Another day, another service point.....

On Sunday we covered four special stages. The first had unexpected heavy snow and caught many folks out on the wrong tyres. Lots of abandoned cars in the stage. Results at end Sunday are:

leading Mini is Raimondo in 4th place oa.

Lopes - 19th

MCR team:
20th - Barker
81st - Vines
119th - Morrow
136th- Burnier
247th - Gandy following incident with rock face.

Thank Aaltonen rally champion is 151st.

Today is Monday 31st January and we look forward to four more special stages.

END

Sunday morning restart from the harbour in Monaco.

As we go into Sunday the results are:

Aaltonen is leading Mini - 24th
Lopes - 55th

MCR team cars are-
Barker - 93rd
Vines - 130th
Gandy - 236th
Morrow - 243rd
Burnier - 248th
Hart - retired

END

Land Rover have kindly loaned two Discovery vehicles as support to the team effort. Here they are supporting the St Andre service action.

Saturday 29th Jan - St Andre les Alps

Busy service scene as the Barker/ Cave and Vines/Moss cars service together before going into St Andre les Alpes time Control. Here we are fitting studded tyres before going into the first test over the Col de Braus.

Friday to Saturday - Concentration Run

Nigel Chetwynd prepares to give service to The Vines / Moss team in car 282.

The first part of the rally is the Concentration Run, and brings all of the cars from their various starting towns together in the little village of St Andre les Alpes in southern France. For in excess of six hours a continuous rally stream of over 300 classic cars pass through the Time control in the village on their way to the first competitive section over the Col de Braus and Col de Castillon, before the end of leg time control in Monte Carlo during the afternoon and evening of Saturday 28th Jan.

Friday 28th Jan - The start in Reims

Only in France....a glass of champagne before you leave sir? Strictly orange juice- honest. Pictured L-R are Willy Cave (co-pilot car 273), Peter Moss & Al Vines (car 282).

Reims Scrutineering

All dressed up and ready to go.

The CRX 89B team eagerly looking forward to the rally.

Rallye Monte Carlo Historique - Where Does it Go To

See below the maps of the places to be visited for the Reims starters. I should like to thank John Clarke very much for the effort he has put into creating these map traces of the route of the 2011 Rallye Monte Carlo Historique for display here.

Redditch - Monaco


View 2011 Rallye Historique Monte Carlo in a larger map

Monaco - Valence


View 2011 Rallye Historique Monte Carlo in a larger map

Valence - Valence (incomplete)


View 2011 Rallye Historique Monte Carlo in a larger map

Maps of the remaining route will be uploaded in due course ... watch this space!

Thursday 27th January - Departure

After a long day yesterday of packing and fettling including having to
repair two slow punctures in our new snow tyres, we are finally on our
way. An 05.45 wake up call this morning got us underway. We picked up
Peter Moss our co- driver at the M25/M3 junction on the way through to
Dover. Here we are in the queueing lanes at Dover - no other rally
cars in sight though. Team mates Barker / Cave are not far behind and
will take the next boat. We will see them on the auto route on the
other side. Morrow / Richards have gone Norfok Line and will land at
Dunkirk ilo Calais.

Breaking news......Barker / Cave team who have identical rig to ours
have been pulled over by UK Customs who thought it was us coming
around again. Will they get their boat on time, or will they get the
rubber glove treatment?

END

Sunday 23rd January - Into The "Funnel" of Final Preparations

Saturday 22nd January - Nigel Chetwynd gets to grips with lining out the Land Rover Discovery to potect the interior from the rigours of servicing duties to the rally cars.

Alastair Vines and Peter Moss are entered into the Rallye Monte-Carlo Historique (car 282) http://www.acm.mc/ which will start on Wednesday 26th January and finish on the 2nd February 2011 in Monaco. Nigel Chetwynd and Simon Wheatcroft will provide back up to the team tackling running repairs, refuelling and maintenance throughout the event. The team are attempting to raise £10k to support their entry and raise money for the charity Bliss http://www.bliss.org.uk/ which concerns itself with babies born too early, too small or too sick to fend for themselves. They have to date won the backing of sponsorship from Mini Spares http://www.minispares.com/  , Heritage Insurance at Norton Insurance Brokers http://www.norton-ib.co.uk/ and Land Rover http://www.landrover.com/ who have loaned two Land Rover Discovery support vehicles. The team continue to seek more help with funding to secure their ambition and if you would like to help please call Alastair Vines on 0776 437 7322 or email to crx89b@blueyonder.co.uk

We picked up the Land Rover Discoverys on Friday 21st January, so in order to get prepared we immediately set about preparing the interior of the car to receive all our rally gear - spare wheels, fuel tanks, spare parts etc. I have been out testing our new snow tyres as well, and although we have no snow at present, the tyres gave an acceptable level of performance on wet and slippery January roads. EARS Motorsport http://www.ears.co.uk/ also fitted studs to a further set off tyres for us.

The following pictures are of the CRX 89B team getting ready and preparing their kit in readiness to leave for France on Thursday 27th January.

