Team Camaro – First Leg of the Route 66 Rally

By Robby DeGraff

RedMaro6

Well the first official leg of the rally has been completed, from Joliet Illinois to Rolla, Missouri. While asleep at 7am, we got our requested wake up call from the Motel 6 front desk and got the day off rolling. Before we get into the rally leg, lets talk about the Motel 6 and how it might be the biggest disappointment in motel chains. Ok so we all know that Motel 6’s tagline is “We’ll leave the light on for you,” but when we arrived at this motel last night at like 10:30pm…..they left the light on, but didn’t leave us any shampoo, working internet, bath towels, and the usual motel hotel conveniences. Not to mention, the hallway was orange and reminded us of a dimly lit hotel in The Shining. The room itself had like bamboo floors, an upscale bathroom, my partner John and I were just confused haha. Now, on to day one of the rally: the first day was an adrenalin rushed successes. We packed up and headed out to the back parking lot and saw the wide variety of cars competing with us.

Continue reading after the jump!

A giant Ford Raptor dubbed as the support/parts vehicle, a shiny Dodge Challenger, a silver V12 Mercedes Sl (speed will help the car but not it’s gas mileage!), a classic dune buggy with a Subaru WRX boxer engine inside, Dodge Challengers, a Scion TC, a few fixed up Mustangs, and lots more. Unfortunately, our friend Jon who drove his Mini Cooper all the way from the tip of Maine to Illinois just for the starting line, was already experiencing technical difficulties with a massive oil leak from his CV joint. So a few of the rally participants had turned the Motel 6 parking lot into a temporary mechanics haven.

Luckily, our lifting jack from the Camaro came into play as we raised the little Mini Cooper off the ground and the team got fixing (good news is that the duo from Maine were able to get their Mini running and met up with us later on in Missiouri). After a quick run to a Citgo to fill up the Camaro’s main and portable gas tanks, in hopes our broken fuel sending unit/gas gauge strikes back and we run dry on gas in the middle of Missouri. We met up with Mike Schlee, from Canada, representing Canada’s Autotrader.ca in his brand new blue Subaru WRX and a few others as we departed from the motel to the 2010 Route 66 Rally starting line at the Route 66 Chicagoland Speedway.

We arrived at the entrance way to the speedway and met both Scott Spielman & Tony Intreri, the two founding leaders of this year’s epic rally. We filled out a release form and drove into a vast racing complex, filled with the east coast crew’s cars. After a brief meet and greet with pictures in front of the speedway building, we lined up at the starting line. There must have been 30 sports cars, trucks, classics, and other unique automobiles all ready, engines thumping, CB/walkie-talkie chatter playing, to get on with the rally. Tony and Scott lined everyone up; handed out the route cards with our three checkpoints, rally rules, and the first day’s finish line hotel, Zeno’s Motel located in Rolla Missouri.

We pulled up in our red Camaro next to the dune buggy, the clock started, and Jay in the dune buggy did a massive peelout, that ended up with his throttle cable breaking! We all set off for our first checkpoint, the old Ambler-Becker Texaco Gas Station, otherwise known as the longest operating gas station along Route 66! En-route to the first checkpoint, we (Team Camaro) tagged along with a red Chevy Cobalt SS, Dodge Challenger, a Scion TC, and BMW 3 series. Keeping in contact via CB radio and two-way radio, we navigated off the main high way and headed into towns.

Flashy sports cars must have been the talk of town in Dwight, Illinois as we rolled down the streets searching for this classic Route 66 landmark. John and I suddenly spotted a blackish/dark blue newer Mustang GT decked out in the 2010 Route 66 decals, quickly leaving the first checkpoint. I saw the Ambler-Becker Texaco Gas Station, pulled into the parking lot, John got out to run inside and try picking up a driving map, but the doors were locked! We snapped a quick picture of our Camaro in front of the landmark, hopped in and gassed it out of the lot. A few minutes later, we caught up with the two guys in the Mustang GT and tailed along with them for a while. Teams Scion, BMW, and Cobalt were out of radio contact though another rally participant, Kevin, in a highly modified Chevrolet Impala soon caught us on the CB radio waves.

The next checkpoint, the old Memory Lane billboard was probably thirty minutes away and was hard to find. At the current moment, Team Camaro had been flying down a newer Route 66, a road parallel to Highway 55, at a nice steady pace of 85 m.p.h. “Oh S**t,” I yelled out as we flew by an oncoming Illinois State Police patrol car in the left lane at more than 85 m.p.h., luckily our radar detector hadn’t gone off and we slipped by this time. That was an intense moment because on this 2010 Route 66 Rally, one ticket from the police meant an automatic disqualification from that leg’s awards.

