Targa Rally Day 2 – Attending Racing School

All day. Which is a long time to sit still. Team Nissan was seated in a row at the back.

When the presentation talked about to how to protest something you didn’t like (a score, or a penalty), Michael Vaughn leans over and whispers, “I’m going to protest your car Sunday night”, and I lost it. Good one.

Race Details:

The goal of the game is to have the least amount of points.

The course is about 2,200 km long, peppered with 42 stages, each of which is between 0.7 – 24 km long.

There are 3 classes, and I’m in the middle one, “Grand Touring”. There’s about 40 cars competing in total, and 12 in my class.

Apparently the roads are nuts: no guard rails around hairpin turns hovering above mega rocks and the ocean. The whole province gets into this race, neat eh; everyone ropes off their front yard, and we race through suburbs and town centres. I could knock on that door while passing by.

It’s a Time-Speed-Distance game, it’s not only about going fast. It’s brisk, but not like the top class which travels 200+ km/h. Max I’m allowed to go is 130 km/h -ish.

And you can’t just speed through the course, stop and wait, then glide across the finish line right on time, because there’s interim time control people hiding the bushes, watching for this. Really.

There I am in the official brochure!

Michel and I sharing the driving though, to be clear (wasn’t for my lack of pitching.)

Told you I was going to wear the same thing every day.

Day 2 of class tomorrow.

Hope we learn more navigational math, I’m still unclear about those formulas.

 

 

 

Targa Rally Day 1 – Arrived and Installed in NWFLD

Hi hi from St. John’s, Newfoundland.

Here’s my home for the next 10 days.

We all arrived late afternoon, got ourselves installed into our hotel rooms.

It’s so true what they say about the people here, eh.

Then we went to pick up our cars.

That’s the hashtag – #TeamNissanTarga

L-R: Danny Bailey, Michael Vaughn, me, Michel Crépault.

Finally I can introduce you to my partner, Michel!

He’s a fellow auto journalist out of Quebec, and it’s a good pairing, him and I. A well-balanced duo.

Day 1 of Racing School starts tomorrow at 8am.

There is a lot to learn, because I know nothing about rallies. But like okay… I can drive, I’ll learn some navigational-math, a new language (rally speak! Ex: you never say “right”, instead say “check”), and tada.

TTYT

All Targa posts are filed under this blog tag: #NissanMicraTarga

Oh!

I’m ranking #1 in Google for ‘Nissan Targa Rally’ ha.

Now the trick is to maintain that.

 

 

Leaving for Targa NWFLD Rally in 36 hrs, Freaking

In 36 hours, I’m going to compete in Canada’s biggest rally race, for which Nissan has outfitted me with a car, kit AND support staff for both logistics and mechanics, I know nothing about this sport.

My only rally experience was a few months ago, when I got to do the Mazda Adventure Rally. Where I won the Daniel Boone Award, for being last to return to base every. single. day.

But then I think, it’s okay, there is really only one thing to know:

Don’t crash the car Keri, do not crash this car.

Plus my life’s still unsettled from the move.

There’s more to this owning-a-house thing than you think going in, eh. Still don’t have furniture, think my washing machine is broken, and I’m nervous to leave my house alone for the first time.

Then my mind just seized up, and for the last 45 minutes I’ve been pacing between the laptop, and an open suitcase… GUYS.

That’s all I have packed, but the decals came out amazing, good and thick. The Decal Zone made them.

First time I’ve held my URL IRL

And my hair is looking great, thanks Kaila! Brennen Demelo Studio. Go too: 416-301-1072

My Itinerary

Tuesday – day off blogging, deadline at newspaper, finish ‘Auto About’ page, forgot to buy things and other errands

Wednesday – fly 12 pm, team dinner

Thursday – Day 1 of Rally Racing School

Friday – Day 2 of Rally Racing School

Saturday – don’t know

Sunday – official practice day, thankful this day exists

Monday – Friday – RACE 7am – 5pm, 6pm auditorium meet & greet, dinner, study next days route book

Took time off from the newspaper, blog will be updated daily, will try for lots of video.

My helmet arrived Friday.

It’s been modified -a microphone and ear-plugs, to a plug out the back that I connect to a radio, to talk to my driving partner.

kk I feel more normal-brained now, blogging it helped. Blog. Because of this blog, here we go on a once-in-a-lifetime $30k race car extravaganza. Got goosebumps typing that.

Starting Wednesday afternoon,
I’ll be living in another world for 10 days.
TTY from there, then!

Where this post came from.

And the good luck gift I got myself: Targa shoes.

Twitter@KeriBlog

Facebook – Keri CDN

Blog tag – #NissanMicraTarga

I’m car # 1998.