Fancy Racecar on a GRM Budget - A Rally Co-Driver's Perspective - AMA

TXratti said:

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

... Have the car ready at least a week (preferably more) before the event, or don't go. Seriously. You're going to miss something or be worrying about the car and not be focused on driving, and it won't be fun. Do yourself a favor and be realistic about when it will be done, and you'll enjoy the event a lot more when you do go (make it as much of an "Arrive and drive" situation as you can).

This is so true. If you're wrenching on the car in the trailer at 3am the night before leaving for a race, you're in trouble. Some people take it as a sign of being hard core but really it's a lack of planning and preparation. It's not just the car that's untested and thrown together at that point, you've also got a driver/crew that's tired and not in the right mindset. If you're going into a grueling event like an enduro or a rally, you need to be ready with lots of time or you have to be lucky.

TXratti said:

Example of the ridiculous amount of suspension travel these things have:

• The rear coil over looks like its angle towards the back of the car. Is that accurate or the angle of the photo?
• The angle makes me think the rear suspension might be (semi) trailing arms? 
• What kind of brake setup do these cars run to fit under a 15" wheel and still stop like you mentioned on gravel?
• How'd McKenna get a 3 door fiesta in the US?

Thanks for doing this!

Thanks for doing this! I'm curious about your crewing experience outside rally as well if you feel like, and can, share about it.

bluej (Forum Supporter) said:

Thanks for doing this! I'm curious about your crewing experience outside rally as well if you feel like, and can, share about it.

Of course! I love sharing. I've crewed a couple of time for Team LMR/ 515 Motorsport at the WRL Championship round at COTA the last few years. An extra set of hands, running the radio (talking to drivers), doing the maths on fuel stops, and going over the wall to fuel the car on pit stops. Unfortunately last year was a bit exciting, with a motor failure (piece of a valve seat on a previous motor blowing up got sucked into a cylinder, and shoved itself into the head on the S54 in our E36 racecar), and a no sleep overnight head swap to get the car running for the 2nd race, among other things. We've been fortunate to have a few big names with the team, Ross Bentley one year, and Andy Lally last year.

I'd like to do more of it, but it'd mean giving up rallies and I keep getting offers to co-drive so it's hard to switch it up, there's only so many vacation days in the year.

Me and Andy fueling the car last year:

Keith Tanner said:

TXratti said:

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

... Have the car ready at least a week (preferably more) before the event, or don't go. Seriously. You're going to miss something or be worrying about the car and not be focused on driving, and it won't be fun. Do yourself a favor and be realistic about when it will be done, and you'll enjoy the event a lot more when you do go (make it as much of an "Arrive and drive" situation as you can).

This is so true. If you're wrenching on the car in the trailer at 3am the night before leaving for a race, you're in trouble. Some people take it as a sign of being hard core but really it's a lack of planning and preparation. It's not just the car that's untested and thrown together at that point, you've also got a driver/crew that's tired and not in the right mindset. If you're going into a grueling event like an enduro or a rally, you need to be ready with lots of time or you have to be lucky.

This x1000

shagles said:

TXratti said:

Example of the ridiculous amount of suspension travel these things have:

• The rear coil over looks like its angle towards the back of the car. Is that accurate or the angle of the photo?
• The angle makes me think the rear suspension might be (semi) trailing arms? 
• What kind of brake setup do these cars run to fit under a 15" wheel and still stop like you mentioned on gravel?
• How'd McKenna get a 3 door fiesta in the US?

Thanks for doing this!

It's definitely on a big angle backwards, as is the front. The Skoda looks funky in the front because the damper is basically vertical/ almost has an angle backwards, but the ball joint for the knuckle is pretty far forward so there's at least some caster there. It actually hurt my brain and I had to crawl around underneath it and see what was going on. the Fiesta seems to be a very stable and predictable car, while Barry was talking about the Skoda as being a bit "lively" with it trying to swap ends under heavy braking and such. Because all of the R5s are developed independantly, I'm sure all of the suspension configs are at least somewhat different.