A few minutes later we were in Lexington, driving around looking for this classic billboard. With no luck, we pulled a quick U-turn and stopped at a local gas station. My co-driver and navigator, John and I ran inside asked for directions and sprinted out. Turns out we had just literally passed this hidden billboard about ten minutes back. As we left the gas station, the Mustang GT we had been following flew by, with its 4.6L V8 roaring across the Illinois country-side. Eyes open wide we scanned both side of the road looking for an old billboard, at last we saw it and drove off onto a dirt path to reach it. “Go go go, get out, grab the camera,” John yelled as we hopped out of the car and ran to the billboard to snap a picture. (On this rally, you needed to prove your attendance at each of the checkpoints by taking a picture or video.)

After snapping the picture and pulling out of that gravel road like the Dukes of Hazard, we got back on to 66 and within a few seconds the Impala flew by in search of the same checkpoint. We hopped back on to the highway and headed towards Springfield, Illinois for our third checkpoint, Lincoln’s Tomb. Driving through Springfield was chaotic, stoplights and slow moving traffic everywhere. Team Camaro was on a roll; time and speed were what we cared about. The Mustang GT caught up with us as we rolled into Springfield, searching for Lincoln’s Tomb. Thankfully, my navigator is from the Illinois area and was familiar with Springfield. We followed a few signs and came across a huge monument and tomb for old President Abraham Lincoln. Doors open we hopped out, took a few pictures with our Canon Digital Rebel XT SLR camera and jumped back in.

We pulled an “interesting and questionable” U-turn and took off for the main Route 66 road through Springfield. Eventually the Camaro made its way back onto the main highway, 55, and we were heading southwest towards St. Louis, Missouri. “The Arch!” I yelled out as we approached the St. Louis skyline. I had never seen the great St. Louis Arch and thought the site was something great. Driving through the St. Louis highway system reminded me of my younger days of playing Mario Kart on Nintendo; lots of curves and hilly highways; yet lots of bumps were not particularly good for our 2001 Camaro, with almost 100,000 miles on it. Our modified Camaro coupe is equipped with 17 inch American Racing Rebel rims with 275 width tires all around: which means every time we hit a large bump or dip in the pavement, “WHAMPF”, our rear fenders would lower down and rub against the tires. The noise was a bit scary but something we just couldn’t stop for; our rally pace was just too perfect. We just hoped the metal fender rubbing against the rubber tires wouldn’t cause a blowout at 80 plus m.p.h.

Keeping in radio contact with Kevin and Brad in their modified Impala, John and I decided to make a quick pit stop for gas, a bathroom break, and maps. We got off the highway and pulled into a Marathon station. John hopped out of the car as I backed it up and pumped gas as fast as I could into the Camaro’s gas tank. Back on the highway we were, heading south through St. Louis at a decent pace until…. traffic jams and construction. John and I had switched positions, he was driving and I navigating with a laminated gas station fold out map of Missouri. Constantly we were in bumper-to-bumper traffic, driving along at a crawling pace of less than 30 m.p.h. About half an hour later, we were out of the traffic jam, out of St. Louis, and flying up and down the winding hilly roads of Missiouri. John was coasting at around 80 m.p.h., and I was using our binoculars to scan the horizons for hiding police cars.

Around 3:45pm or so, Team Camaro arrived at the final destination of the day, Zeno’s Steak House and Inn. Julia and Mark Janos, of Team Hemicuda from season three of Bullrun, welcomed us with their awesome Hemicuda as we pulled in. Julia checked off our pictures, proving that we made it to all three checkpoints, and we parked the Camaro. There were only a few cars at the motel including the blitzing fast silver Mercedes SL, an old fast Dodge Omni, and the Impala from Michigan. Rumor has it that the driver of the silver Mercedes Sl, with its monstrous V12, was seen doing over 160 m.p.h. on the highway earlier on today. We remember him flying by our Camaro at 110 m.p.h! As the rain started falling, more and more cars started making their way to the final destination of the day. Once everyone was checked into the hotel, and their leg one times taken note, we all gathered in Zeno’s restaurant for a delicious dinner and celebration of a successful first day: no major breakdowns, no accidents, no speeding tickets, tons of great cars, tons of great people, and a whole hell of a lot of fun!

Day two of the 2010 Route 66 Rally begins Thursday morning at 9 a.m.! Stay tuned for more details and don’t forget to checkout the official 2010 Route 66 Rally Facebook page for photos and more!

See my ride page for more pics!