Haller, Rachel and Coop have all checked in with updates on the state of the race. There've been a number of hairy wrecks with at least one person, the navigator in an E-Type, landing in the hospital. Coop reports:

"We came around a very sharp curve at about 80 KPH, only to see that one entire lane of the road was GONE, having been washed out by the rains the night before. There was a 20-foot section of the inner lane that was simply gone, as if a bite had been taken out of the road. We avoided it, as well as the other challenges offered today. Others were not so lucky."

La Carrera: Raceblogging is Tough; La Carrera: Yes, I Am Having More Fun You [Positive Ape Index]; It's Only Day 3 [mil0] The Unlimited Class Blog

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More La Carrera Panamericana [Internal]

Inverting the maxim constantly bandied about by competitors in the Gumball 3000 and Bullrun, among other events, La Carrera Panamericana is most assuredly a race. We've had radio silence from our correspondents from the last day as they were busy with qualifying (qualifying isn't mandatory for La Carrera, but a good session moves you up in the grid). Meanwhile, Haller got his blog on and has a cornucopia of snippets, including this Mini crash photo taken while the pilots of the diminutive British econobox suddenly noticed a Stude piloted by a couple of dudes named Carlos who ended up in the weeds. Thankfully, everyone was okay, and not only that the Mini's back on the grid. Oh, and Rachel qualified 16th of 103 cars in her mostly-stock Lotus.

The Unlimited Class Blog

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More La Carrera Panamericana: Rachel Arrives in Veracruz [Internal]

So we were yammering with Haller too late at night, and as late-night yammering between car guys often ends up, ridiculous ideas spring forth. On the spot, he decided to offer free entry into La Carrera Panamericana's Unlimited Class to any hombre with cojones enough to subject his Ferrari FXX to the Mexican endurance test. And here's a note to the kids over at the Scuderia: if you boys want data, here's a way to gather it. The invite is open. All you have to do is get your car to Mexico.

Reschedule the meetings and cue the Ennio Morricone, wealthy men. It's time to to rock your own spaghetti western and mix it up with plebes of lesser estates and other exotica fans alike. Are you true Ferraristi, willing to take on all manner of comers as Il Commendatore intended, including ridiculously-prepped Subies? Or are you simply vegetable-chewing pansies with too much money? Pony up, sirs. Besides, when will you ever get to drive your FXX this far again?

The question concerning the Ferrari FXX. [The Unlimited Class]

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The Unlimited Class at La Carrera Panamericana [Internal]

Last Thursday, around 7:30am we were supposed to be on our way to Pebble Beach in a Ferrari 308 GTB with Jalopnik reader, Larry Manetti fan and all-around fantastic character Pen Pendleton, who was to play Rick to our Thomas Magnum. But we weren't. We were asleep, having snoozed right through our alarm. A few frantic phone calls and some mad Interwebs clicking later, we were in the Durango on the way to LAX to catch a flight to San Jose, where we were offered a ride to Monterey by a very nice woman from Texas named Susan, who refused payment for the lift. (Thanks, Susan!) We hooked up with Pen upon arrival, who actually had been passed by Haller's two-SUV caravan on PCH on the way up, for which he received a bit of grief.

After mutually drooling over the Lotus Formula Junior parked out in front of the Marriott at Calle Principal and Del Monte, we got on our shoe telephone to Haller, who was at dinner with Jim Glickenhaus and was about to give us Annabelle Frankl's number when we spotted a man in pink pants across the street, which could only mean one thing: Nicholas Frankl, sometime Team Polizei co-driver and twin brother of Annabelle. What followed was a mini-Bullrun reunion at Cibo, an Italian restaurant with a bustling bar, due to its proximity to the RM and Russo and Steele auction sites.

After much chatter and catching up, we marvelled at the sound of the straight-pipe exhaust kit on Nick's DB7 (what else would an Englishman in pink pants drive?) and wedged ourselves through the rollcage in Pen's thoroughly awesome 1976 308GTB, complete with snap-on plastic windows and headed to the house where we'd be spending the weekend. We swear, after four days of stepping over that rollcage we're 50 percent more limber than we were when we hopped on the plane. And in the 308, we found an unintentional workout that's almost as much fun as sex. We think we need to figure out a way to own one.