-I haven't crawled under the Fiesta, but I'd believe you'd be correct about the semi-trailing arm. Here's a photo with the wheel off, but you can't see much. It does look like a pretty beefy semi-trailing arm.

-As for the brakes, the Fiestas run AP racing brakes front and rear, with a lot of pistons I am sure! Braking force can be generated one of two/three ways. More clamping force, or move the clamping location further away/ make the pad area bigger. Traditionally this is done with the latter because it's cheaper to move a caliper further away than it is to fit more pistons (road racing big brake kits, etc). In rally we're limited (by the tires available, because of the world rally regs) to 15in wheels, so these cars fit the biggest beefiest AP Racing calipers they can inside the wheel. Most traditional brakes are enough to lock the wheels up on gravel, and the insane braking from these cars comes from being able to stand it on its nose and get ALL the weight over the front axle and use those fancy brakes.

-In terms of import, the show and display has a 'long term' part to it AFAIK, and the 2 door fiestas that he has here have NY state plates on them. Ken Block did it for years when he was competing regularly, look at photos. All of his fiestas have been 2 door cars, and Utah plates (where he lives). The Skoda has Hungarian plates and differs a little bit since there's no applicable US model. They all leave the states pretty regularly to satisfy the regs, and aren't here permanently, and aren't out and about on the streets as daily drivers (obviously). I also don't pretend to know how they go about these things, and nor am I a legal expert on these matters, so take anything I say with a grain of salt :).

I'm pretty sure the R5 cars have McPherson struts on all 4 corners. The Odd damper angles/position is to get the suspension travel from the struts. 

Median said:

I'm pretty sure the R5 cars have McPherson struts on all 4 corners. The Odd damper angles/position is to get the suspension travel from the struts. 

That is true, but does not preclude a semi-trailing arm (McPherson being only defined that the damper is a load bearing member, rather than having an upper control arm). It does also have a toe-adjustment arm behind the hub in the rear, can be seen in the last photo.

Co-driver training/driving schools: 

Can you weigh in on the cost/benefit of spending money on training (OzPro, etc) vs. Entry fees/testing, when running on a grassroots budget?

kodachrome said:

Co-driver training/driving schools: 

Can you weigh in on the cost/benefit of spending money on training (OzPro, etc) vs. Entry fees/testing, when running on a grassroots budget?

TL,DR: Do both if you can, but a pacenotes school is invaluable if you only can do one.

For drivers and driving school training (Team O'Neil, Rally Ready, Dirtfish, The Firm, etc), it is absolutely worth the 1-1.5ish event opportunity cost to get a good basis of car control on dirt (assuming you're a total newb). I wouldn't say that driving school is an absolute necessity, but I would HIGHLY recommend it (full disclosure - I work as a driving instructor at Rally Ready Driving School in Austin occasionally). You'll feel MUCH better on course and can probably have fun rather than just trying to avoid going off every corner.

Pacenotes/codriver school. I would say as a new team (codriver/driver) it's almost a requirement. Especially now that the majority of events are 2 pass recce with no organizer notes (Jemba) supplied, knowing WHAT to look for on recce to be safe as well as fast is key. As a new codriver, unless you're the ultimate detail oriented person and go down the rabbit hole of research about what a codriver needs to do with regards to organization on event, etc., then going to OZ RallyPro will help you start on the correct path. No matter what experience level of driver or codriver though, there's always something to learn and the Gelsominos tailor their training to the person or team that they're working with, and you'll learn something that you can take away and use to make yourself better/faster/safer on recce or on stage. 

I'm not the one doing the AMA (it's really interesting!) but I thought I'd chime in here with a couple of illustrations.

The codriver has to paint an "accurate and unambiguous picture in the driver's head" and this is a lot harder than you think. The navigator is the most important person in the car, the driver is just a trained monkey doing what they're told. At least, that's how it's been explained to me by my navigator.

