We weren't allowed to run to our machines at the start of the race. So we skipped! -photo by little steve
Click on a thumbnail sketch to see the full size picture.
I wish we could have gone to the first Ventura Kinetic Sculpture Race. But Ventura is a long drive from Corvallis, and it was just more than any of us could handle. But this year we planned it earlier and just did it.
Ventura has some killer hills and I was expecting to have to tackle them. We are heavy, so we wouldn't go fast. But The Rex Files has the gears to be able to handle it. However they didn't run the race on the hills. It was all rather flat. This year.
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My parents and two brothers live in Ventura. These are my nephews, Jesse, Tom, Chris, and my niece, Mira. -photo by little steve |
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The race was started by firing a small cannon at the head of California Street. We weren't allowed to run to our machines at the start of the race. So we skipped! -photo by little steve |
The sand was more of a challenge. First we tackled a sand pile much like the daVinci Days race. We then ran our racers for a mile parallel to the beach. Ventura beach sand is quite soft and many of the vehicles pushed. We didn't, but I can understand why they did. The temperature was about 85F. We went slow.
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Gold Diggers was fast on the sand but somewhat slow in the water. Jim and Lauren drove down from the Bay area for the race. -photo by little steve |
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Junkyard Hog was able to keep up with us in The Rex Files on the sand. There was a mile of soft sand. At times we ran along in the surf. But the slope of the beach was almost as bad as the soft sand. The temperature was in the 80s. That is unusually high for Ventura. Most of the year it in the 70s. I am told the hot weather arrived just as we arrived. And it cooled off somewhat the day after the race. -photo by little steve |
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Lick Me. -photo by little steve |
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I hear the Trailblazers kids were tired after dragging their machine over the beach. -photo by little steve |
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Tri-Again. -photo by little steve |
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The Energizer Bunny didn't have the energy to put together a drum. -photo by little steve |
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Officials. -photo by little steve |
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Here we have a young aspiring Kinetic Scultor. -photo by little steve |
After a day of racing most people want to rest. Not us. We get energized by giving rides.
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Whenever I got a chance I gave people, mostly kids, free rides in The Rex Files. We gave rides to anyone who wanted one. As it turns out most of the kids around were from Trailblazers, including all of the kids in this photo. Other racers were labeling me 'The Pied Piper' for attracting such a following. More pictures of people taking rides. -photo by little steve |
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Saturday night we, along with many others of the racers, camped on the grass near the Marina. This is the Trailblazers' tent city. |
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The Rex Files is a transformer. Here one of the side panels becomes an impromptu tent. That is my head reflecting so much light from under my 'tent'. -photo by little steve |
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Debbie Giles was the race coordinator. She did a bang-up job. I was especially impressed with how she was able to line up media coverage. She sent out over a hundred press releases. Three newspapers had coverage on multiple days, including the Los Angeles Times. There were also TV stations covering the race. Imagine if every race had that kind of coverage. |
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The police were great. They escourted the racers along the route at all times. They stopped traffic for us. They were always cheerful and courteous. |
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Bite Me was the fastest machine in this race. Those big wheels are very good in the mud. It was a local Ventura vehicle. |
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The Rex Files. That's Laura and me in the pilot seats. My parents are standing to the right. One of my motivations for going to the Ventura race was because they live in Ventura. |
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Lick-Me [left] had no trouble in the mud. I was suprised that Headhunters [right] had so much trouble. A problem was that they were not stable enough. When they would try to move, the front of their machine would lift off the ground. They also didn't seem to have a low enough gear. -photo by little steve |
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The mud didn't look like much. It was shallow. But once we got into it we discovered a very slick spot. It filled in our treads and we just spun our tires. Because The Rex Files is front wheel drive, it has better traction when we move the center of gravity forward. We had Stuart, our pit crew, stand on our front bumper, moving our center of gravity more onto the front wheels. This is a technique we have used in the daVinci Days race, the Port Townsend race, and the Arcata race. It worked here too. -photo by little steve |
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Vehicles with lots of driven wheels often do well in mud. Even though many of the tires are mired in the mud, others are getting good traction and are able to move the whole machine forward. Trail Blazers moved through the mud quickly. -photo by little steve |
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One of the nice features of the Ventura Race was the Water Wizard. This woman was at the mud pit to wash off the machines as they got out. -photo by little steve |
There was a short road trip from the mud to the water entry at the Marina.
