Vuokatti rally 8th of August 2015

A couple of months and the Peugeot was in a rally again. This time we were rallying in the middle of Finland in Vuokatti, Sotkamo. Finland is so long from South to North that even though I drove 577km from my home in Helsinki to Vuokatti I should have driven about 100km more to in the halfway into the most Northern part of Finland. Anyway in my eyes we were North enough. Vuokatti was me and Antton’s third rally together and we were determined to see the finish line this time. I personally had three retirements in a row so seeing the finish line would be a luxury.

Scrutineering in Vuokatti. Peugeot looking like a car again :)

The rally ended up being a short one once again. No we didn’t retire luckily. The rally was supposed to be only 43km long anyway, but the two stages which were to be driven twice got into so bad condition that the organizer canceled the second one. In the end we drove something like 33 stage kilometers and finished second in our class. Nice to finish on the podium, but I felt somehow frustrated to drive 1300km just to codrive three stages.

Nilfisk rally 6th of June 2015

Rally season continued in June. Nilfisk rally on the 6th of June was our first junior championship rally together with Antton. The plan was to start aggressively and not to lift in every corner. Of course there is some risk involved when you do this without pace notes. 3 kilometers into the first stage and we rolled spectacularly. We were bouncing against the limiter around 155km/h towards an easy left hander. We dropped the speed maybe 20km/h or something. When we got into the beginning of the corner we could see past the bushes in the inside of a corner. The corner tightened. Not much we could do except throw the car sideways. All the credit to Antton that he managed to react and act. With 2okm/h less speed we might have had a chance to make it.

You always wonder how much your brain has time to process in a situation like this. I thought before we started rolling that we are lucky since there is just a field on the outside corner. During the rolling I thought that it must be already our fourth roll, but then just thought I must be imagining it and maybe it’s the third. We ended up rolling the car 5,5 times and it actually rolled back onto the road.

Crash filmed by Juuso Jalovaara

After all the cars had passed we pushed the car onto the trailer. Pushed? Yes. The car rolled quite softly. Of course all the panels were dented and all the glasses broken, but other than that the Peugeot was in quite god condition. Only one rear damper and one tyre was broken. The scrutineering chief made an accident report of the car and thoroughly checked the car and our safety equipment. Everything was in OK condition. All the credit to Peugeot engineers and safety equipment manufacturers.

A sad looking Peugeot

Me and Antton went to see the rally doctor to get a checkup. We were feeling quite OK, but just in case something turned up a couple days later we wanted to make sure we wouldn’t have a fight with the insurance company people. I ended up with small bruises all over the body and a read eye, but no sore neck or anything like that. It helped a lot that the car just rolled and didn’t suddenly stop to a tree or something.

Kaloppi –ralli 16th of May 2015

Something different. Codriving for Antton Laurén in his Peugeot 208 R2 in a rally which is driven without pace notes. Using just the road book in which the organizer has marked the surprising corners or dangerous places. Otherwise just scanning the road and trying to guess where the road turns and how hard.

There are only three rallies left in the Finnish rally championship. And since Jari wans’t planning on driving any other rallies as practice I have time to kill. Antton was looking for a codriver for the Finnish junior rally championship + some practice rallies. The two series don’t have conflicting schedules so I decided to jump in.

Scrutineering before the start

The rally went well. It’s a really nice car and Antton drives fluently so as a codriver I had really nice time. Of course it felt strange not to have pace notes. Last time I did one of these “blind” rallies was about 2,5 years ago so I wasn’t really in my comfort zone. Well you get used to it.

Road section. All of  them were quite short.

The stages were really nice with one exception. Fourth stage was on a small road and we were driving on number 145. There were deep ruts and in a couple of places Antton had to lift the car from the ruts so that we wouldn’t lose our front bumper. Unfotunately we suffered a puncture 3km before the end of the stage and had to limb to the finish. We lost about 1,5min and the battle for class victory ended there. Since there was only one stage left to go and we had driven enough training kilometers we decided to call it a day. We changed the wheel and drove back to rally headquarters. All in all it was a good day. Since Kaloppi wasn’t a junior championship rally the only aim was to get training kilometers. In that we succeeded and Antton was happy with the car setup.

