be even more ready for the Idaho Rally in June. Hopefully some of you will come out and spectate or volunteer. I look forward to seeing you out there!

And don't forget to follow the Racer Dave channel on Youtube, Instagram or Facebook to see the full event video and stay up to date on the latest racing action.

- Dave