Meeting 7-9pm-ish on December 12th, 2024, with the monthly meeting *always* happening at Laurel Auto Clinic, aka “Carl’s Shop” Laurel, MT. Attendees were Carl, Matt, Briant, Darrin, Jared, Micah, Lane, Luke, Jess, Chris, and Kindra. Didn’t see your name? Than’s ‘cuz you weren’t there. Try a little harder to make it next time. We would love to find more chairs….
***In case you didn’t know, the November meeting was the End-of-Year Banquet. It was very fun, lots of good food, and trophies were handed out to Luke and Darrin. Apparently, they are good at something. Staebler almost lost an eyebrow to the BBQ….. Thanks for cooking!
—-*Carl Jones (El Jefe), Matt Boggio (El Jefito), Lane Baumann (Treasurer), and Kindra Munda (Secretary) graced us with their presence this evening*—-
TREASURERS REPORT:
Lane reports that the club’s finances include: $18,419 and one sad penny. The only debt we have thus far in the Rally season is the upkeep and cleaning on the Porta-Johns. We will catch up on that at the end of the season. Could need dumped twice if we had more people out there for Rally.
*LET’S GET READY TO RALLY!!! – We continue RallyX 2024/2025. RallyX is one of the best things to come out of a dirty, overgrown field. One of the many pleasures that can come from winter besides the corporate Christmas Party. A continuation of the fun we call motorsports. The course will be set by Matt and Luke with RallyX events 4 and 5 set in Bridger. The last events will be at Big Sky Speedway so stay tuned. Make sure to bring your best dirty car, you know the one, the one that has a wheel that likes to fall off every once in a while. Yes, that one. It was brought to the club’s attention that folks are driving down the return road at YDS a*bit* too fast. Keep your eye out for anyone who may be taking that spirited driving feeling a bit outside the sandbox. Ideas presented were to funnel cones out to make those slow down a bit. One member thought a Chicane would help… another member proposed Darrin’s van wrapped up nice and bright reminding everyone to keep the speed low. Another idea was to set up a 10MPH speed limit sign. I guess we will see what we come up with.
*Rally Issues – Nothing worthwhile is ever without some difficulty, RallyX has been experiencing some timing issues.
1. AxWare does not register in, and Pronto does not register out. So, issues with the program and timing talking to each other. It’s like they had a family quarrel over Thanksgiving about Uncle Chad and his penchant for liquor. Pretty sure it happened at the In-Laws. The Antenna was mentioned, and Briant says its omnidirectional meaning it has to point up. This allows the radio waves to travel in the shape of a donut, all directions perpendicular to an axis. Thanks, Wiki, for a crash course on radio waves.
2. Attendance. Participation and attendance are a bit low, with 10 people at these events most of the time. Thoughts are a rough course rather than a smooth one (fix would be time and money), too many RallyX events right behind AutoX events (fix would be less RallyX events). Ideas to increase participation include Night RallyX (rally Saturday Nights, the have day RallyX). It was also brought up to utilize Bridger more as well as the price is right for that property (same as YDS, $250.) There’s a need for more venues too. Having some weekend events rather than just one day events next season to bring in people from out of town (stay for the weekend). The idea of double RallyX days brings up the topic of more RallyX Safety Stewards. To learn more about how you can become one of these super-duper, fabulously good-looking, 100%-always-really-awesome and just overall a really cool guy, see the next topic below.
*****Safety Stewards – WE NEED SOME MORE!! Wanna learn how we keep our events safe? Ever thought of yourself as someone with attention to detail (almost to a fault)? Think you have what it takes to build a bomb-ass course? If you answered yes to these questions, you would make a great Safety Steward! RallyX needs some, and AutoX needs some too! If you’re interested, email SCCA Region Services first, then they will open the Portal of Awesomeness for you to enter and become certified. This is a go at your own pace set up, and they will guide you through, as a Safety Steward may have once done for you on your first run in AutoX. After you request courses on becoming the very valuable and completely necessary Safety Steward, the link will present itself to you. Please direct any questions to Briant.