Can't sell this tyre or use it in testing

Next rally is on the 6th of June in Oripää with Antton&Peugeot without pace notes and one week after that I’m driving with Jari&BMW with pace notes.

Talotekniikka10 ralli 15th of September 2012, Kerava

What a fantastic rally! We were fighting for second place in the Finnish 2wd championship, bu that wasn't meant to be. The stages were mostly really fast and there was no hope of fighting against more powerful Civic type-r of Ville Hautamäki. That became very clear after two first stages.

Picture by Marko Mäkinen, official pictures of Finnish Rally Championship

That didn't spoil the day though. We had an excellent battle in our class with Joonas Lindroos' C2 R2 and Jukka Korhonen's Fiesta R2. All three were inside few seconds on every stage. For example on sixth stage only two tenths of a second separated us and Lindroos. On the next one all three drove exactly the same time! Not even a tenth of a second separating the cars. We weren't fighting for championship points, just for bragging rights so it was good fun. Of course we had to finish the rally with Andreas. But on the other hand it's easier to drive fast than just cruise around. So after a lot of fast driving we finished third in our class and sixth overall among 2wd cars. That meant we finished third in the championship. Can't complain and have to be really happy about the result. There were seven rallies in the championship and none of the top three cars retired even once. Our lowest class result was fourth with two wins, three second places and one third place. With those results I can just look back and say that it was a good season! And of course not forgetting the biggest adventure of the year -> our WRC round Neste Oil Rally Finland. For a first timer it was a dream come true to be on the legendary stages. Especially when we had trouble free rally and a great result.

Only constant in life is change and that goes for rallying also. Have to write something about next season when year 2013 is nearer. Before that there is still one more training weekend at the Vierumäki sports center. So saying hi to the now already familiar rowing machine. Good fun if you are into masochistic stuff :) But before that still one more rally. Co-driving for my brother in his M3. Let the gravel fly!

Merikarvia rally 18th of August

A couple of weeks after Neste Rally Finland it was time to get back to our familiar Finnish championship. The championship continued near Pori in Merikarvia. The good thing was that the playing field was equal to everybody. There hadn't been a championship rally near Pori in ages so the stages were new to everyone. The stages turned out to be mostly fast and wide, but then you suddenly were also driving on narrow and slow roads. A quick attitude change was required from time to time. 

We started the first stage with our normal pace. After the stage it was a bit of a surprise to find out that we had been fastest in our class with a margin of almost 17 seconds. Obviously driving the NORF a couple of weeks earlier helped to keep rust out of driver's wrists. The second stage was interesting. First driving on a really narrow "summer cottage road" and then in the blasting several kilometers flat out without even touching the brake pedal of our R2 Fiesta. We lost time to bigger engine d Honda Civics, but again were fastest in our class. 

The third and fourth stages followed the same pattern. Driving with our normal rhythm and being fastest in our own class. The most interesting part of the rally was stage number five. By being 44km long it was roughly half of the rally. The stage also had very challenging roads so it wasn't a stage you could just cruise through. We tried to attack on the stage since it suited our small R2 car quite well and the was a slim chance of catching Ville Hautamäki's civic which was only 15 seconds ahead of us. We didn't catch Ville, but managed to win our class by 1min30s so can't complain. The overall championship standings after Merikarvia remain very interesting. Joonas Lindroos secured the 2wd championship win, but Andreas is in a close battle with Ville Hautamäki for the second place in the season finale in Kerava on the 15th of September.

WRC, Neste Oil Rally Finland 1-4th of August

Secret agent Austin Powers had a "things to do before I die" list in of one the movies. On my list was to one day be able to participate in Finland's WRC event. The rally of the Thousand lakes, the rally of the Thousand tales, Suurajot, Jyskälä. Many names, but everybody knows what the names mean. Well that can now be marked as done. And at the same time got to co-drive through long version (33km) of Ouninpohja. Twice.