More from Pebble Beach [Internal]

So while some of you have expressed displeasure with our extensive Bullrun coverage, some of y'all have enjoyed it and some have reacted with indifference, we have to say that our own abbreviated sojurn as a mini Sal Paradise to the distaff Dean Moriartys of Keri Rensing and Jennifer Nicole was an experience we'll never forget as long as we live. You can call the celebrities B-grade. You can laugh at some of the posturing, but at the end of it all, it was an incredible gathering of car guys and gals all blowing across the country together and often helping each other out. And while yes, certain things were overwrought, we had a wonderful time on our two days on the rally. Click through for some of our favorite participants' recollections.

While tickets were a worry for some, others, like the Subaru Forester-mounted Colin Herrick, managed to stealthily cruise past law enforcement, Herrick comments, "I didn't get any tickets! Don't know if that's really something to brag about with the Bullrun crowd, but it certainly makes things easier for me!" Especially considering Herrick's an emergency worker and excess baggage on his license could mess with his ability to do his job. On the other end of the scale, Noah Lehmann-Haupt in the Ford GT scored a plethora, commenting, "If you count the CHP combined "speeding + improper lane change" as a twofer, then 5," while his co-driver Rob Ferretti racked up exactly zero. Meanwhile, Jennifer Nicole made a game of it, shooting photos of every cop that pulled them over.

Fast cars make for hot action, no? According to a veteran rallying friend of ours, that's not always the case. He commented, "Guys like you and me would have more luck with women in a regular bar on a Wednesday night than on a rally. There's a lot less sex than everyone would think." Nevertheless, the Rensings managed to sneak in a couple of rendezvous, while Annabelle Frankl saved it up for after the rally, noting that she made the beast with two backs "Only once we got back to LA. However, it was someone on Bullrun..." Rory Camangian had to wait until he returned to his wife in New Jersey, noting that due to the omnipresence of roommates, he wasn't even able to rub one out. Jennifer Nicole, however, seemed satisfied with the titillation the cars themselves offered: "Keri would crack up because every time I saw a hot car or heard the Ford GT's extremely loud exhaust, I'd get major goosebumps down my legs and my nipples would get hard. The funniest thing about that was in Vegas: one of the guys on the run put his hand on my leg (I won't mention his name) and mentioned how nice my legs were and I turned to him and said 'If it wasn't for you and your fucking hot car they'd be a lot smoother!" and he just laughed. I think he got the picture...later.'" Jason Garber, who is now known to us as the Dutch Hercules for his amazing performance in the Team Darkcyd Support Navigator, was more succinct, merely answering, "Yes."

So while a number of us were busy not getting laid, we focused on the cars. We were in love with the Feretti/Lehmann-Haupt Ford GT, which sported an aftermarket Ford Racing exhaust system that gave the car the vibe of a knife-shaped Norse hammer. Or a gun-shaped knife. Or something. Whatever it was, it was godly. Obviously, Jen concurs, but what else were people into? Chuck Mallett was so impressed with Claus Ettenberger's Brabus CLS that he's vowed to enter a four-door of his own next year. While Lehmann-Haupt admits to going faster than Mallett and co-driver Danny Coyle, he counts Tove Christensen's Porsche as his favorite car, "Because seeing it meant we were finishing second." Herrick, on the other hand, was a little more indecisive, naming the Ward/Haller Stude as his personal fave and then coming up with a couple of alternates: "Of all the cars that finished I'd have to say the Lotus 340R was pretty damn cool. The Mosler was stunning, but at 147F inside the car, I'd pass out. They literally fried an egg on the dash board." Garber nominated Mallett's diff-fluid-boiling 'Vette, while Haller and Emil Rensing seconded Herrick's props to the all-open-all-the-time 340R.

