We're in the planning stages for a Rally venue in mid-west Georgia, and I'd like your opinions on what you'd like to see. The plan is to have a RallyCross circuit for wheel-to-wheel racing, a Super Special Stage/Race of Champions layout (think X-Games if you don't know those) and space for SCCA RallyCross events as well. This poll is simply to help us get an idea of what the community wants so we know where to get started. Thanks for your input.
Lol. Thanks. Is this something that you guys have wanted for a while? Admittedly, there hasn't been much interest in organized Rally in the Southeast, but I know that people go out and have a BLAST on back roads all the time. We plan to harness that enthusiasm and give everyone a quality facility in which to compete.
No need as both options will eventually be available. We just need to know what you guys want us to build first.
We've uttered that statement in many a meeting. We're short a corn filed though ... it's currently just a pasture. Less work for us, I guess?
Awesome! This is something I have wanted to see done since early 2000. No one / company has ever been able to make it work though. For us, the closest Rally-X's are in TN and AL. I'd rather see the typical SCCA style Rally-X setup and the opportunity for proper Rally style staging (not wheel to wheel).
Our first approach was to run staged rallies, but we simply don't have the acreage for that. A small staged rally weekend takes place on 100+ acres and we are shy of 50. We do have plans for a SCCA RallyCross area and hope that it takes off, but the SCCA doesn't have a strong presence in the area. That will have to be built up over time and hopefully will in parallel with the success of the defined rally arenas. Also, SCCA groups are welcome to use the ~.75 mile RallyCross circuit for solo runs if they wish to do so. That will all work itself out in time. The Super Special Stage layout is the best compromise we can accommodate between wheel-to-wheel competition and solo RallyCross. This will not be an extreme X-Games style course, but more of a tame WRC Super Special Stage. There will be a bridge for the crossover with a low grade to keep all 4 tires on the dirt and a wide breadth between lanes to keep the drivers safe. We plan to require minimal barriers as to keep the cars safe as well. Personally, I'm very excited about the SSS as it's a really cool mix of drag racing, Pro Solo and RallyCross. It will hopefully be a draw for competitors from all of those disciplines.
I think that if you make it wheel to wheel you drastically increase your risks as promoters. I'm also pretty sure that my insurance is voided if I ever participate in any wheel to wheel racing with my car. And dont you have to have special licenses to actually race in wheel to wheel races? I'd be all over this if it was a standard rallyx but the fact that I'll be out there with a noob who may be a worse driver than me I'm going to say no I'm not interested.
For the circuit racing, yes, a competition license is required. There will be safety requirements for those competitors and the cars. We are in no way expecting novices in street cars to compete in wheel-to-wheel RallyCross. We do not have a final word on the SSS as far as safety requirements and insurance. In all honesty, the SSS is less wheel-to-wheel than drag racing at your local 1/4 mile track. The cars run heads-up, but in their own individual lanes which are separated by a minimum distance or barriers.
im assuming tho that this would be like any other racing venue, where the participants would sign waivers and would basically be waiving any and ALL rights to insurance claims. the track wouldnt be liable for a thing
It will be near Manchester, GA. Yes, participants will sign waivers, but we must sill have insurance. Workers, spectators, etc will likely need to be covered by our insurance, regardless of any wavier.
Are you leasing the land? I know there are quite a few land owners who might be willing to work something out from my old land management days.
We will most likely work with Rally America as they have shown the most support in these early stages. SCCA has expressed no interest and we have yet to hear a final word from NASA. I feel that they will come around once the venue nears completion.
Isn't kinda premature to post anything until you get a sanctioning body? I mean the sanction body is gonig to determine rules, course layout, protocols, safety equipment, license etc etc....
We are gauging interest currently. There are several steps that have to be taken before we present layout, financials, safety, etc to a sanctioning body. We need to know: Is there actually a market here? What can we build based on the geography of the land? Is it worth the cost to pursue? That said, RA has stated that they are willing to work with us on a grassroots level to get the venue up and running. This includes sanction and insurance.
I hate to be the buzzkill here but I will predict that nothing will ever come of this. We have a thread like this every other year, and all it does is get our hopes up for nothing. I would love to see a rally circuit built in GA, but I don't really expect it to happen. If you can make this happen, fantastic, just pointing out that this is not the first time someone came here to propose a rally circuit, etc... That said, my suggestion, and I doubt it can ever happen, would be to work at getting a mountain road closed for a day to do time trials. They do this in PA each year at Black Mountain or Blood Mountain, or whatever it is named. They close off a route in the mountain for the entire day and do time trials up and down. There are many good mountain roads in the area that would make for a lot of fun not having to worry about crossing the double yellow line or cops. As with the events you are describing, a racing license and probably roll cage would be required, with your rule out a lot of us.