But If we start from the beginning. Preparation for "Jyskälä" had been long and Andreas had done a big job of securing sponsors, spare parts, mechanics etc. I helped more on the normal side of team plans, fuel calculations, hotel reservations and so on. The recce from Monday to Wednesday was surprisingly relaxed we had enough time to drive through the stages with some thought and get good pace notes.

The rally really started on Thursday. The not so fun part was to drive 1,5 hours from Jyväskylä to Lahti for three stages. Then back to Jyväskylä. All the cars gathered to Lahti harbour for people to see and hear the drivers being interviewed. My girlfriend was there to see me which was nice.

Posing in Lahti harbour. The shiny blue MIR suit is good for blocking all the sun heat. Picture by Tiina Ketolainen.

From Lahti we drove to the first proper stage Koukunmaa. The first stage didn't go too well for us. We were both quite nervous. In the beginning of the stage I was reading too much forwards and Andreas wasn't driving on the car's limits either. After the stage we got our act together since what was there to be nervous about. More people, but the same Finnish roads as usual.  The next stage was a super special in Lahti horse race track. We managed to drive on a normal rhythm and beat our Norwegian partner. Third and final stage for the day was Mynnilä. It was already 10pm when we started the stage and we even installed extra headlights.

In Mynnilä stage. Picture by "Juha_Koo"

It was good to get a couple of good stages after the first nervous one. After Mynnilä it was time to head back to Jyväskylä and the night service. Luckily we had excellent mechanics in the service so we didn't have to worry about them to check the car and getting it to parc fermé. It was quite late when we finally managed get back to hotel. Around 12.30am or so.

After 5-5,5 hours of sleep it was time to get up and head to breakfast. Normally you would be quite tired with so short sleep, but since you were so exited to continue the rally you didn't even feel that tired. Friday started with Urria and its famous jump. We took the jump carefully and managed to drive a good time for the morning. A good start. Next stage was 22km long Jukojärvi. I personally really enjoyed the stage. As a road it wasn't too fast or too slow. All the time turning somewhere.

Picture by "Jack Bacon"

After Jukojärvi we headed to service. After the service we were to drive first round of stages Mökkiperä, Palsankylä and Lankamaa. Mökkiperä didn't start too well. One of our biggest competitors Jukka Korhonen had gone off into a ditch and that distracted us a little bit. The car didn't block us in any way, but you immediately started to think "what does this mean in the overall results?". Until that point we had been driving stage times which were only few seconds apart. Palsankylä went quite OK. Personally I liked Lankamaa stage a lot. It's a very difficult stage for a driver and a co-driver. At some point it's really fast and then slower. All the time quite narrow. But if you have good pace notes the speeds are in some sections quite respectable.

Entering a junction. Picture by Tiina Ketolainen.

Then back to service and going to Mökkiperä, Palsankylä and Lankamaa for the second time. The roads were rougher, but not too bad since people had been scaring us before the rally that they would be even worse. Not much to report about the second round except I again enjoyed the Lankamaa stage a lot. There was a small timing error in the Lankamaa stage and for a short period of time the results showed us being fourth overall in the standings right behind Citroën and Ford factory cars. People cracked a few jokes about that. The very last stage for the day was Killeri super special. The Norwegians beat us this time since we took the first round a bit too carelessly. But the rally had been going OK and we were happy to get through the day without any problems. Also we were looking forward to getting a good night sleep since around 7,5 hours of sleep was in the cards.

