The JPIII RS Honda Prelude VTEC competed in Round 6 of the Michelin SCCA PRO Rally Championship in the Maine Forest Rally held in Rumford, Maine July 26~27 hopeful of closing the gap to the Production Class points leader Lon Peterson. Peterson would not be at this event, and this would help level the playing field as he had already competed in 2 more events than Jim in the Prelude VTEC. The event was run in a two day format including 2 stages held in downtown Rumford on Friday night. The weather was fantastic creating near perfect conditions for a rally. The event was also being taped for broadcast on the Satellite network SportsChannel.

Two other Production-class competitors turned out for this rally including the Canadian class leader Pete Pollard in a VW GTI and as well as a Ford Escort GT driven by Irishman Charlie Langan in his first US event in the 2wd car.

The first two stages were held on a 6 mile logging road just outside of Rumford. Navigator Martin Dapot and I went into attack mode on the Friday stages and pulled out a 22 second lead over Pollard's GTI with Langan's Escort a distant third, more than 2 minutes back.

Saturday's schedule was the majority of the 120 stage miles. The car was handling marvelously and I was trying not to push too hard but maintain the lead. Unfortunately, halfway through the 6 miles of Special Stage 8, the right front lower spring perch decided it had had enough and broke off the car. We were able to make it into service, but the damage was too bad to repair in spite of a great effort by the crew and we were forced to retire with 4 stages still to be run.

The DNF was quite disappointing, however, we will have the car ready for the next event in Bemidji, Minnesota August 23~25.

The chase for the Production class driver's championship is still going full bore. Jim has 36 points from 3 events. Lon Peterson is still in first by 17 points with 53 points. Remember, only the best 6 finishes counts towards the championship. It will be an uphill battle to catch Lon, but Jim is looking forward to continuing the battle in Bemidji, Minnesota.

Many thanks to all of the JPIII Rally Sport sponsors!