We took the (short) codriver school before running the Targa Newfoundland in 2008 and it was enormously helpful. Watching our in-car video versus some of the other novice teams showed a huge difference. We took it again when we went back in 2011 because it was a good refresher for my navigator and myself.

Here you go, two teams with the same level of actual experience - this is the fifth day of the Targa. One has taken the Targa Newfoundland pacenotes school. The other has not. I apologize for the video quality, but we've come a long way in 12 years :)

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Absolutely! Thanks for sharing your experience as well, the more the merrier. That's definitely a good comparison with taking the school and being able to carry good pace.

Also, Targa Newfoundland is nuts and I would love to do it someday. A lot of my rally friends have done it in the past, and it seems like a riot.

It's nice to see cars showing up at North American rallies that aren't all Subarus. Nothing against Subies, but some variety makes it more entertaining for me. We really need something like the AP4 cars being constructed in Australia and New Zealand, lots of common components with different engines and shells.

In reply to TXratti :

Very cool thread.  Thanks so much for sharing!

How'd you get into rally co-driving?  I think it's neat too that you drive and co-drive both.  A man for every seat!

foot buttons are the best! I finally got around to giving my co-driver the floor horn button and he gets to stomp his a feet a bunch when we see spectators while he reads, its great fun! Washer system would be interesting, I need to look into that as my setup is pretty limiting. 

Thanks for sharing! 

awesome topic! Fascinating  

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Keith those videos are great. 

TXratti said:

I'll see if I can post some onboard from Ojibwe, but here's some from Barry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXi2hN77pOQ

I have no experience with Rally so pardon my naivety. This video is nutty and I have questions. How can I learn more about the co-driver lingo, the timing, etc? Some is intuitive like "over crest" but I am left guessing on the numbers. Is there a standard language or does it vary by team? Is the code driver calling out degrees (of bend) for turns, distances to a waypoints... approximate speed? I'm literally psyched to learn more about this sport based on this post.

Is "Rallycross" like this?
 

... also one of Keith's videos showed what it's like to lose your place in the notes - does that happen with professionals as well? Are there markers on the course akin to mile markers to allow you to find your place if you do get "lost" relative to the course notes?

In reply to OHSCrifle :

This magazine article does a halfway decent job covering the basic notes, but yes, to some degree they are also tailored to the team using them- most use lower numbers for tighter corners, and a 1-6 system, at least here in the US.  The distances are in meters or yards or "who knows, it feels right" because the most important thing is knowing what your own notes mean, not necessarily whether they're perfectly accurate if you were to measure them.

SCCA rallycross is basically just autocross on dirt, no notes.  European style rallycross is more like a wheel to wheel supermoto race with cars.

We've gotten lost in the notes a few times, but it hasn't happened in a while so I would bet that the really fast guys basically never do.

How's it ride on transits? Digressive valving in the shocks? I'm trying to think back through all of the rally questions I've had before...

What does a post event check list look like?

OHSCrifle said:

TXratti said:

I'll see if I can post some onboard from Ojibwe, but here's some from Barry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXi2hN77pOQ

I have no experience with Rally so pardon my naivety. This video is nutty and I have questions. How can I learn more about the co-driver lingo, the timing, etc? Some is intuitive like "over crest" but I am left guessing on the numbers. Is there a standard language or does it vary by team? Is the code driver calling out degrees (of bend) for turns, distances to a waypoints... approximate speed? I'm literally psyched to learn more about this sport based on this post.

Is "Rallycross" like this?
 

... also one of Keith's videos showed what it's like to lose your place in the notes - does that happen with professionals as well? Are there markers on the course akin to mile markers to allow you to find your place if you do get "lost" relative to the course notes?

When Janel (my navigator) watched the video of the Alfa, she said "he's looking up" almost immediately. That's one of his big problems, besides the unneeded wordiness.

The navigator is equipped with a rally computer that shows elapsed distance down to the meter (actually, I think ours is 10 cm) and that's what the notes are timed to. It even has a signal from the reverse lights so it corrects if you have to back up. I'm a little rusty but I think you can also plug in a correction in case you find something's way off.