Posing with Tuija Huttunen. One of the many people who in Finnish rally training donate countless hours of their personal spare time helping  the young drivers. I'm still quite energetic at 10.30pm and with only 5,5hours of sleep on the previous night. Picture by Juha Huttunen (also one of the helping people in training)

Saturday. The last day of rally Finland. Still around 143km of special stages to go. 66km of those driven in legendary Ouninpohja. Leustu 1 and Surkee 1 started the day however. Leustu was a very nice stage. First on a smaller road and then on a really fast section. We had a bit of a moment in one left hand junction where a down hill braking caught us by surprise. Lost a couple of seconds since Andreas had to throw the car more sideways than optimal and that kills the momentum with a fwd car. After Leustu 1 and Surkee 1 we had service then the same stages were driven again. We took a bit of a gamble by continuing with a low car. We speculated that the roads might stay in better condition than they actually really where. Well you win some and you loose some. Sometimes you have to make decisions.

Some deep ruts on Leustu or Surkee junction. Picture by "Jack Bacon"

After the service was the legendary Ouninpohja. We tried to convince each other that it's just a Finnish road like every other stage. Still in the start line of Ouninpohja 1 you could sense our concentration was above normal. First you have 6-7km of fast roads going up and down, then the really fast sections going basically flat out, then the Kakaristo junction and after fast narrow road almost to the finish line. The first run wasn't easy for us and we were pretty humble guys at the finish line. In the beginning I read a bit too much forwards until I got the rhythm improved. Also Andreas had his hands full since there were places on the stage where we were jumping even though we didn't have it in the notes. The stage really is that fast even for a R2 Fiesta.

One of Ouninpohja crests. Picture by Jenni Lehtola.

Storming through Ouninpohja. Picture by "Jack Bacon"

Jumping again. Picture by "Jack Bacon"

Landing. The normal ride height isn't that low. Picture by "Jack Bacon"

Second time through Ouninpohja was much easier. The stage was more or less in muscle memory and you knew what to expect. Still at one slower left hand corner I realized that the pace was so fast I hadn't had a chance to fully inhale during the past couple of kilometers. Funny what you might notice during such a fast special stage.

At the Ouninpohja 2 finish we were happy and sad. Happy that we were second in class behind Joonas Lindroos and also at the same time second fastest 2wd car. Sad that the rally was over. We had virtually no problems during the rally and the stages were spectacular. The atmosphere on stages and even on the road sections is unbelievable. There are people standing by the road and waving even on the road sections. If you need to pass someone on the road sections they try to make as much room as possible and wave when you pass them by. What an adventure. Hopefully got a chance to go back again.

On the podium celebrating the second place. Picture by Juha Huttunen.

SM Vaakuna rally, Mikkeli 26th of February 2012

Winter season's final Finnish Rally Championship round was held in Mikkeli. Luckily the weather wasn't as cold as the previous year when the temperature was around -32 celcius.

The rally started already on Friday evening with an 11 kilometer super special stage. The stage circled on a horse racing track before heading into the woods. In the woods the road was narrow and had a lot of loose snow outside the ruts. We lost some time when the rear stepped out of the ruts a couple of times.

Picture by "Jack Bacon"

On Saturday morning things luckily turned brighter. Long and challenging stage number 2 went really well. We beat Joonas Lindroos by ten seconds and took the class lead. However the class lead disappeared during the next two stages. Those were wide and fast roads. We don't have a lot of power in our car so if the rear steps out even a little bit it kills the speed.

Before the last stage the situation was clear. Joonas was leading by 15 seconds so without his mistake positions weren't going to change. The last stage went really well and we even managed to catch the car which started ahead of us. We weren't able to pass him so we just cruised to the finish. After steady start of the season we are now second in the 2wd championship so things are really well after the winter season. Next round of the Finnish Rally Championship will be held on 8-9th of June.

Picture by "Jack Bacon"

Arctic Lapland Rally, 27th-28th of January 2012

One week after Riihimäki rally it was time to head to Rovaniemi in Lapland. Arctic Lapland Rally is a legendary rally in Finland and like the name says it's held on the Arctic Circle. The rally is twice as long (233km of special stages) as the normal Finnish championship rounds so we had three and a half days for the recce. The stages were awesome. Even the shortest one was 20km long and the longest was 47km! A real challenge for me since the roads in the Arctic Lapland Rally are the most challenging in Finnish championship. The winter had been perfect for ensuring firm coating of snow and ice on top of the roads. During the recce the temperatures were between -17 and -30. Had to use more than just a T-shirt when walking outside.