As we've previously noted, nobody needs to drop 14 large on top of the price of a car and enough petroleum products to get the job done to haul ass across North America. So what does one get for one's money? According to a Bullrunner who wished to remain anonymous, "The food and drink situation on the rally was disappointing. There were way too many cash bars and not nearly enough good meals to justify the expense. Sure, the Bullrun was worth it as an experience, but it was certainly not something that I can call a 'value' as I try to convince more of my friends to participate next year." We personally found the breakfast at Shelby's facility to be especially bad, although the final meal at Social was good, and the breakfast spread at the W in San Diego featured really rather good eggs. The King Taco experience at California Speedway was generally universally reviled, leading Annabelle Frankl to comment, "If you're going to hire something mobile get a fucking In-N-Out Burger van!"

As for accomodations, Gansevoort in New York and the Sonnenalp in Vail, CO tended to be the two favorites, with Haller noting that the anticipation of the impending rally added a special air to the pre-race night in NYC, while Camagian had fond, Teutonic memories of the hotel in Vail: "It made me feel like I was in Germany, even more so after speaking with Peter Kolb for an hour."

Ah yes, Peter Kolb. The hyperserious, r-Deutschman who campaigned a Porsche GT3RS under the aegis of Robb Rill's Team Darkcyd. Peter is a serious believer in the power of German Precision, and given Tove Christensen's turbocharged "Always First First Place," we can't not lend the man's opinion some credence. So what, then, can we learn from Peter Kolb? Camangian: "I learned that anything that comes from Germany is better engineered than anything from other countries — including beer, pretzels, mountains (The Alps), weiner schitzel, and of course, PORSCHE!" Haller: "I like the Brabus. I think I buy a Brabus." The Dutch Hercules was cryptic, commenting only that, "There is no easy way to devirginate an asshole." Meanwhile, Keri was more forthright, praising Herr Kolb: "[I learned that] some Bullrunners have manners — example: they will stop and check if you're okay when you are pulled over on the side of the road for no reason, even though the other 15 cars in their pack did not." But we'll give Emil the final word on Mister Soul Patch: "Porsche may make the most precise of fine German automobiles, but if you drive like Peter, you won't win the Bullrun."

And that, friends, is it for this year's Bullrun coverage. As Kerouac wrote, "Nobody knows what's going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old." Here, then is a toast to bombing across the country while you still can. We're shutting up. Y'all can exhale now.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

The rally was originally supposed to end at The Grove, one of the tonier open-air shopping areas in Los Angeles. However, at the last minute, mall authorities reneged on the deal, as they'd been doing some research on the Internets and decided that the Bullrun wasn't a "family-friendly" event. During the drivers' meeting at Fontana, David Green informed us that our final destination would actually be the Beverly Hilton, our hotel for the evening.

After a few pace-car-led laps of the track (with Danny Coyle getting reamed by the authorities for passing everyone, including the pace car) and a snack at the King Taco truck, (where they don't know the meaning of the words "no meat"), we lined up for take off. Pulling away from the starting line under escort Keri suddenly called out, "My brakes! Something's wrong with my brakes!" When she got the car stopped and threw the Audi into park, the motor immediately began revving. The gas pedal had gotten stuck under the floor mat. Emil later remarked, "I told her she should've ditched that thing at the beginning."

She tossed the offending piece of carpet back toward us and took off. But we'd lost valuable positions, considering that most of this stage would be played out in Los Angeles traffic.

We didn't have our route entirely planned out as we took off, but we knew we were heading toward the 210, as we figured the 10 would be an absolute disaster. A number of cars had similar ideas, including the consistently well-placing Darkcyd support Navigator and the Skiny/Haller A6 Avant (now missing most of its stickers due to scanner reports that police were looking for the silver/gray wagon). While on the road, we mused on possible routes aloud to ourself while studying the road atlas, until Keri told us to be quiet until we had something figured out. We let Jen handle the directions at this point, as she's a 909 resident, and thus knows the roads out there better than us.

Finally, she suggested the 605 down to the 60 and then over to the 10, which we were pretty much going to have to be on at some point. In a moment of kismet, we mentioned that were just thinking that it was the optimum route as well. So it was set, the Nav Bitch was yammering and we were off. We'd never spent so much of a stage staring out the back window. At one point, we were pretty sure we'd seen a white Crown Vic a ways back. But every time he was out of our line of sight, Keri would put a little more distance between us until he ceased to be a worry.

