Winter storm Q moved through the Salem, MO area Thursday dumping snow, ice and freezing rain on the area making many people dub the 2013 100 Acre Wood Rally as Sno*Drift Remix Rally in the 100 Acre Wood. The snow on the roads made for some slippery conditions. Some rally teams were a little unprepared and forgot to pack snow tires and some even had trouble making it at all, but snow and ice does not stop rally!

Ken Block and Alex Gelsomino in their Hoonigan Racing Division Ford Fiesta had the unfortunate privilege of being first on the road. Even with the disadvantage of having to sweep the icy roads, Block jumped out to an early lead ahead of Antoine L’Estage and Nathalie Richard in their Rockstar Mitsubishi EVO X and David Higgins and Craig Drew in their Subaru STi. Stage 6 would change all of that. Early in the stage Block went off the road crashing through a gate and hitting a tree. He was able to limp to the finish of the stage, but couldn’t complete the following one and was forced to restart Saturday under super rally rules. Stage 6 would also claim L’Estage after springing a coolant leak on stage 4, his engine overheated and he was forced to retire from the rally. This bumped Joseph Burke into 2nd place, behind Higgins at the end of the first day.

More bad luck was in store for Block, as he suffered a throttle issue on stage 10 and was once again forced to retire. Block’s retirement meant Higgins could coast to an easy victory, winning 9 of the last 10 stages. Burke and Alex Kihurani maintained 2nd place ahead of Lauchlin O’Sullivan and Scott Putnam who grabbed the last podium spot.

O’Sullivan also grabbed the Super Production victory over Evan Cline and Jake Blattner who finished second. David Sterckx and Karen Jankowski grabbed the final SP podium spot after suffering turbo boost issues and losing considerable speed which lead to Cline overtaking them on stage 15.

Andrew Comrie-Picard and Jeremy Wimpey battled with Dillon Van Way and Andrew Edwards until stage 11 when Van Way crashed out giving ACP’s Scion xD the victory in the 2WD class. Edward McNelly and Ole Holter grabbed 2nd place in their Ford Fiesta.

More photos in the 2013 100 Acre Wood Photo Gallery

For more info visit http://www.rally-america.com

It looks like Sebastien Loeb might have a challenge for the Driver’s Championship from his fellow countryman Sebastien Ogier. Ogier took the lead in the Driver’s Championship points with the victory at Rally Sweden and captured 3 bonus points by winning the Power Stage. His victory also marked the first win for the Volkswagen Polo R WRC team on only their second event. The win in Sweden was Ogier’s eighth WRC victory.

Ogier dominated the snow and ice packed stages of Sweden grabbing the lead from Loeb early on Friday and never letting go. Ogier said, “The win here was amazing but also a big surprise. We have spent so much time and effort with the team in preparation – all of last year – but we never expected to have this performance so soon. It couldn’t be better. This morning Sebastien was putting a lot of pressure on. He was flying into the stages. We tried to follow him without maximum risk but we had to push because he was so fast. To win like that is amazing!”

Loeb finished in second in his Citroen DS3 WRC car, making for a French 1-2. Loeb blamed a poor performance during the qualifying stage that determines start order for most of his struggles, but also credited Ogier with a ‘perfect rally.’ “We lost a lot because of that I think,” said Loeb. “We didn’t get a good road position, then we changed the car set-up to try and improve things but that led to two mistakes on the first day and the loss of about 30-seconds. Okay, Sebastien Ogier didn’t make any mistakes. He has done the perfect rally. There was nothing more I could do.”

Mads Ostberg had a scare early on Friday when the fluids of Ford Fiesta WRC car drained out onto the snow. But Mads was able to recover and take the final podium position, beating out Jari-Matti Latvala who grabbed his first Championship points after crashing out in Monte Carlo.

Mikko Hirvonen continued to struggle in 2013 finishing a disappointing 17th.

Petter Solberg made a brief return to WRC action, driving is beautiful Ford Escort MKII in the historical class.

Next up is Rally Mexico March 7-10. Visit wrc.com for more info.