Simon Wheatcroft assembling a spare distributor surrounded by service vehicle clutter

Our service vehicle fully equipped to carry all our stuff receiving a little under bonnet preparation as well.

Sunday 23rd January - Fitting Trials for car and trailer.


I have lots more packing to do, so I am going to cut this update here, and send you more from the rally.

Al

END

Friday 21st January - Tweaking, Testing and Photo calls

Tuesday 18th January - Mini Spares photo call for the cars of Bill Richards and Alastair Vines who are being supported in this years event.

Alastair Vines and Peter Moss are entered into the Rallye Monte-Carlo Historique (car 282) http://www.acm.mc/ which will start on Wednesday 26th January and finish on the 2nd February 2011 in Monaco. Nigel Chetwynd and Simon Wheatcroft will provide back up to the team tackling running repairs, refuelling and maintenance throughout the event. The team are attempting to raise £10k to support their entry and raise money for the charity Bliss http://www.bliss.org.uk/ which concerns itself with babies born too early, too small or too sick to fend for themselves. They have to date won the backing of sponsorship from Mini Spares http://www.minispares.com/  , Heritage Insurance at Norton Insurance Brokers http://www.norton-ib.co.uk/ and Land Rover http://www.landrover.com/ who have loaned two Land Rover Discovery support vehicle. The team continue to seek more help with funding to secure their ambition and if you would like to help please call Alastair Vines on 0776 437 7322 or email to crx89b@blueyonder.co.uk

Photo: c/o Andy Yu of Heritage Insurance
Since the last post I have been very busy fine tuning the car, running durability miles and participating in photo calls for our sponsors. Steering column bushes have been changed to firm up steering feel, out has gone the early type Springalex steering wheel, and in has come a Motalita as it is much stiffer. The front suspension has been lowered an inch to provide better cornering balance; air horns are improved, and ignition system parts have been sealed against water ingress. Spare parts kits have been received from our sponsors Mini Spares http://www.minispares.com/ , exterior mirrors and upgraded light units purchased from classic car equipment suppliers Holden and Vintage http://www.holden.co.uk/

CRX 89B cockpit - Sprigalex steering wheel above changed in favour of a stiffer Motalita type.

Saturday 21st  January - We were pleased to receive Andy Yu from Heritage Insurance at Norton Insurance Brokers http://www.norton-ib.co.uk/ , to whom I am very grateful for being instrumental in facilitating the support to us from his company. Here Andy presents me with a cheque as a donation to our chosen charity Bliss http://www.bliss.org.uk/ and contribution toward our entry expenses.

Tuesday 18th January - With fellow competitor Bill Richards (car# 321) for a Mini Spares photo call. Mini Spares are providing support to two cars in the event this year. We are extremely grateful to Keith Dodd and Justin Jefferey for the support they are giving to the charity Bliss and our entry.

The photo call with Bill Richards of Bill Richards Racing http://www.billrichardsracing.com/ in Ashford, Kent enabled me to give the car a good stretch . I drove approximately 400 miles on the round trip, during which time the car ran without any significant hitches. The engine is sweet, gear changes are smooth and interior noise perfectly acceptable despite the straight cut gears and competition Maniflow exhaust http://www.maniflow.co.uk/ . Steering wheel alignment, adjustment to column rake angle and thread locking the starter knob onto its shaft were all that was required to be attended to on our return. Fuel consumption settled at 29 miles per gallon with a safe useable range of about 320 miles at 65mph motorway driving.

Friday 21st January - Collecting the Land Rover Discoverys from Land Rover at Gaydon.

We are very grateful to Land Rover who have provided two Discoverys to act as support vehicles to myself (Car #282)and Peter Barker (Car# 273). I would particularly like to thank Fiona Pargeter, Kath Ditchfield, David Sneath, Mark Chellingsworth and Peter Melling who have worked hard to facilitate the loan, provide specialist kit and prepare the cars for our use. Discoverys are fantastic tools to use as support vehicles on this event. they have lots of carrying capacity, the benefit of 4WD, the standard equipment tyres keep them sure footed in even the worst conditions (see video in my earlier posts), they are fast and tow our car trailers with ease. I am delighted that Land Rover have agreed to let us borrow them.

Friday 21st January - Photo call at Mini Plant Oxford. From left to right Peter Barker (Car #273) Jeurgen Heidreich - Plant Director, Paddy Hopkirk - rally legend, Richard Norris - Plant Oxford Mini team, and Nigel Chetwynd who is my Service chief (Car #282).

Nigel Chetwynd who is heading up my Service team took CRX down to the Mini assembly Plant at Oxford earlier today to participate in a photo call with Paddy Hopkirk and the Plant Oxford Mini team. The Oxford team have been very enthusiastic about finding ways to help the Mini Cooper Register rally team, and have been able to provide some tyres and clothing which some team members have been able to take advantage of.