We hopped off at La Cienega, took Cadillac up to Robertson, then cut over on Olympic to Beverly to Wilshire. The sensation was not unlike when you're driving home and you really have to go to the bathroom. And the closer you get, the worse the feeling of having to go is. By the final stoplight, all three of us were ready to pop. We'd heard via the radio that Los Matadors (who'd taken the 10 all the way) were already there. We pulled in 18th (filmed by one of the Car-Parazzi kids), right behind Richard Rawlings' 750il. William Wu had blazed to victory on the stage, just beating Carl Lewis due to his handy-dandy little device that turned any light with an emergency-vehicle sensor green.

Now it was time for donuts.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

Skiny maneuvers the A6 Avant into proper takeoff position in San Diego.

Generally, when you wake up in the morning at a deluxo hotel in beautiful downtown San Diego and find out that your next destination is in the 909, your first inclination is to break out in hives, go into a seizure, mess yourself, and then put on a straight-brimmed baseball cap, take a hit off the glass dick, climb into a lifted Avalanche, get a slew of tribal tats and crank up any and every Fred Durst-related project you can get your hands on.

Dave Green (left) used to be pretty. Somehow we doubt Richard Rawlings ever was.

Instead, we had eggs that were quite good, drank a fair amount of coffee, and sat down at a table with a group of people, all of whom, except for Jennifer Nicole, had varying models of Motorola RAZRs. Ours was even admired for being "old school," despite the fact that we only bought it last fall. Emil's was gold, Keri's was pink, and Claus had one in some crazy dark finish we'd never seen before which is probably only available to owners of Brabus-tuned cars.

But much in the manner of ninjas during one or another of those Shogunates they had in Japan back in the time, we and our RAZRs would all soon be hurtling toward California Speedway in Fontana. Little did we know, but those of us in the black Audi A8L would also be headed toward our finest hour on the 2006 Bullrun.

The intersection was a madhouse. Danny Coyle was pulling mad donuts and block-long burnouts in the Mallett Corvette. Jen couldn't figure out which way to point the Audi until Emil pointed out to her that she'd be driving out over a curb. Skiny and Bret were about to enter a world of hurt and emerge unscathed, but with their time shattered. Emil was shooting back and forth like a shuttlecock. And Claus? Well, Claus kicked back with his feet up on the open door of his Brabus and made use of his RAZR. Peter Kolb was undoubtedly being more German than anyone else. In fact, we're starting to wonder if he'd actually shrunken the state of Bavaria down to pocket-size when nobody was looking and was carrying it in his pants, simply for added precision. A little extra Weissach never hurt anyone, after all. Except for James Dean.

And then, suddenly, we were off. And miraculously, we were really off. After blowing past Los Matadors on the 163, we didn't see anyone until we got onto the 15, blasting past Skiny and Haller in their A6 Avant. And then the crackle started on the radio. The heavy hitters were quickly moving up behind us. Tove Christensen. the Lehman-Haupt/Ferretti GT with Noah at the wheel. The Team Chris 911. And of course, Danny Coyle wheeling the Chuck Mallett 'Vette.

They blasted past us, with Danny the first to arrive, but not without Jen getting a crack in to Danny over the CB about how it felt to be behind a girl. More chatter, including some worrying news from the well-tuned scanners in the GT regarding Chippies searching for Bullrunners. And sure enough, not long after, the news came over the radio that Team Chris and the GT boys had been snagged. We attempted to get a shot as we drove by, but our imprecise Japanese camera did not allow us such a luxury. We knew we should've bought a Leica. Peter Kolb is no doubt laughing at us as we write this.

Then we flew past Chuck Mallett on the side of the road, refuelling the 'Vette, which only had a 66-mile range. Keri commented, "Watch, in five minutes, he'll come flying past us." Guess what? He did, doing well over a buck on the hard shoulder. Keri put out an APB to all Bullrunners within range, pointing out that in California, the hard shoulders are often filled with tire-and-air-dam-destroying detrius and that we all should be careful.

