Monkey Wrench Motorsports On Fire to Win Rally America’s Production GT Regional Cup Championship

Monkey Wrench Motorsports driver Scott Wilburn earned the Rally America Production GT Regional Cup Championship at Missouri’s 100 Acre Wood on February 27^th and 28^th.  Wilburn and Co-driver Aaron Crescenti came to the event looking to follow up their 2008 Eastern Regional Production GT title with a win in Rally America’s invitational “shoot-out” for the nation’s regional champions.  Despite completing only one of the event’s two days of competition, the team still managed to take the Cup honors.

Based in Salem, MO, the 100 Acre Wood Rally is round 2 of the Rally America National Championship.  Running in parallel with the event was Rally America Regional Cup Championship for the 2008 class winners in each of the 4 Rally America regions.  The event featured smooth, fast forest roads and very unpredictable weather.  Monkey Wrench Motorsports started the event anxious to face the challenge of a rally on which neither driver nor co-driver had previously competed. 

The rally’s first day consisted of 5 timed “special stages” in the Ozark foothills surrounding the host town.  The event started well for Wilburn and Crescenti as they sought to find a good rhythm before going bananas to push for Cup Championship victory.  “I feel like we made a pretty steady start.  We were competing on Lassa tires for the first time as well as using a new rear differential, so the car’s handling was slightly different than I was used to” Scott Wilburn said.  “The new tires worked really well and allowed me to maintain greater speed in the corners than before” he added.  The rear differential however, would cause problems for the team later in the day.

After completing all 5 of the first day’s competitive stages, the team hit trouble on the road section back to the finish.  “We started to notice some handling problems with the car about a mile from the end of stage 5.  On the road section after the stage, it became clear that we had a serious problem with the rear differential.”

As Wilburn and Crescenti reached the finish line for day 1, leaking oil from the differential caught fire and led to some tense moments for the team.  “We reached the finish time control and realized that there was a small fire at the back of the car.” Aaron Crescenti said.  “It made for a spectacular finish at least!” he added.  Knowing that they had done enough to secure the Regional Cup Championship, the team withdrew from competition before the start of day 2 to prevent risking further damage to the car’s drivetrain.

The team’s next event sees them heading to the Catskills region to contest Rally New York USA on April 3^rd and 4^th.  They’ll be looking forward to peeling out right from the start of this fast, challenging, all-asphalt event.  Check www.monkeywrenchmotorsports.com for updates and team information.  It’s Bananas!