Words: Alan Ockwell
Photos: Andrew Harvey

It started, like most adventures, with a
phone call.

In the week following the New England
Forest Rally, and the subsequent announcement that Boris Said and Pat Moro
would round out the field of qualifiers, Otis Dimiters and I learn that we are
the first alternate for the rally car racing
competition in X Games 13.

It is the worst possible position because
we aren’t in or out for sure. We have
to make the decision to go to Los Angeles in case somebody can’t make the
start. Rally America, the organizing group,
wants a substitute on site in case they are presented with this scenario, but
we aren’t sure that the cost/benefit analysis will be favourable. We ask for some funds to cover our expenses,
but that request is turned down. With
this in mind, we decide to enter Rally West Virginia instead, which is much
closer to home and significantly cheaper to run.

Tuesday,
July 31
Jump practice at Lake Elsinore motocross
park. The organizers have built a
replica of the crossover jump to be used at the Home Depot Center in the actual
race. Ramana Lagemann has a very
spectacular end-over-end rollover when his Mitsubishi doesn’t soak up the
landing of the jump. The car is badly
damaged and it’s unlikely that he will have it repaired for Sunday’s main
event.

Later that afternoon, my phone rings. It’s Otis.

“Pack your bags, we’re going to Los
Angeles.”
–“Are you serious?”

Our chances of making it into the
competition have taken a dramatic turn. However, we are now faced a new set of problems: Otis is holed up at Autosport Engineering in
Michigan with the rally car, and the truck is parked at North Coast Subaru in
New York City.

I send out a call for help to our team’s
mailing list. Angelo, Peter, and my
brother Erik are able to go on short notice. Andrew Harvey, photographer extraordinaire, is coming with us. Flights are booked and hotel rooms are
reserved. We hammer out a movement
plan, catch up on X Games announcements, and try to figure out just what the
hell is going on.

Otis calls Arek, one of our regular crew
members. Arek and his wife Ewa will
make a mad dash to North Coast on Wednesday morning, grab the truck, and make a
break for Michigan.

2,900 miles to go.

Wednesday,
August 1
Arek and Ewa arrive in the evening, help
Otis put the finishing touches on the car, and get a full night’s sleep before
leaving bright and early the next morning. It is the only full night’s sleep they will have all week.

Those of us still at home spend the next
few days sorting out some logistical issues: withdrawing from Rally West
Virginia, coordinating crew arrivals and pickups, arranging the load-in of our
gear on Friday night, figuring out who to contact, tracking down a HANS device,
chasing potential sponsors – the list is long and never seems to end. Ananda Sivert from Rally America bends over
backwards to help us find what we need. We owe him a big thank-you.

2,300 miles to go.

Thursday,
August 2
While the truck makes its way west, on the
left coast the teams are out practicing the course. We receive an update from Los Angeles – not only is Ramana going
to be ready for the main event, he’ll be able to practice on Friday. Our “sure thing” participation suddenly
isn’t so sure. Our team members,
scattered throughout Toronto, New York, Connecticut and rural Nebraska, starts
to ask ourselves whether this last-minute dash across the country will be for
nothing.

Otis and Arek take turns behind the wheel
and drive through the night.

1,530 miles to go.

Friday,
August 3
The truck is overheating on Friday
afternoon but Otis and Arek press on regardless. The teams have another three hour practice session today. We receive another update – Antoine L’Estage
has rolled. We might be back in the
game after all.

550 miles to go.

Late Friday afternoon, Peter arrives at the
Home Depot Center, the venue for the rally car event. He is collecting our credentials when we receive some encouraging
news – the truck has arrived in Los Angeles. They manage to get everything moved into the service area before heading
back to the hotel and crashing for the night.

Saturday,
August 4
Peter, Otis, Arek and Ewa spend Saturday
catching up on the ever-changing rules, course layout and competition. The rest of the team – Angelo, Erik, Andrew,
Lauren and myself – arrive in Los Angeles on Saturday afternoon. We learn that L’Estage has repaired his car
and will be ready for tomorrow’s race. We feel like vultures waiting for someone to die.

Sunday,
August 5

We’re all exhausted from the travel, but
Sunday doesn’t offer us a chance to rest. The crew is awake at 4:30am to move our gear to the floor of the Home
Depot Center. Otis and I are able to
sleep for a couple more hours, but it isn’t enough. Last night was a late night even without any competition.

Practice is supposed to start at 8:00,
followed by two hours of media rides. We planned to do as many runs as possible. Our competitors have had three full days of testing, which
allowed them over a dozen runs on the paved courses plus a full day on the
practice jump. We’re coming in cold and
we need every second of seat time that we can get.

Unfortunately for us, construction delays
push the schedule back, and we’re only able to complete a single practice
run. We have no problems with the
crossover jump, but we suffer some damage on the ramp exiting the stadium,
cracking the radiator and bending the subframe. However, Antoine L’Estage – our competitor on the practice run –
badly damages his Hyundai on re-entering the stadium. He is facing major repairs and he doesn’t have a lot of time to
make them. Antoine has to be ready for
the parade lap or else we will take his place. We’re on pins and needles, counting down the minutes, until we find out
whether we will be participants or spectators.

It’s going down to the wire. Antoine’s mechanics are frantically trying
to rebuild the front end of his car. We
go through the motions of getting ready to race, just in case. We put on our helmets and get in our car as
the line for the parade lap starts to form. Half the field has started the parade lap when a Rally America official
walks up to our car and taps the hood.

“Otis, you’re in.”

Antoine was originally paired up with
Andrew Comrie-Picard in the qualifying round. Since Antoine couldn’t take the start, we will face off against
ACP.