Since Janel and I were novices, we didn't go for the number system. We went for a reduced vocabulary, such as "easy", "square", "tight". The Targa is a little different, you get tulip diagrams supplied to you and you don't really get the chance to recce so it's all being done blind. Janel would go through the book and write out her instructions, then I'd go through it to get a feel for the stage and see what to expect. Occasionally, with a really weird situation, we'd agree on a special call. You can hear "funky bridge" called at one point in one of our videos. That set vocabulary also meant less chance of miscommunication. Back to the Alfa, at one point you can hear the navigator call out a street name. That's not useful information even if it is in the notes! No offence to that navigator, he was a good guy. But he and his driver were out for fun.

When Janel and I went back for the second run at Targa, we had a much faster car but the regulations had us on worse tires. It took us a day to get the timing right because of the higher approach speeds and tighter timing.

You can hear Janel better in this video. I'm pretty sure she looked up at about 1:12 and lost her train of thought. Also, you can hear her say "should be there" at least once, which we realized later was a subconcious code for "why are you not slowing down?". There was also "not there yet", which means "stay on the gas wuss". Not all Targa stages were little tight street stages like this, but they show off the navigator's work better.

TVR Scott (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to TXratti :

Very cool thread.  Thanks so much for sharing!

How'd you get into rally co-driving?  I think it's neat too that you drive and co-drive both.  A man for every seat!

Finally getting back to this after a holiday weekend!  

I got into co-driving originally as a set towards driving, having been a WRC fan for a long time (late nights on the live audio feed), and discovered US rally after Travis Pastrana started rallying. Which lead me to discovering other drivers like Antoine L'estage and yes, Ken Block.

While I was at University, I discovered a rally happening IN THAT TOWN (Prescott, AZ), after watching a stickered up Escort Cosworth (which was unfortunately stolen at one point: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/off-topic-discussion/bolo-stolen-cosworth-in-new-england/125535/page1/) drive by and knowing exactly what was going on. I was eventually able to volunteer for the event in 2014, and 2015 was the first year I competed. 

It was wild. We went something like 120 mph on the first stage, which the first 5 miles or so are next to a sheer cliff (see video made by the local heli flight school: https://youtu.be/rucPpgIqTF8?t=50), and we lost the light I was reading from inside the car on one of the night stages and I had to find my headlamp in my bag while still going full speed, culminating in losing one of the rear wheels with a stub axle failure. I was hooked. Here's a great interview from that night: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGj9b8l9rcA

I went in headfirst after that, doing 11 events the following year and just loving the right seat, that I forgot about driving. I feel that I can compete at a MUCH higher level as a co-driver, obviously considering the nature of the beginning of this thread, than I ever could ability wise - or afford - as a driver. 

I eventually found autocross, now HDPE, and soon to be Lemons/WRL as a driver where I can challenge myself in different ways than as a co-driver.

DeadSkunk (Warren) said:

It's nice to see cars showing up at North American rallies that aren't all Subarus. Nothing against Subies, but some variety makes it more entertaining for me. We really need something like the AP4 cars being constructed in Australia and New Zealand, lots of common components with different engines and shells.

AP4 cars still cost close to $80,000, which is still much more affordable than an R5, but similar to a Proto (which uses STI or Mitsu EVO drivetrain). There is one AP4 that was brought to the states (Millen's Rav4, which was never raced after Toyota pulled their backing), but there's not a lot of connections otherwise.

fidelity101 (Forum Supporter) said:

foot buttons are the best! I finally got around to giving my co-driver the floor horn button and he gets to stomp his a feet a bunch when we see spectators while he reads, its great fun! Washer system would be interesting, I need to look into that as my setup is pretty limiting. 

I turn into Bambi's friend Thumper when passing spectator points and a foot horn hahaha.

The wiper shouldn't be too hard, you're basically just splicing the wiring for whatever is triggered for the sprayer/wipe (usually pulling the stalk near the steering wheel towards you), same as the horn button.