I understand your concern, and you might be right. There is a chance that nothing will come of this if the answers to the question posed above are unfavorable. And, I know that people "plan" to build things all of the time. Your approach is well justified. I had this discussion with one of the team yesterday actually. It's so much different on our end ... it's very real and exciting. We have the land, a great, diverse team and the means to start building something tomorrow if we really wanted to. There are loaders, tractors, backhoes, etc. sitting on the land right now ready to start cutting in the beginnings of a course. I understand that you all cannot know this, and have been duped in the past. Given that, the responses I've received here have been very helpful and honestly more positive than I expected. I'm surprised that it took this long for someone to just come out and say it as plainly as you have.
Ok let me put it to you this way... Say I'm interested in W2W Rally racing... how am I suppose to get a racing License? Do I get a NASA or SCCA Club racing license and assume that works? What happens when your sanctioning body doesn't take a NASA or SCCA license and I'm out a double weekend race school ($400-$800)? What if I have to go a stage rally school and the license school is only offered during certain parts of the year? What if I want to start building a car? What are the rules and classing? What if I build a car that cannot be classes or is badly underclassed. The questions go on and on and on.... With out of basic idea of what the rules and regulations will be how can anybody be definitely interested. I'm sure can find some intersted but the hard core hillclimb and rallyx folks with fully built cars wouldn't commit to anything unless they know exactly what the rules and regs will be for the this new event.
Those are all good questions, and they will be answered once we work with Rally America on the answers. At this point, there is no way that we could answer any of that. As I said, we don't start by going directly to the sanctioner with these questions. We are meeting on location this weekend to go over a lot of things, including the proposed layout and if they will work as expected with the geography of the land. Once we have that nailed down, we will go over the estimates of how much this will actually cost based on those layouts, and what possible sponsorship opportunities there are for construction. We then take the comments from the community in to consideration to decide which course to build first. Then, we can move on to how we plan for this venture to actually make money. At that point, we can begin the detailed discussions with the sanctioner as they have requested this information before they can really give us any details of what they are willing to sanction and insure. If our ideas do not match, we go back to the drawing board to work out a compromise that we can agree on. At that point, we can likely answer the questions you have proposed. Again, we are very early in the process. If you are interested in the general rules outlined by Rally America, you can find them on their Web site ... http://www.rally-america.com/rules.php Please understand that we are not asking for hard numbers for competitors that will 100% be there for every event. We are gauging interest. We have no expectation that people will go out right now and start building cars or getting licenses for events at out venue.
100% interested in a local rallycross series. Similar to autocross, but offroad... I'm not at all interested in entering a wheel-to-wheel event. No way! Too much body damage!!! I think just about anyone could enter their car in a time-trial event, but only a few could afford something they could dent and rock chip all to hell, which a W2W event would cause. It would be more fun, but it would be really hard to find entrants. In fact, I just put together an entire different suspension/wheel/tire/skidplate setup just to enter the events in Alabama. If you had something in GA I'd enter every event.
I think you might have the wrong idea about what we want to do. Yes, we would like to offer a wheel-to-wheel RallyCross option for those drivers that want to compete at that level, but we don't see those competitors as our core group of visitors. We expect most visitors to be interested in the Super Special Stage course. The Super Special Stage is NOT a wheel-to-wheel event. Yes, it is a "heads-up" race against another driver, but the cars are in separate "lanes" and generally not beside one another except for the start and finish of the race. The lanes are separated by a distance of 30'+ or by barriers. So, imagine a drag race start leading to a 1:30 Solo RallyCross. The second driver technically starts at the midway point of your lap, and you at the midway point of his. The drivers swap "lanes" the first time over the start/finish and continue on to the second half of the track. The race is over after you cross the start/finish in your original "lane." I know the mention of "barriers" might scare some people, and that is fair. The SSS design will include solid barriers in 3 places ... the start/finish straight between the lanes, on the side of the bridge that will be built where the 2 "lanes" cross and the underpass of the bridge itself. All of these areas are straightaways. There may also be semi-permanent barriers (that will give with contact, but aid in keeping an out-of-control vehicle from entering the opposite "lane") in a few places on the course. These will be placed several feet off the inside shoulder of the outer "lane." This allows the most room for a vehicle in the inside "lane" to correct or come to a stop without assistance before reaching a barrier. So, to put it simply ... if you lose control in a corner where there is a semi-permanent barrier, you will have to slide across a 30+' lane, then a 25+' runoff area before reaching a barrier. This should prove difficult with cornering speeds in the range of 20 - 35 mph.