We started to the first stage around 1pm on Friday. We were once again fighting against the all Citroën C2 R2 front. Sergey Karyakin from the WRC Academy was entered to the rally with a Fiesta R2, but he had withdrawn before the start. Shame since it would have been nice to compare our speed with one of the WRC Academy guys. The first stage was a super special that we would drive three times during the rally. For a super special the stage was actually really good since it was 3,7km long. We just drove it through with normal speed and managed to be fastest in our class. With a huge margin of 0,1s. The main thing is not to win the super specials, but not to give any easy/stupid seconds away to the competition. Those are hard to get back in the forest between the trees.

The second stage was a proper stage with 23km of fast roads. We lost 5 seconds to the class leader, but we were happy to get the rally properly under way. I managed to be late with the pace notes once when going through somebody's yard, but luckily there wasn't anything tricky with the corner and had the time to catch up immediately. After this stage we entered the service for the first time and then headed for two long stages which were to be driven in the dark.


In addition of driving in the dark the rally there was a problem off snow dust hanging in the air. Similar phenomenon as Greece or Cyprus WRC rounds have with the gravel dust. When the temperature is cold enough and there is no wind there is a risk of snow dust and these two stages now had the dust hanging in the air. The third stage wasn't that bad with only the occasional dust. We lost 3 seconds to the class winner on the 32km stage so one could say that the battle for the lead was quite even.

After 60 stage kilometers we were 6,1 seconds from the class lead. The fourth stage was also a long one with 36km. On that stage the snow dust really was a problem and you could only see 20-30 meters in front of you. We even dried if we could see better using only the normal day time driving lights. That sometimes helps if there is really much snow in the air and the extra lights doesn't reflect so much from all the snow in the air. That trick didn't provide any assistance. One thing that really saved our day was the fact that we used an accurate trip meter for checking the distances during the recce. No we relied on the pace notes when keeping the throttle to the floor half blind. It worked. The margins weren't huge, but we managed to eat 4,9 seconds from the class leader and were only 1,2s behind when going back to Rovaniemi for the super special and overnight  service.

On the super special we attacked a bit too much and went wide one corner loosing time. Without that small mistake we would have been in the class lead, but had to settle for the second place when heading of to bed. The time difference after 100 stage kilometers was 0,9s! Excellent battle and the spirits were high since with differences like this you don't have to sleep in the car half of the rally. In the 45min service we changed the brake discs and pads and drove the car to parc fermé around 9.30pm. 

After good night sleep it was an early wake up for breakfast and getting the car out of parc fermé after 8am. Our plan was to attack on the first stage and that we certainly did. We were trying a bit too hard and our driving wasn't neat enough especially on the junctions. We lost almost 20s on the 30km stage. Luckily there were still 100 stage kilometers to go so the game wasn't over yet. We decided to tidy up the driving a bit for the next stage which was also 30km long. Well that wasn't to be. One kilometer from the start of the stage we heard a loud banging noise from the front. We thought that a drive shaft was broken, but when Andreas tried to brake he realized it might just be a brake caliber problem. Apparently when changing the discs and pads one of the brake calibers wasn't tightened properly. We stopped on the stage, took out the front left caliber and switched a spare wheel since the rim was broken too. Then drove 28km with only using the hand brake. Luckily the last 10km was a really fast section so we didn't have to slow down too much. In any case we lost 10min 35s. 

Just to make sure we were on a good mood the driver's side window got stuck 3/4 open for a 50km road section in -23 degrees temperature. It got a bit chilly in the car. We don't usually play with the windows too much, but Andreas opened it in a junction because he couldn't see through the window since it was frozen from the inside. The R2 car's heaters don't have enough power to keep the side windows open when the temperature is below -15 or so. Even our water bottles near the floor of the car were 2/3 frozen since only the area near the roof is even somewhat warm. The windshield stays open since it's electrically heated. 