The Monte Carlo Rally is celebrating its 100th birthday this year, and Paddy shot to World rally fame in 1964 by driving the first Mini to win the event outright. Minis went on to win the event again in 1965, 66 and 67, although were controversially disqualified in 1966, along with many other competitors for an alleged lighting regulation infringement. The subsequent row and "we woz robbed" stories in the Press probably did more to bring the Mini to public attention than winning the event for the third time.

Plans for the coming weekend are to get the special tyres we bought from Francois Windeck at Auto-BMC Vienne in France http://www.auto-bmc.com/ ,  fitted up to wheels, finalise preparation of the Land Rover Discoverys and complete the readiness of our service kits. Five days until we leave. Not long now.

We have bought 12 off 10 inch snow tyres in this pattern, of which 6 are studded. We will also take 4 off Dunlop D55 snow tyres lightly studded for transit section running in order to slow down wear rates on our competition tyres.

END

Sunday 9th January - Mini Cooper Register Team Day & car prep

Saturday 8th January - Mini Cooper Register Rally Team day at Coventry University - Navigators Willy Cave and Peter Moss in hot discussion at the board regarding service car locations for the Monday 31st January Valence / Valence loop.

Alastair Vines and Peter Moss are entered into the Rallye Monte-Carlo Historique (car 282) http://www.acm.mc/ which will start on Wednesday 26th January and finish on the 2nd February 2011 in Monaco. Nigel Chetwynd and Simon Wheatcroft will provide back up to the team tackling running repairs, refuelling and maintenance throughout the event. The team are attempting to raise £10k to support their entry and raise money for the charity Bliss http://www.bliss.org.uk/ which concerns itself with babies born too early, too small or too sick to fend for themselves. They have to date won the backing of sponsorship from Mini Spares http://www.minispares.com/ and Norton Insurance http://www.norton-ib.co.uk/ and continue to seek more help with funding to secure their ambition. If you would like to help please call Alastair Vines on 0776 437 7322 or email to crx89b@blueyonder.co.uk

The period immediately after Christmas and into the first two or three weeks of January is one of the very busiest times for preparing for the rally. A myriad of activities are all coming together; finalise the car specification; shake down runs; develop spares packing list; agree service car schedules; route recce by team members in France etc.

Since our Boxing Day drive the car has been in our garage for much of the time receiving final adjustments to specification. My friend Paul Price, who is one of the last remaining Lucas Racing auto electricians from the 1960s and who worked on the BMC competition Minis in the old days, spent Thursday 30th December with us going through the wiring to ensure that all was well, and to add an additional relay into the lighting circuit. It took me until after the weekend to put the car back together again!

On Bank Holiday Monday 3rd January our service crew, Nigel Chetwynd and Simon Wheatcroft spent the day with me working on packing our spares boxes and finalising the shopping list of parts that we will need to go out and order. We also took the opportunity to fit improved competition full harness seat belts, fire extinguishers, improve the air horns, an additional ignition coil, and save a bit of weight by removing the bumper over riders.

On Tuesday 4th January the roof light came off to save more weight, and on Thursday 6th I took the car out to do some fuel consumption checks to further develop our refuelling plans on the rally.

Argh**!?Bxxx - The speedo cable snapped almost immediately - so back into the garage for a new cable. I am however pleased that this happened now, as a speedo cable failure on the event means that hope for a good result in the rally is effectively over. Changing a cable is a horrid job at the best of times, and this one proved to be especially difficult - so I managed to incorporate a few tweaks to make it easier next time.

In the period Tuesday 4th and Thursday 6th Willy Cave and Peter Moss, navigators for cars 273 and 282)  flew out to France to conduct a recce of the route. They did a fantastic job and drove every competitive section plus some of the other trickier parts of the route at least once, making detailed notes as they went along. This work is vital in order not to get lost, and to provide important information to stay on time whilst in the competitive sections of the rally.

Yesterday, Saturday the 8th Peter Barker (Car 273) organised a day at Coventry University for the Mini Cooper Register Rally Team to come together to discuss tactics and areas of mutual help and assistance. We had an excellent day sharing our experience of prior Monte Carlo rallies with new team members, clarifying rally rules and proceedures, going over Willy and Peter's recce notes, and agreeing common service point locations and resource sharing.

"The Master" - Ex BMC Works Team navigator Willy Cave (Navigator car 273) describes the Valence / Valence section whilst Nigel Chetwynd and Simon Wheatcroft (service crew for car 282) check their maps.

L - R: Graeme Allan (navigator car 319) follows Willy Cave's explanations, whilst Jim Jupp (Mini World reporter and service crew to car 273) checks his maps. Peter Moss (navigator car 282) prepares the next topic and Peter Barker (driver car 273) demonstrates the point on screen with Google maps.

There is still much much more to do. We urgently have to get more miles on the car to shake out any further problems , check our lip to lip fuel consumption, set up our distance measuring equipment, prepare winter wheel tyre assemblies, order our spares parts, raise more sponsorship monies - only two and half weeks to go before we leave - phew! It is getting very exciting now.

END