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Bribery of the judges is encouraged. This girl escaped our notice for some time because she wasn't in the judges uniform. She is related to the Tri-Again team, and even wears their uniform. -photo by little steve |
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The Rex Files entering the water. Our transition is somewhat slow, but its always a crowd pleaser. We got an award for Best Transition. We had arranged a grudge match race with Lampoons over who has the fastest vehicle in the water. This was it. At previous grudge matches Rex had had mechanical problems, putting the results in question. This time I checked out the systems carefully before the race. |
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After we entered, Lampoons joined us in the water for the grudge match. We squared off where the waterway turned right. The sprint was short but intense. Rex performed well. At the end of the straightaway it seemed that we had a tie. So there you have it folks. The Rex Files and Lampoons are equals in water sprints. |
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Junkyard Hog's road drive system is totally separate from his prop drive. On the road he mounts the water drive upside down on the top of the vehicle. When he enters the water he remounts the water drive so that the prop is properly underwater. |
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Insecticide in the water. |
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Life's A Beach. |
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Land Sharks enter the water with a splash. |
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It was quite a project to get Trailblazers into the water. I hear that the operation took half an hour. |
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Tri Again and Trailblazers in the water. Trailblazers had technical difficulties involving floatation. One of the bikes became a submarine. I think they skipped the water leg of the race after that. |
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The Rex Files in the Marina. -photo by little steve |
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We of The Rex Files have never learned how to exit water when there are waves. This was a typically messy affair. We suffered some damage to the prop. -photo by little steve |
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Once we left the water we took off our off-road tires and pontoons. These children helped us deflate The Rex Files pontoons by sitting on them. I didn't ask them to do it. They just jumped into it. Kids are wonderful. -photo by little steve |
After exiting the water we raced several miles on roads and then on the Ventura Promenade.
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The Rex Files. We actually spent quite a bit of time with full decorations. But this is one of the few pictures I got in that configuration. |
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We had a lot of fun running The Rex Files in circles when we got to intersections. We also did circles around traffic police who were directing traffic. They weren't TOO irritated by that. |
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On a hot day the fountain along the Promenade is a popular place to be. The fountain is at the Finish Line. -photo by little steve |
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Its The Cheeze at the finish line. Notice that the Cheeze part has been separated from the Its The part. The pilot took a bad risk, cutting in front of the 4000 lb Trailblazers on the road. Trailblazers cannot stop quickly because that requires all 24 pilots to hit their brakes simultaneously. They ran over the top of Cheeze. I hope the pilot of Its The Cheeze learned something. He could easily have been badly hurt. |
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The Real Thing at the finish line. The Real Thing had a mishap also. They touch one of the two walls bordering the walkway along the Ventura Promenade. Bounced between the walls like a pinball and almost rolled. |
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Lampoons was awarded the Grand Prize in Ventura. They were tops in Engineering and in Art. Lampoons is really a fine machine. |
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Head Hunters at the finish line. Head Hunters dragged their teddy in a cart behind their vehicle. Actually 'Teddy' was a Garfield doll. Gag. Garfield suffered an injustice when we ran over him with our front wheel. They repaired the cart and replaced Garfield with a voodoo doll. The doll had the same hair color as me. Coincidence? I think not. |
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Trailblazers at the finish line. |
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Auctioning off Debbie's hat is an annual tradition now. Last year it went for $50. This year $200. The money goes to the Turning Point Foundation |
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Jim of Gold Diggers bought a medalion that Hobart made. Another $200 for The Turning Point. They also auctioned off a Keystone Kops hat and a helmet cover from The Rex Files. |
The week before the race Ventura was experiencing typical weather for Ventura: low 70s. On the day of the race the Santa Ana's (east wind) hit, raising the temperature to the mid 80s. My Corvallis friends thought this was great weather. But I noticed the Ventura locals apologizing for the weather because it was so hot. I guess its all a matter of perspective.
A few days after the race, the temperature in Ventura had dropped back to the low 70s. Looks like Mother Nature was playing a little joke on us. Its OK. We were all laughing.
| This site: http://brown.armoredpenguin.com/~abrown/rex/RexFiles/Ventura1999/index.html |
My home site:
http://brown.armoredpenguin.com/~abrown |
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Last modified 11 Dec 2006 |
Copyright 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 |