EMAIL: regionservices@scca.com
*AutoX 2025 – Schedule was discussed, dates were offered, and schedules were exchanged! Yay! Do you have big summer plans and wonder how the schedule will fit? Don’t think the old lady will approve of a certain date? Come to a meeting and have some input.
-> Bridger will be brought to the Bridger Airport Board by Matt. Carl will talk to Kristen at the next Bridger City Council Meeting.
-> Proposal for sponsorship by AC again this summer. Hopefully we can get a Metra date again. I believe Lane will do some foot work on this.
-> Throw in some Test N’ Tune once? Maybe the Metra, maybe YDS. Who knows.
-> The Metra – Carl will also email the Metra to set some dates. Single days at the Metra were discussed and if it could be profitable. There is a lot gonna happen if we can get some good dates for the venue. We are hoping to make the AC sponsored event a Metra event and be at the beginning of June. Having it earlier in the season can help increase awareness of the club as well as hopefully increase membership. More to come.
*Sponsorship – Thoughts on a sponsorship structure for the club. We discussed logos on helmets and vinyl on the trailer to showcase those who support us, with logo size possibly being a direct representation of how large the donation was. It was thrown around that a structured (bronze, silver, gold…etc) package type of deal could allow for greater options for donors. Others thought this idea was geared more towards selling advertising, which we are in a way. It seems that a hat-tip to the donor at the safety meeting was a good idea overall. There is more to be decided on this topic. Until then, mention the club and see if anyone is interested in giving us some money. Talk to Lane or Carl if you have some ideas. You could also come to a meeting. Just sayin’.
*Helena Schedule – Loren has the Helena schedule well underway, and our options for events were limited. We voted on July 26-27, but please keep in mind that these dates are very fluid and can possibly change. We discussed motorcycle training, and how they are always cramping our style. It was brought up that if the motorcycles aren’t there, we could use ALL the asphalt. Most people in the club were very receptive to that idea.
*New Venues – It was discussed to begin our ongoing search for new venues. If you have an idea, bring it to the meeting, or email Carl. There is a packet of paperwork, and a letter explaining our super fun sport. It was brought up to maybe look into Wyoming, and Powell Airport, Cody Fairgrounds, Fremont Motors in Cody, and Greybull Airport were suggested.
*Business Cards – In the works(yawn). Micah and Lane are working on getting the details together (since May I am told… blah blah blah). Could have handed out at least 50 of those bad boys this summer alone. If only we had them…. *sigh*. Plus, it would have been cool this last Monday…. There was another GR Corolla at COSTCO. But I couldn’t leave a card. Sad day. Gertie would have eaten him for dinner, cuz she’s a bad bish…
*Course Design – It was discussed to have some pointer/learning videos put up on the website informing members about course design earlier this fall. Houston SCCA has some great videos. They will be posted soon hopefully, as Lane will get the link up for viewing. Briant says that is ok. Thanks, Briant. The rubber at the Metra is pretty much burned into the asphalt, as GoogleMaps satellite view shows. It is really kind of cool, also the satellite view of RMESTC has some neat markings. However, this is a good reminder that past event course designs have been so similar. Having multiple different people design the course can offer exciting new changes as well as offer a shared responsibility among club members. It was discussed and voted that there will be 2 lead designers and 1 grunt. Design could be swapped on Sat/Sun if it is a two-day event. If there is a discrepancy among design ideas, the last vote will go to the grunt for majority. It was also decided that the Safety Steward of the event and the course designers will walk the course TOGETHER to discuss safety issues and ensure flow of the course. These people will be decided at a meeting prior to the event, so if you want an input, or don’t want to be volun-told, come to a meeting. You can have an opinion, so come share with us!
** IMPORTANT DATES**
January 19 – Bridger RallyX
February 23 – RallyX
March 16 – RallyX
April 13 – RallyX
Meeting adjourned tonight at some time, but it was so fun and relaxing that it didn’t even seem to be as late as it was. Like what you’re reading? Sound like fun? Want some super yummy, delicious Carrot cake? Shoulda been there. So, if you got this far, you already know… 😊 Some pics from the October meeting and all our cones that YR108 was able to bring home and a beautiful Corvette (Bill Blaquiere) in Helena.