Meanwhile, just a few miles before we hit I-10, we got stuck in massive traffic. We're not quite sure how we got past Tove, but with the traffic locked in and the GT boys and Team Chris stuck behind us due to their run-in with law enforcement, we knew we had a real shot. Especially if Chuck and Danny ran out of gas again.

On the 10, we made good time, and on the offramp to the Speedway, Jen made use of her looks and got us up in the line. We drove carefully, as the fuzz tend to hang out around the entrance to the speedway, and then hauled ass to the staging area, where we pulled up third behind the Magnaflow RS4 and the Mallett Corvette. The RS4 guys had voluntarily disqualified themselves because they'd left 20 minutes earlier, due to the co-driver not feeling well, putting the nearly bone-stock A8L in behind the 900hp Corvette.

Which just goes to show that on the Bullrun, horsepower is far from everything.

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More on the Bullrun [Internal]

If you want to blast across the country, you can do it for as little as the cost of gasoline, accomodations, coffee and any incidental repairs and speeding tickets you may incur. If you wanna do it on the Bullrun, you've gotta pony up 14k. As an embedded journalist, we were provided with two nights of accomodations, at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas and at the W Hotel in San Diego, which, in the interest of full disclosure, Los Jalopniks must admit to you. They also provided us with meals in Las Vegas, snacks in Lake Havasu, more meals in San Diego, a taco truck in Fontucky and a last supper in Los Angeles. With that out of the way, click through for an abbreviated Jalopnik-style Team Party Crash.

As somebody said to us, "The girls here can smell the size of your wallet a mile away." And well, it's largely true. The greatest females on the rally were generally the married ones, so we spent much of our time talking to them. After all, wouldn't you rather have a good conversation with somebody you know you is off-limits than spew futile, boring bullshit back and forth with somebody there's a 99% chance you won't score with anyway? Well, we suppose your mileage could vary.

Regardless, the girls they rounded up to attend the parties tended not to be interested in broke-dick bloggers. Instead, we tended to appeal to millionaire men. Big ups to the Bullrun wives, though. Your ovaries are equal to the cojones of your husbands, if not superior. Meanwhile, we're gonna go about figuring out how to be gay. Spence, CTE, a little help here?

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

Nine Olympic gold medals should be reason enough for anyone to be considered a badass. But here's the thing: we don't consider Carl a badass because of that, although he was a childhood hero to us. We consider Carl a badass because in the world of sporting/celebrity culture, he's earned the right to be a total dick, yet the night the Bullrun ended, once the party in Haller's room got shut down by the Beverly Hilton's Gestapo, Nick Frankl chewed out the security guards and immediately got on the horn to Carl. Lewis invited us up to contiue the festivities. When we told him we didn't have a hotel room or a ride back to Pedro, he let us crash on his couch. What's more, the man even got us a blanket. That, friends, is class. We've met a number of our childhood and teenage heroes, and Carl's right up there with Joe Strummer in terms of fulfilling our expectations. Trust us, that's rare. Plus, the dude's funny as fuck.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

To get to the W Hotel in San Diego, of course. From front to back, we have Keri Rensing (who drove the stage, shaving 1 1/2 hours off the time predicted by the GPS from Lake Havasu to SD), our intrepid reporter, who only nearly soiled his pants once, feeling somewhat like the inverse of Frog in Smokey and the Bandit, and Jennifer Nicole, whose girlish charms got us out of a momentary jam the following day on the way to California Speedway. Bret Haller captured the exhausted trio on their way to a date with bliss bath products. Needless to say, he and Skiny beat us to the checkpoint.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

Just got off the phone with Haller and Bullrun co-chief Dave Green, who are currently hurtling along in a Lotus Elise with no air conditioning. There was a morning drag race in, Great Bend, KS, wherein the cab from the Queen Latifah bomb Taxi raced a local sherriff. The cab won. Meanwhile, we'll be joining the rally tomorrow night at an undisclosed location. Haller and Ward have totally shelved the Stude, which means we'll be riding along with a variety of characters. We'll hit the stops along the way, but remember, we only stop for the best.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

So the veterans of the Fourth Battle of Bullrun aren't pulling into Manassas, VA tonight, but rather Kansas City, MO, after bombing down from Chicago via Saint Louis, presumably not stopping to check out the legendary screen door of Belleville, IL. Alex Roy has been aggregating anecdotes for us, and after the jump, we aggregate further.

