SCCA: Late Breaking News - Ojibwe Forests SCCA ProRally
25 August 2000
A record seventy-nine cars are entered in the 16th running of the Ojibwe Forests SCCA ProRally Championship event. All four Championship manufacturers (Hyundai, Toyota, Subaru and Mitsubishi) are well represented, featuring the hugely successful Hyundai Tiburons, 8 Mitsubishi Lancers, and 10 Subaru Imprezas, in both FIA Group N and several SCCA specification categories. The two-day event will be held on Minnesota forest roads in the area south and west of Bemidji. The Rally starts tomorrow afternoon, Friday 25 August from the Northern Inn headquarters hotel adjacent to the Bemidji/Beltrami Airport at 5:30 PM CDT. Selected late entries, news: · The controversial finish of last month's Maine Forest event was finalized by the SCCA's National Court of Appeals yesterday afternoon following an extensive investigation, with the court ruling in favor of the teams that lodged the protest. The top five Overall Driver's Championship points going into this weekend's event will now read as follows: Scheible - 77; Choiniere - 63; Lawler - 34; Lahm - 33 and Shepherd - 27. The overall Manufacturers' Championship points are: Hyundai - 82, Mitsubishi - 70; Subaru - 64; Toyota - 47. · 1999 Group 5 Champions Henry and Cindy Krolikowski are quickly learning their ProDrive Gr N Subaru WRX-Sti, working closely with tech support from Prodrive at the Maine Forest ProRally in July. Expect a good show from the couple here, their "home" rally. · West Coast teams are making a strong showing for Ojibwe this year, in many cases traveling nearly 2000 miles each way. Included in that list is George Plsek; with new-to-the-team co-driver Alex Gelsomino. Gelsomino brings European rally experience to the Tato Motorsports entry, having participated in numerous tarmac rallys in Italy. · Also from the west coast is the debut of another new Subaru Impreza, a 99 model driven by fast rising west coast star, and former motocross champion Eric Eaton. Previously, Eaton has been driving a Mazda 323 GTX. · This event has a good history for Hyundai and team boss John Buffum's Libra Racing, winning the last three in a row for the manufacturer. Overall, Libra Racing has won the event a total of nine times. Mitsubishi has one win here, in 1996 with the team of Henry Joy and Michael Fennell in a Lancer Evo II.