The 2013 Rally America National Championship season kicked off in Atlanta, MI at the Sno*Drift Rally. As the name implies there was plenty of snow and ice to cause for some difficult road conditions which set the stage for a classic dogfight between Antoine L’Estage and Nathalie Richard’s Rockstar Mitsubishi EVO X and the reigning Rally America National Champion David Higgins and Craig Drew’s Subaru STi. After swapping stage wins and the lead multiple times on Friday, Higgins took a half second lead into the 2nd day. Higgins managed to hold on to his lead all the way through the 2nd day until the final stage. L’Estage pushed hard on the last stage and took the stage win by 7.6 seconds which was enough to surpass Higgins and take the victory.

“Those stages were maximum attack,” said L’Estage, “After we saw the time we gained on the (previous) 15 mile long stage we decided to go for it. Everything connected and we ended up winning.”

Crazy Leo Urlichich and co-driver Craig Williamson took the final podium spot in their Cam Jam Subaru STi. Ken Block and Alex Gelsomino also made an appearance, but suffered an electrical issue after a rock hit the alternator on their Hoonigan racing Division Monster Energy Ford Fiesta early on Day 1 and they were forced to restart under super rally rules on Day 2. Block was able to battle back for an impressive 6th place finish and taking stage wins on 6 of the 12 stages on the second day.

Evan Cline took the victory in Super Production over Mason Moyle. Cline and co-driver Jake Blattner lead SP from start to finish in their Exedy Clutches Subaru. Andrew Comrie-Picard and Jeremy Wimpey piloted their Scion XD to the victory in the 2WD class over Dillon Van Way and Andrew Edwards’ Ford Fiesta.

Click here for full results.

Reigning Rally America Champion David Higgins and the Subaru Rally Team USA unveiled their 2013 livery. Just in time for the first Rally America event of the season, Sno*Drift. Higgins and co-driver Craig Drew will be vying for their 3rd Rally America title in a 2012 Subaru STI prepared by Vermont Sportscar as the season kicks off in Michigan January 25-26.

For more info visit the Rally America website.

Ken Block unveiled the Hoonigan Racing Division yesterday, taking the place of his previous Monster World Rally Team. Block also unveiled the livery that will be on his Ford Fiesta for 2013. The livery is inspired by his love of ’80s and ’90s skateboarding. Block said, ““I’m stoked on how this livery and overall team aesthetic has turned out this year. With the name change to Hoonigan Racing Division, we wanted to take the look in a slightly different direction, one that has been inspired by my love of 80s and early 90s skateboarding graphics, as well as Miami Vice-era offshore powerboats and a dash of hair metal and old school hip hop mixed in for good measure. Much like we did in our years as MWRT, we’re continuing to try and lead and innovate in the motorsports marketing arena with this livery.”

Block also released his plans for the 2013 season. He plans on competing in the complete Rally America National series, the Global Rallycross series and the newly founded Global X Games competitions. For all those wondering if Block has given up on WRC, he said he hopes to compete in as many events as he did last year, three. I would count on an appearance at WRC Mexico, even though he doesn’t specify which events he would be competing at. It also looks like there will be another Octane Academy this year.

The 2013 WRC season kicked off in snowy Monte Carlo this past weekend. A lot of excitement surrounded the debut of the Volkswagen Polo R rally cars piloted by Sebastien Ogier and Jari-Matti Latvala. Both Ogier and Latvala showed that the car definitely has what it takes to hang with Citroen and Ford. Ogier took an impressive second place finish for the VW team, but to little surprise reigning champion Sebatien Loeb took the victory in his Citroen.

The victory was Loeb’s 77th WRC win. “I’m always happy when I win, and Monte-Carlo is one of the most exciting rallies I’ve done. This one was really, really difficult. The conditions were extreme compared to what we have usually and winning wasn’t easy.”

The conditions were indeed very tricky, with snow and ice on all stages and claimed multiple casualties. After hanging around the top 5 for most of the event, the snow and ice finally got Latvala and ended his VW debut on the final night. After Evgeny Novikov, Jari-Matti Latvala and Juho Hanninen all crashed out the organizers decided to cancel the final 2 stages due to safety concerns.

Dani Sordo returned to a Citroen driving for the Abu Dhabi team finishing in third. He battled with Novikov for most of the event until Novikov lost a wheel and was forced to retire, securing Sordo’s podium finish.

Mikko Hirvonen had a very frustrating rally, but the demise of Latavala and Novikov helped him to finish in 4th. Another Citroen piloted by Bryan Bouffier finished in 5th and Mads Ostberg was the first Ford to finish in 6th.