We make our way to the start line. Otis is nervous. I remind him of his lengthy rallycross history and how
those
skills will translate well in this type of event. In the back of my mind, I’m thinking that we’ve only seen the
course once, and Andrew is a very skilled driver, so we have an uphill battle
ahead of us. We can do it, but we’ll
need a bit of luck.

The lights go out and we hit the gas. Over the crossover and out of the
stadium. The gap jump is exhilarating –
I look out the window as a very small Mitsubishi races underneath us. Otis nails the jump, clears the ramp without
any problems, and has a clean run through the first tarmac section.

We re-enter the stadium in a very close
race with ACP. We cross the line and start
the run under the crossover jump. Something’s
wrong. The car is down on power and
won’t accelerate like it should. We
have a boost leak, possibly a result of our hard landing in practice. Otis makes the most of the available power
but there’s only so much that he can do.

Our X Games is over as suddenly as it
begun. Worse yet, the skateboarding ran
long, so our race receives zero coverage on the TV broadcast.

The whole week has been an emotional
rollercoaster, but especially now that the race is over. I’m happy that we got the chance to compete,
and even though we lost, I’m relatively pleased with the result. Considering the boost problem and having a
single practice lap, Otis drove really well – the best he could under the
circumstances.

The crew guys are proud of Otis, too, but
they’re pissed off that we didn’t get any TV coverage. We have worked extremely hard and sacrificed
a lot to get here, but we have nothing to show for it.

Otis is extremely disappointed. It’s something we have never seen from him,
even when we have been hit with bad luck before. It’s hard to pinpoint the cause. Does he feel he drove poorly? Is it the lack of TV exposure? Or is it the price tag of towing across
the country for two laps in a stadium? We can’t figure out the answer.

Looking
Back
Would we do it again? Probably. When Lagemann crashed, it seemed virtually certain that we would
compete. It would be very hard to walk
away from an opportunity like that.

Will we be back next year? The circumstances would have to be very
different, and right now that’s too early to say. But we would certainly consider the opportunity if it came up.

Was it worth it? This is the toughest question of all.

From a financial perspective, we should
have stayed home. The X Games is
incredibly expensive – we could have run two eastern national events for the
same price. And we didn’t get the coverage
that we had hoped to receive. We’ll
have to tell our own story. 

On the flip side, the memories will last a
lifetime. Some day we can tell our
grandchildren that we had the chance to compete in the X Games. The banzai run across the country and the
quick coordination of our whole team proved to ourselves that we are capable of
accomplishing a seemingly impossible task. And being in the stadium was unforgettable – the fans, the crashes, the
controversy and the fierce battles.

 But was it worth
it? I don’t think we can answer
that question right now. Having said
that, I don’t think any of us regret making the trip. I’m pretty confident that in a few months we’ll look back on our
X Games adventure and consider it worthwhile.

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

All Rights reserved – Andrew Harvey (www.andrewharvey.ca)

Tanner Foust and Chrissie Beavis
(SYMS) took first place overall, leaving second place to Ken Block and
Alex Gelsomino. Third place went to Travis Pastrana and Christian
Edstrom, who competed for bronze against Ramana Lagemann and Mark
Williams.

Chrissie Beavis was all smiles after winning gold. "I’m really happy. It all happened in such a short time."

Alex Gelsomino was proud to bring home silver this year. "It was a
close battle. Tanner deserves to win. We tried our best and we will be
back next year."

Things could have been a lot different if the racers had the chance
to compete for the alloted four hours this morning, says Gelsomino. Teams only got to practice the full course once this morning, due to the fact that the course wasn’t ready.

Colin McRae’s co-driver, Carolyn Bosley, was happy, but they never got to go over the jump!
Colin is disappointed – they were aiming for a top 3 finish.
McRae/Bosley plan to be back next year, but that would mean having to
qualify for the X Games.  [Ed. - Perhaps we'll see a Scotsman in the Rally America series for a few rounds next year?]

Discuss X Games in the FORUM…

by Catherine Woods.
Photos: Andrew Harvey

Photo: ArtPartPhoto

LOS ANGELES – Tanner Foust, a stunt driver on movie screens this weekend in “The Bourne Ultimatum,” surged ahead in the home stretch to take the checkered flag – and the gold – in the Rally Car Racing Super Special competition, the final event of ESPN X Games 13.

Rally Car, which features a driver and a co-driver racing street legal cars on closed sections of roads called “stages,” is in its second year at X Games, and this year’s race marked the first time teams raced head-to-head. They did so before a sellout crowd at The Home Depot Center.

Foust and co-driver Chrissie Beavis led early in the final race but lost the lead to Ken Block and his co-driver Alessandro Gelsomino – only to blast forward in the last inches of the course and cross the finish line .68 seconds ahead of Block and Gelsomino.

“[Block] was leading us going out, and on the way back he must have caught bad breaks because he got really close and I was thinking ‘Oh my gosh, there’s no dust at the finish line, we might have a chance at this,’ ” Foust said afterwards.

“Big finishes somehow always happen at the X Games,” Foust shrugged.

Travis Pastrana, the Moto X Freestyle legend of double backflip fame, said recently that Rally Car Racing now occupies “99.9” percent of his time. During a semi final heat, Pastrana crossed into Foust’s lane in a similar push for the finish line, and was disqualified. He later took the bronze in a heat run to determine third place.

“I thought [Foust] might be a little bit ahead – I just totally overtook that corner a little bit, and completely ran right through the barrier,” Pastrana said. “They made a call, and we’ve been on the other side of calls a lot…we’ll take it – we’re still at the podium.”