The Atlantic Region Motor Sports Annual General Meeting was held on November 23-25th in Moncton New Brunswick. As part of the AGM the annual Rally Workshop was held to discuss the year past as well as the upcoming season.
2012 Atlantic Region Motor Sports Rally Workshop
November 24th, 2012
Gordon Sleigh (Navigational Rally Director)
Ian Pearce
Sherrie Hennigar
Cathy Partridge
Charlotte Partridge
James Partridge
Ron McKenzie
Jerry Ward
Clarke Paynter (Performance Rally Director)
Proxies Held:
Brent O’Connor (Cathy)
Daphne Sleigh (Gordon)
James Whittman (Gordon)
Minutes recorded by Sherrie Hennigar, Transcribed by Gordon Sleigh
2011 Rally Workshop minutes were read by Gordon. Motion to approve by Sherrie, seconded by Ian, All in Favor.
Review of the 2012 Season
Navigational Rally
One Word: Yuck!
– Only one regional event for the season
– Two regional events were cancelled
– Lots of spoken interest in putting on club rallies but so far very little action
– Ian Pearce will be organizing the January ASCC Regional Rally on January 12th.
– Clarke has committed to holding the October Bridgewater rally in 2013 as well.
Navigational Rally Discussion
– Because there was only one regional event, Championship trophies will not be awarded.
– Sherrie and Pidge will organize a club rally in 2013.
– We need more rallies, but not necessarily regionals
– Pidge reviewed his 2012 Fun rally from Sackville to Peggy’s Cove, discussed how to better advertise fun rallies as ‘starter’ events.
– Brent O’Connor has indicated he would like to put on a club event, but no date has been set aside.
– A discussion took place regarding having the June Bluenose Rally on Sunday or Saturday. Saturday was agreed as preferable.
– Clarke prefers to keep the Bridgewater Rally in October to maintain as a night event.
– Clarke indicated that in the past a number of rallies used to be organized around university programs. Possible area to follow up.
– A note of thanks will be submitted to Subaru Canada for their support in 2012, even though no championship prizes were given out.
– Gordon discussed the trophy situation. With the return of the missing Novice trophies from 2010 we now have 6 long-term Navigational rally trophies available, enough to cover all classes.
– The new Experienced Equipped/Unequipped class system for 2012 was not tested with the one regional event this year. It will continue in 2013 for review.
– No 2013 regional rule changes are anticipated
Rally Cross
– 8 events took place in the 2011-2012 season.
– Wayne Pitts and Brendan Neily were battling to the very last event with Brendan taking the overall championship.
– Several rallycross competitors have moved up to Performance Rally events.
– A discussion took place regarding attracting cars from NB/Maine
– Dave Hull joined the workshop
– Fredericton Motorsport Club would like to put on events but faces challenges with their venue
– Moncton Motorsport Club plans 2 RallyCross events in 2013 on January 27th and February 10th
– Dave will investigate the possibility of a regional championship in cooperation with MMSC and possibly FMC.
Performance Rally
– Ron McKenzie provided a review and update on the state of Performance Rally
– Currently we hold 3 different types of events, RallySprints, Single Road events and full Stage Rallies
– Plan to have all 3 in the 2013 season with the first event always being a Rally Sprint.
– CARS has been very helpful and provided lots of effort to help get us up and running.
– Regionally we will be following CARS rally classes, included all changes in 2013 and beyond. This will allow local cars to compete in other regions without any issues and to attract cars from away
– The responsiveness of CARS to the input concerning the new classes was discussed.
– Ian mentioned a strong desire to not exclude ANY safely prepared vehicle from competition, regardless of the new classing. It was generally agreed that nobody will be turned away.
– Clarke reminded all that CARS maintains a Competitors Liaison (Currently Bruno Carre) who can be contacted with all concerns.
– There will be 3 Performance Rally events for 2013.
– July 14th Rally Sprint
– August 24-25th Ledwidge Lookoff Rally
– October 20th Single Road Rally
– CARS has indicated that all performance rally competitors will require CARS Regional Licenses for 2013. Procedures and costs on these licenses can be found in the CARS General Competition Rules.
– Ron indicated several areas which will be improved:
– Volunteer Management
– Attracting Teams from Away
– Site conditions, The September rains ruined most of our stage roads. Ron is working with Ledwidge to make these improvements.
– New stage roads should be found to help us move forward
– Discussions took place concerning the locations and conditions of the old Dartmouth Highlands roads. Ron and Dave will be spending more time investigating them.
– Special thanks were formally put forth to all of the sponsors of the 2012 Ledwidge Lookoff rally, particularly Steele Subaru.
2013 Schedule
– BAC RallyCross dates have been posted.
– Regional Navigational Rallies will be held on January 12th, June and October – Club events TBD
– Performance Rally dates are July 14th, August 24-25th and October 20th. The August dates are absolutely fixed and cannot change.
Other Business
– Gordon and Clarke were re-elected as Navigational and Performance rally representatives by acclimation
– Clarke mentioned that CARS will be electing a new president for 2013 as Tom McGeer will not be re-offering. Currently 9 names are on the list including one from our region.
– Cathy Partridge, on behalf of her Proxy from Brent O’Connor made the motion to re-name the Navigational Experienced Unequipped class to something without negative connotations. Jerry Ward seconded. Votes were 3 for, 2 against. Classes will now be known as Experienced Equipped and simply Experienced.
– Motion to Adjourn by Ron McKenzie, seconded by Ian Pearce, all in favour.
