West Virginia HillFest: A whole festival centered around a hillclimb

Love cars? Love hillclimbs? Love festivals? That’s the premise behind the first-ever West Virginia HillFest on August 9-11.

Tom Zielinski and Aaron Bambach are the two gentlemen behind the endeavor. Tom’s background involves promoting events, such as 4Fest. Aaron’s history involv…

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Well, I like everything about this. I will see if I can coordinate that time in my schedule. Cool.

West Virginia and neighboring Kentucky are definitely making moves to do more motorsport activities. Stay tuned for more.

Anyone venture a guess as to how many trips up the course you would get per day?

Hmm. Snowshoe isn't that far away from here. I should probably check this out.

J.A. Ackley said:

West Virginia and neighboring Kentucky are definitely making moves to do more motorsport activities. Stay tuned for more.

They're also making moves to restrict the rights of many motorsports enthusiasts. For example , one of the 30 anti-trans bills in this year's WV state legislature would send me to jail for attending the hill climb if kids are there. That is not hyperbole. Both of the regular sites for my home region rallyx,wdcr scca, are in WV.

Registered and hotel booked! Excited to see more motorsport events in this area, and this one is nice as their things for the family to do besides car events, which they care very little about.

If you've never been to Snowshoe, it's a must. Amazing place to visit any time of year.  Bonus is the Cass Scenic Railroad is there as well. Cant recommend that place enough. 

Note that the surrounding area is a "radio silence zone" meaning no cell service. I recommend downloading your map before traveling to that area. One wrong turn (get it?) and you'll be in trouble. 

Good to see a major event in the making.  I am hoping the Carolinas will step up to the plate and offer similar things here.

In reply to Scotty Con Queso :

I never had, so I'm looking forward to getting up there with the family. Hope to find some good hiking trails, biking, sightseeing, and restaurants.  Thanks for the tip about cell service!

Mentioned this to my wife.  She didn't immediately say no.  Asked the cost then followed up with "And you can use the RX7?"  Seemed promising until she said "you'll be careful, right?"

This sounds pretty rad!  I've yet to do a hilclimb and this seems like a nice entry point.  I'd want to spend one day, maybe 1.5, doing hillclimb stuff and the rest of the trip exploring the area (and keep my wife from getting bored).  I wonder how that would jive with their format?

edit: wife's response - "I would be down to do that, but what would we drive?"  We're off to a good start :)

ralleah said:

J.A. Ackley said:

West Virginia and neighboring Kentucky are definitely making moves to do more motorsport activities. Stay tuned for more.

They're also making moves to restrict the rights of many motorsports enthusiasts. For example , one of the 30 anti-trans bills in this year's WV state legislature would send me to jail for attending the hill climb if kids are there. That is not hyperbole. Both of the regular sites for my home region rallyx,wdcr scca, are in WV.

That's good (and sad) to know, since OVR co-runs with SWVR and one of my friends who is interested in rallycross is trans.

Here's the view heading up Spruce Knob:

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

ralleah said:

J.A. Ackley said:

West Virginia and neighboring Kentucky are definitely making moves to do more motorsport activities. Stay tuned for more.

They're also making moves to restrict the rights of many motorsports enthusiasts. For example , one of the 30 anti-trans bills in this year's WV state legislature would send me to jail for attending the hill climb if kids are there. That is not hyperbole. Both of the regular sites for my home region rallyx,wdcr scca, are in WV.

That's good (and sad) to know, since OVR co-runs with SWVR and one of my friends who is interested in rallycross is trans.

I think you have my email if you wanted to pass it along to your friend (or my IG). 

For those familiar with Snowshoe, would I be making a big mistake to choose lodging at the base of the hill rather than the Village up top?  The price is nearly double to stay in the village. 

Lof8 - Andy said:

For those familiar with Snowshoe, would I be making a big mistake to choose lodging at the base of the hill rather than the Village up top?  The price is nearly double to stay in the village. 

Guess it will depend on how the event is setup and what all they're closing, as far as roads. 

Humourous snowshoe aside: packing my suburban up after a long weekend vacation snowboarding out of a rental cabin in BFE near snowshoe, my roommate at the time, totally intentionally, locked the doors on my idling truck after she put her bag in. 

Locked us right out of the truck. Running. Local pop a lock type guy took over an hour. And she defended the decision: "didn't want my bag to get stolen."

By who?! We're in the middle of the berkeleying woods!

In reply to Lof8 - Andy :

If you're looking to be in the action, yeah.  Snowshoe is set up so that everything is at the top of the mountain.  Resort, lodging, bars, restaurants, parking.  I think the only thing at the base of the mountain is the golf course.  

In reply to Puddy46 :

Would you happen to know if the bars and restaurants all open during the summer? 

In reply to jfaz :

Unfortunately I don't.   I've only been there during the winter to ski.  

In reply to jfaz :

Some are, yes. When we stayed at Cass last summer, we went up to Snowshoe and had a pizza. 4-5 restaurants, shopping, all open. Definitely not as vibrant as winter, but still lively enough.  I think there was even a band playing. 

I think the big summer activity is mountain biking. Or at least that was the big event while I was there.  

Trying to talk myself into driving the miata down from Seattle for this. 

Scotty Con Queso said:

In reply to jfaz :

Some are, yes. When we stayed at Cass last summer, we went up to Snowshoe and had a pizza. 4-5 restaurants, shopping, all open. Definitely not as vibrant as winter, but still lively enough.  I think there was even a band playing. 

I think the big summer activity is mountain biking. Or at least that was the big event while I was there.  

Yes.  Snowshoe usually hosts a World Cup event there in July, but this year they were taken off the schedule in lieu of Lake Placid.  It's a great mtb community! 

I've seen some posts from Adam Bambach (one of the organizers) indicating that the ruleset is going to be fairly lax and that someone can bring a street car and proper helmet and do the hillclimb.   I reached out ot him to see if I can put a passenger in my car (my wife) and he's checking with USAC.  That'll likely be the determining factor if I make the effort to get up there.

If I can take passengers on a hillclimb I will drop everything to be there. I've been climbing for seven years now and it's never been possible.