Next up is Rally Sweden on February 7-10. Check out wrc.com for more details.

2012 got off to a fast start with a trip to Rally America’s Rally in the 100 Acre Wood in Missouri. Some parts of the trip from a personal standpoint weren’t the best, but the rally and photography part of the trip were amazing from start to finish.

Maybe the most famous point of the 100 Acre Wood is the cattle guard crossing. Almost every car that crosses this points catches air and some get really high. This was my first time photographing this part of the rally and it definitely lived up to my expectations. It was easy to see why a lot of the drivers enjoy this stage so much.

The cattle guard crossing is made a bit more difficult when you only have 3 tires. Early during the stage Crazy Leo Urlichich got a puncture, but kept going. This resulted in the tire being ripped to shreds and was almost completely gone by the time they reached the jump. Even with only 3 tires his Subaru STi got off the ground and made a successful landing.

Some landings weren’t quite so sucessful. Monster World Rally Team driver Ken Block, got a lot of air but his landing wasn’t so graceful. Block’s Ford Fiesta landed nose first, but sustained little damage and was able to carry on.

The woods and forests surrounding the roads of the 100 Acre Wood Rally are amazing and made for some great photo opportunities. The lighting coming through the trees presented quite a challenge to capture a great photo, but when you got it right…

Then something crazy happened, literally. Crazy Leo came around the slight bend in the road in front of me and I immediately noticed something was wrong. The wheels on Leo’s STi were cross-eyed and he was heading straight at me. I quickly dashed out of the way as the car went into the trees right where I was standing just barely missing my camera bag I had left laying on the ground.

I immediately checked if Leo and his co-driver Carl Williamson were OK and luckily everyone was unharmed. The car on the other hand was done. Leo and Carl were stuck on the stage until all the other cars had gone through, so we made the most of it. Leo took some time to relax and reflect on the day.

This wasn’t Leo’s or Carl’s first off, so they decided there was reason to celebrate the fact that neither of them was injured.

All in all it turned out to be quite a great experience and I had a lot of fun meeting 2 great guys. I also was awarded a broken fog light cover off the car, which Carl and Leo both autographed for me. “Thanks David! P.S. Sorry for nearly killing you!”

I then moved onto a stage held at a park in a small town in Missouri. The cars make 2 trips around the access road that runs through the park. This stage is run annually and a large rut was still left from the previous years rally.

That rut helped Ken Block who was pushing hard to get his Ford Fiesta up on 2 wheels.

I will definitely be back to the woods of Winnie the Pooh, Tigger and Eeyore next year for another great rally event. For more photos from the event visit the 2012 100 Acre Wood Rally Gallery.

For historical PAX values visit Rick Ruth’s PAX/RTP page

The first day of competition claimed last year’s winner, Antoine L’Estage who had to retire after stage 4 due to transmission failure. Crazy Leo (Leonid Urlichich) suffered a puncture early on stage 1 which put him out of the running, but had made his way back up to 4th spot, behind Krzysztof Holowczyc. But the battle would be between Higgins and Block on day 2.

Block took the first stage, but then suffered 2 punctures and significant damage to his left front fender on the 2nd stage and Higgins took the stage win by 42 seconds over Block. The 2 battled all day, but Block pushed even harder on the last 2 stages and took the victory by 29.3 seconds over Higgins who finished 2nd overall. The victory extended Block’s streak to 6 victories in 6 appearances. Third place went to 3 time Polish Rally Champion Krzysztof Holowczyc.

Lauchlin O’Sullivan put together an impressive come from behind win on the final 2 stages, edging out Travis Hanson by 43.9 seconds in the Super Production class. Chris Duplessis cruised to another victory in the 2WD class and Andre Comrie-Picard edged out 2nd place by just 2.8 seconds over Dillon Van Way.

Following his spectacular crash a few weeks ago in Canada, Crazy Leo was looking to finish strong again at 100 Acre Wood, but it was not meant to be. On stage 2 of Saturday, Leo hit a rock which damaged something in the steering. He attempted to nurse the car through the next stage to make it to service, but the steering gave out and the car ended up in a tree, ending their day.

2012 100 Acre Wood Rally Photos

Next up is the Oregon Trail Rally on May 4-6 in Portland, OR. Check out the Rally America site for all the details.