Quick tour of the DirtFish facility today.

[edrach]

I might as well get this posted up before Turbone beats me to it. We went out to the DirtFish Rally School facility today in Snoqualmie. Great site for playing and they are moving toward being ready to open the school to students shortly (although they are already getting advance students in now). Lots of potential here and and they plan to use all of it.

 

They are currently re-furbishing the main building of the previous Weyerhauser owners for classrooms and potential meeting halls for clubs and perhaps a joint start/finish location for TSD rally and other motorsports activities.

 

They toured us around their garage and we got to inspect some of the cars they use for the school. Also drove around the grounds for some of the rally roads they are currently using for the school. Lots of land for expansion for that purpose.

 

We watched the slalom exercise with some current students and two of the instructors came by and offered a few of us a ride around the slalom course. Fortunately, I had brought my helmet and was lucky enough to sit next to Forest Duplessis for a couple of runs around the shortend course.

 

I found it doubly interesting since I had co-driven stage rallies in my youth and never had the chance to watch the driver's technique since I was too focussed on the route book, mileages, time and so forth. Today I had the opportunity to watch the driver's technique from the perspective of a learning rallycross driver. It was great fun. Thank you Forest!

 

More information at their website: http://www.dirtfish.com/

Edited September 4, 2010 by edrach

[carfreak85]

Any word on weather or not they plan to run events up there? Doubtful, but I'd like to get into rallyX, however all the events are several hours away. It sure would be nice to only have to drive 45 minutes to race...

[edrach]

Any word on weather or not they plan to run events up there? Doubtful, but I'd like to get into rallyX, however all the events are several hours away. It sure would be nice to only have to drive 45 minutes to race...

They would like to establish a rallyX area and run those events but there are some hurdles they need to overcome. Also, they really need to establish their core business first before attending to the rallyX issue.

[renob123]

I'm happy to see anything that makes rally bigger (or makes NASCAR smaller) in the US . I'm still skeptical of this new school, though. I don't see how they can hand over high-power rally cars to beginners and have them run through a few stages. Rally America doesn't allow that, and I assume it's for a good reason. I'm worried that the school will end up charging a bunch of money for people to do donuts in the mud somewhere, which makes my favorite sport more like NASCAR.

 

I certainly hope I'm wrong, though.

 

Jacob

[Turbone]

They are still in the process of getting sponsors, etc. They are attracting a lot of interest, some from larger corporations. Some of the events they were talking about will be specifically for corporations. Team building type weekends, that sort. I think that cost might drop with a group, so if several people sign up for a day class prices might be doable. I dont think they will have any problem with providing Group N cars, I saw the garage and parts room :-p

They also may have a different class of car for the people going to the one day class, the hi power cars for weekend class (I'm not 100% sure on this).

But regardless, I'm sure you will get your $ worth.

I've already told (Ms) Santa what I want for X-Mas.

[edrach]

I've already told (Ms) Santa what I want for X-Mas.

You really want to do this in the winter???

[ShawnW]

I'm happy to see anything that makes rally bigger (or makes NASCAR smaller) in the US . I'm still skeptical of this new school, though. I don't see how they can hand over high-power rally cars to beginners and have them run through a few stages. Rally America doesn't allow that, and I assume it's for a good reason. I'm worried that the school will end up charging a bunch of money for people to do donuts in the mud somewhere, which makes my favorite sport more like NASCAR.

 

I certainly hope I'm wrong, though.

 

Jacob

 

While I fully feel that Nascar stinks I want everyone to remember that support for racing, racing venues, safety, insurance, the whole works come from a group effort on all types of racing. Support all of it and the whole ends up better off.

We learn from Nascar, motocross, and everything else to make Rallycross better. Supporting SCCA, RallyAmerica and any other sanctioning body will help the other ones. People are taking our racing venues away far too fast.

Being skeptical about what this company is addressing for safety and insurance is very valid. Make sure they join forces with the local Scca Rallycross group to make it safe, within standards, and insured so that it continues.

[renob123]

While I fully feel that Nascar stinks I want everyone to remember that support for racing, racing venues, safety, insurance, the whole works come from a group effort on all types of racing. Support all of it and the whole ends up better off. We learn from Nascar, motocross, and everything else to make Rallycross better.

 

I respectfully disagree. If NASCAR never came to be, I think that there is enough interest in racing that another form (maybe rally) would be just as big and provide the same benefits (if any) that NASCAR does now. I learned how to turn left in driver's ed, so I'm not sure what NASCAR has taught us that any other motorsport couldn't teach us if it were as popular. Surely something like the HANS device would still have become common if F1, for example, were big and NASCAR never came to its current form.

 

Since we're both American, we're both allowed to disagree with each other and vote with our dollars. I try my damnedest to not purchase anything that sponsors NASCAR. It pains me to buy Mobile1, but then, one time I went back into the store to exchange some garbage bags I bought that had the logo on them. I don't drink $hitty beer, so that's never been a problem:)

 

Supporting SCCA, RallyAmerica and any other sanctioning body will help the other ones. People are taking our racing venues away far too fast.

Being skeptical about what this company is addressing for safety and insurance is very valid. Make sure they join forces with the local Scca Rallycross group to make it safe, within standards, and insured so that it continues.

 

Agreed, and thanks for expressing some of my concerns better than I could:) I think it's a good first step for them to invite a looooooooong-time rally supporter like edrach out to view the facility.

 

Jacob

 

P.S. Why doesn't the US have anything like Isle of Man TT? I saw it on Discovery HD Theater and about crapped my pants!

[edrach]

Agreed, and thanks for expressing some of my concerns better than I could:) I think it's a good first step for them to invite a looooooooong-time rally supporter like edrach out to view the facility.

 

Jacob

 

I was with a group of nasioc folks. They didn't invite just me, but Jeanne and I were fortunate to be included in this group.