First in? The Johannsen-piloted Magnaflow RS4. And hot on his vapor trails were the Porsche 911 GT2 driven by Tove Christensen, with Rob Ferretti in the SuperSpeeders Ford GT in third. What's more, Ferretti has now collected three tickets. Thankfully, we are not his underwriter.

Meanwhile, Rob Rill of Team Darkcyde (whose support Navigator, driven by Jason Garber, pulled into KCMO in fourth) claims that this is the heaviest law-enforcement presence he's experienced on any rally, corroborating Richard Rawlings' earlier report, as well as seven-rally veteran Nicholas Frankl's assertion that he'd never seen such a "harvesting season" as far as tickets go.

Speaking of the Frankls, Wonder Twin Annabelle was accosted for hitting 106 mph, and Frankl's report was actually issued to Alex Roy while he was following the police cruiser to the station in their Z06 with Annabelle handcuffed in the back.

Meanwhile, the Stude is semi-offically toast at this point, with Haller and Ward motoring along in Skiny's A6 4.2. and the Studebaker most likely to finish the journey back to Los Angeles in Richard Rawlings' Gas Monkey Garage trailer. More Bullrun badness to follow. Keep clicking back.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

Just got off the phone with Haller, riding along with Skiny in the Audi A6 4.2. He reports that the Chicago to St. Louis lunch run has some really fast portions to it, roads where it would be theoretically possible to do 200+. Meanwhile, after almost scoring an engine last night due to the generosity of one of our readers (thanks, Steve!), Ward had us google Crower's number. He's gonna try to have the parts overnighted and see if they can't get the last two days of the rally in back in the Studebaker, which is currently travelling in Richard Rawlings' Gas Monkey Garage trailer. Best of luck, guys!

More Bullrun [Internal]

If anyone out there's got a speed shop in Chicago, or has a buddy who does, Haller and Ward need your help as of right now. They're headed into the City of Big Shoulders with the Stude on Rawlings' trailer, and Kevin thinks he knows what the problem is — the lifters in the Chevy small block are toast. They need to buy a set of solid roller lifters (aka cam followers), (preferably Crower, but brand isn't necessarily important), possibly a set of pushrods, and an intake gasket. If you can help, e-mail davey@jalopnik.com and we'll pass your info on to Kevin Ward.

From Scotto: "We're still in Michigan. We just saw two cars on the side of the road. The Matador Brothers in a Lambo just got pulled over. There's a yellow Murcielago, I think it's #37. They've been pulled over like four times." According to Alex Roy, the Matador boys were nailed for 10 over. Now, anyone who's ever driven in Michigan knows that people regularly drive 20 over the limit on ice, so the MSP is obviously enjoying screwing with the Bullrunners.

Rob Ferretti just got busted twice in ten minutes for 85 in a 70 in the SuperSpeeders Ford GT; at this point, it seems like the MSP is nailing anyone doing more than 70. They've got static radar towers that they're using to vector squad cars toward the participants.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

"Davey: I gotta call you back man. We're doing a little navigating. There's helicopters; cops everywhere. Collins Brothers by the side of the road. It's mayhem. I'll talk to you later."
-Bret Haller, somewhere in Michigan, presumably. 12:50pm PDT

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

As of right now, the Bullrunners are on their way to Chicago after leaving Toronto and heading toward Windsor and Detroit. According to Haller, the Stude is most likely toast after two more cylinders went out. The car is currently on Richard Rawlings' trailer. Speaking of Rawlings, the Texan has picked up another co-driver in the form of William Woo, whose yellow Murcielago took a dirt nap on the first stage, much as it did on the Bonneville Salt Flats during last year's rally.

Also out with fuel-pump problems is Hayden Christensen's Ferrari 360, who was not spotted by any of Roy's contacts in Toronto.

