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What It's All About
The 2010 Escape To Wisconsin Road Rally took place on Saturday, April 17, 2010 in St. Croix and Pierce counties on the western edge of Wisconsin. The event was hosted by the Alpha Romeo Owners Club (AROC). This type of road rally is intended to provide a fun country drive along with some basic rally challenges.
The route began in Hudson, WI with the halfway point at Ellsworth, WI and finished in Woodville, WI. It covered a total of 108 miles, took about 3:20 hrs and averaged around 32.5 MPH, including all stops.
This was a Time Distance Speed (TDS ) event with prescribed start/arrival times, distances and speeds. The object is to arrive on time at each ECZ, not too soon or too late, otherwise points are levied. It is not a race, but sometimes you need to make up time if you become delayed. Cars should be able to stay well within the speed limit. You depart from the BCZ at the given time according to your clock, drive a specified distance to each control point at the specified average speed or CAST until reaching the ECZ, where a worker hands you a time slip.
The correct course at each intersection is determined by applying the following priority list in the order shown.
1. Proceed as
directed by the numbered
instruction.
The Experience
The class we entered was D/HD, stock - novice (no special equipment or experience). We used a digital clock that displays seconds and you synch it to the event master's official time. I picked one up at Walgreen's for $12.99! You need to have a clipboard, pencils and a calculator can come in handy. A compass was not required at all with this type of event.
Each checkpoint zone is just a short distance within each leg. You are only timed between the BCZ's and ECZ's. The length of each zone averaged 1.7 miles and that was the only segment on the leg where you had to maintain the specified average speed or CAST. It didn't matter if you arrived early at the BCZ, as long as you departed at your correct time and maintained average speed.
Weather was postcard perfect along the countryside of Wisconsin's western boundary. Rarely saw any other cars on the roads. It was our first road rally and didn't quite understand the sequencing of events. (Helps to read up beforehand.) We were really just out to enjoy the drive and learn about rallying, but soon got hooked. Finding our way was easy thanks to accurate directions, within tenths of a mile, and using your car's odometer. (Yes, some competitors actually use special equipment.)
Turns out, I synched our clock wrong and was off by a full minute on almost every leg... nice job Stace! Toward then end of the rally we compensated for the lost minute and were able to make an ECZ within 0.02 minutes.
Subsequently, we finished last. Our hosts told us told we did well as beginners by not getting lost the entire trip. There was a Jaguar that dropped out. However, we won the booby prize for dead last... a six pack of Rogue Dead Guy Ale.
Deb was an excellent navigator and read all instructions perfectly. We only made two wrong turns but were able to correct course within a few seconds. It was a lot of fun and Deb can't wait to do it again!
The Route
(Click on "Map" view and zoom buttons to see all highways in detail.) |
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Line by line instructions Note: Official time synchronized with WWV shortwave radio
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