Picture is from the fast 10km section. No brakes anymore, but still almost managed to jump.

On the service we managed to get 3,5/4 of the brakes working and close the driver's side window. Even though we had lost a lot of time you should never quit trying. The plan was to pick up any left over points since those might be really valuable in the end of the season. We still had two stages and 70 stage kilometers to go. Anything could happen. On the second last 23km long stage we lost only 4s to the stage winner. A really good result since the brakes weren't 100%. That helped since now we knew we didn't at least take a 30s beating. Something else helped even more. We got an SMS from our service crew before the very last 47km marathon stage. Others crews had had their share of problems(technical or digging the cars out of snow banks) and miraculously we were now second in class and third overall in the 2wd category! That really lifted the spirits and the plan was to drive "fast without risks". Below is our in-car clip from the stage.

ALR 2012 Stage 10, 47km

Meaning not taking any risks, but also not to lift the throttle if there wasn't any reason to take the bend slower than normal. In the end of the stage we found out that we had been fastest in class by 17,6s and secured the second in class and third overall in 2wd!

Goes without saying that the spirits were quite high in the car! Starting with 0,9s to the lead in the morning, the dropping over 10min and then fighting back to second place. An emotional roller coaster, but that's why the Arctic Lapland Rally has the reputation of being an adventure. After the Arctic Lapland Rally we are now third overall in the 2wd championship standings since the SM2 and SM3 classes are fighting for one title only. The next championship round is on the 25th on February in Mikkeli. Before that we have AKK's training weekend and also one small rally on the previous weekend before Mikkeli.

Riihimäki -rally 14th of January 2012

Riihimäki -rally had the honor of being the first rally of the 2012 Finnish Rally Championship. The weather had been really warm and things weren't looking too good for a winter rally. On the previous weekend we headed 450km north of Helsinki to Nilsiä where one could test tyres and car in proper winter conditions. Two days of testing went well and the whole crew got the chance to get some routine of their tasks.

Any worries of a proper winter rally vanished during the week before the Riihimäki -rally. Colder temperatures and some snow enabled a nice winter rally. The first stage of the rally was super special held in the center of Riihimäki on a horse race track. We didn't try anything special and kept driving really clean. The stopwatch appreciated that and we were the fastest 2wd car in the Finnish championship. This year the 2wd cars have been divided into two categories. SM2-class competes with maximum 2 liter cars (civics, fiestas, R2 clio) and the SM3-class with R2 and R1 cars. Both classes fight for one 2wd championship. The R2s are faster on narrow and technical roads and the bigger engined cars on faster stages. Our SM3-class in funny in that way that we are the only crew driving a Ford Fiesta. Everybody else has Citroën C2 R2s in normal or max guises.

The second stage we drove too calmly and lost 12 seconds to Joonas Lindroos in our class. Lindroos was second in Finnish 4wd championship in 2011 and now stepped one step down back to 2wd drive cars. So we didn't loose to a slow driver, but anyway would have been nice to continue leading our class. Third stage was more to our pace and we only lost a few seconds to Lindroos. We headed to the first service second in our class.

After the service there were three stages where we basically drove neck and neck with Lindroos. Didn't manage to close down the gap however. After those three stages we headed back to the service area for our second service. The tactic for the last two stages was quite obvious. No heroics and secure good points with the second place. That was quite easy to do. We also finished fourth overall with the 2wd category. A couple of civics were also faster than us on the fast roads. Next day after the rally we went and drove the stages though again to see where we could have driven faster, improve our pace notes and read the notes with better timing. An exercise I definitely recommend.

Next rally in the championship is the legendary Arctic Lapland Rally 27th-28th of January in Rovaniemi at the Arctic circle. A two day rally with 233 special stage kilometers and some epic scenery. Since the rally is so long we'll fly to Lapland already on Sunday and start the recce on Monday.