Subenet: Sno*Drift 2007

Archive

For Immediate Release
Contact: David Gee/952-201-3151

Tough Sledding for the K&N Subaru in Michigan

Lauchlin O’Sullivan and Scott Putnam fight for 9th at Sno*Drift

So the first time wasn’t a charm for Lauchlin O’Sullivan and Scott Putnam, driver and co-driver of the K&N Engineering Subaru rally car. It was the first event of the 2007 Rally America Championship season, the first time they had been together since the X Games back in August, and the first time they had ever teamed up in the snowy northwoods near Atlanta, Michigan. And they hope it will be the last time they’re not in contention for the overall rally win.

“The event did not go as planned, to say the least,” recounts O’Sullivan, a California native who doesn’t have that much seat time driving at rally speeds in the snow. “The team though did do a great job in preparing a car that took every hit and bump Sno*Drift had to offer and did not flinch. Scott did a great job this event too, especially considering he has been on the sidelines these past six months.”

O’Sullivan was prophetic when he said before the event how important tire choice is and that things “can go wrong in a hurry if you make the wrong choice.”

The K&N Engineering Subaru team brought a wide assortment of mounted ice and snow tires to contest the conditions, which could range from deep snow to a few inches of loose stuff to hardpack to ice and frozen gravel and dirt, and the choices proved a bit confounding.

“It's really a shame when your team and car are running well, and you don't take advantage,” said O’Sullivan after having the chance to reflect on the season’s inaugural rally. “Against a strong field, where any one of nine teams could have won the event, we could not afford any mistakes. And right away, I started out with the wrong tire choice, only to make a worse one coming in for the second leg of the day. And to top this, I killed the car on a slow corner, and the car would not restart, which meant losing another minute and 15 seconds.”

Day 2 of Sno*Drift would be a longer day with 10 stages in all, as Mother Nature delivered more cold, some more fresh snow, and really flat light that a very competitive field of 50 cars would have to fight all the way through ‘til night.

This time though the guys chose a jack-of-all trades tire that wouldn’t necessarily be the best in any one particular condition, but conversely wouldn’t hurt them too bad no matter what they encountered on a stage.

Not only did they hope to achieve redemption by putting the right rubber on the road, but a fast 25-mile stage provided the opportunity to make up some time on Travis Pastrana and the rest of the leaders.

“We did come back the next day and prove we could run top-five times, but with the longest stage of the day cancelled (due to an errant snowmobiler on the course) we could only muster ninth-place overall,” said a still disappointed O’Sullivan. “This was due not merely to our own miscues, but also because of some really great drives, a lack of problems, and no DNF’s by literally all the other competitors ahead of us. We had some good fun though playing in the snow with the proper tires on the car.”

In previous Sno*Drifts a large number of competitors crashed themselves out of contention, or at least encountered significant problems like flat tires to place them far back in the standings. Not this year though.

“Our strategy – which in a normal year would have taken advantage of the normally high attrition rate in this event – did not pay off this time,” echoes co-driver Scott Putnam. “Even though we saw plenty of tracks belonging to cars that had gone off the road, the snow seemed deep enough to act as a buffer, but yet not deep enough to cause anyone to get hung up, which in prior years would mean a several minute delay. Further, small gambles to gain advantage on tire choices did not pan out as well, and each mistake was amplified against the strong field. After landing on the tire we should have been running on from the start we posted good times the second day, moving up a couple of spots in the process.”

And the moving up process continues as the 2007 Rally America Championship moves to the Ozark Mountains of Missouri for the fast and scenic 100 Acre Wood Rally Feb 23-24.

K&N Engineering, Inc., with headquarters in Riverside, California, has been the world’s leader in performance filter technology since 1969, serving the needs of the automotive, motorcycle, marine, industrial and military markets. K&N is heavily involved in nearly every form of motorsports from off-road and powersports to drag racing, stock cars and road racing. For more information about K&N Filters, please contact K&N Engineering, Inc., P.O. Box 1329, Riverside, CA 92502-1329, (800) 213-4182 for a dealer near you, (800) 858-3333 for technical service/questions, (951) 826-4001 Fax, e-mail tech@knfilters.com, or visit www.knfilters.com.

CPD Racing is a professional rally team owned by Doug Havir and based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The team fields two Subaru WRX STi’s in the Rally America series, the principal sanctioning and governing body of rally racing in the United States. Rally America is also owned by Havir. CPD Racing, a proven rally race winner, is also sponsored by Luther Automotive Group’s Bloomington Acura Subaru and subenet. For more information about CPD Racing please go to www.subaru.net.

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