The first group of cars left Toronto at the same time, with the SuperSpeeders Ford GT of Ferretti and Lehmann-Haupt arriving in at 11:55, the Collins Brothers' 550 at 12:05, followed shortly by the Reicke RENNTech CL600 at 12:10, and the Team Darkcyde support truck at 12:10. Rawlings showed up 15th.

While the Canadian police did not seize vehicles as had been rumored, they did stop all Bullrun cars and form them into a convoy for the trip across the border. From Ferretti via Alex Roy, American police have an exact car count (57 vehicles), which the only could've obtained by cooperating with Canadian authorities, who had set up gauntlets using radar and laser at the same time. Meanwhile there's apparently a nationwide APB out on the Bullrunners. Yikes. The Collinses have just been nailed for doing 150mph in Michigan.

Here's the latest, fresh from Alex in our IM window: Main Bullrun Convoy suffering major "harvesting session" at hands of Michigan PD whilst taking I-94 West from Detroit toward Chicago. Team Frankl Twins (led by former Champion Team Polizei Bullrun co-pilot Nicholas Frankl) are leading convoy of 5-6 Bullrunners on safer route southwest from Detroit via US-12 in order to take I-80 West into the Chicago House of Blues checkpoint. Team Twins (Nicholas and Annabelle Frankl) currently hold the Bullrun 2006 speed record, set at 3:18 pm, of 196mph in their silver Corvette Z06

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

Quick update from the Bullrun.

Scotto/Harris Z06: We heard from the Tall One: "1 ticket: 96 in a 65. The cops in Jersey were pretty fuckin' tight. We'd hear 'em over the scanner, 'Yeah, that, uh #67 Corvette, he's got good brakes,' as we nosedived into a speed trap." More musings from participants after the jump.

Notes from Dennis Collins, who's hammered almost 26,000 miles out of his '99 Ferrari 550 Maranello: "We started 34th and they didn't even have the gate open when we got [to Pocono]. Two of the Murcielagos broke. I've never gotten more than 3,000 miles out of a Lamborghini. 22,500 and it's never broken. I got a flat tire once, but I don't know if that counts. It's a great car, which is why I keep it." While the Lehmann-Haupt/Ferretti GT rolled in first with the Tove Christensen GT in second, Collins hit Toronto in fourth, but apparently, there was some sort of a time-card snafu involving the two first-place cars, so all is currently lost in the wheels of confusion. [Above photo courtesy JF Musial, Team Polizei]

Meanwhile, the Ward/Haller Stude is overnighting in Erie, PA, due to be sussed out tomorrow morning after a good night's rest. Stay tuned to Tha Jalop for all your Bullrunning needs.

More on the Bullrun [Internal]

We just received an update from Mister Roy in New York, who hasn't slept since Thursday and bombed out to the Poconos and back this afternoon. At 6:58 EDT, the Ferretti/Lehmann-Haupt Ford GT pulled up at the Toronto Hilton, with the Tove Christensen Porsche Turbo in lukewarm pursuit, arriving roughly 30 minutes later. The above photo was shot by a man named Hovik. The Ward/Haller team is near Niagra Falls with one cylinder out.

No doubt, an all-night thrash is ahead of Bret and Kevin. Get it fixed, boys. We need a ride in a few days. Meanwhile, Skiny has ditched his ride and is hanging out in Detwa, due to immigration issues. He'll be back on when the rally reaches the US. As for the pic on the hood of the GT? That's Bullrun organizer Dave Green, who at one point was a male model. The caption reads, "Hasbeen Models Inc." on the bottom and "I Used to be Pretty" on the top. Way to fuck with the heads-of-state, boys.

This Ain't Pamplona: The 2006 Bullrun is Off! [Internal]

NEW YORK: So the initial hype is over and the action has begun. We just got off the phone with Alex Roy, who isn't competing in this year's Bullrun, but showed up in the Team Polizei M5 to escort the drivers up to Pocono and document the happenings. And happenings there were. After the jump, a gang of pics and lotsa anecdotes.

According to Alex and his photog pal JF Musial (who shot all of the photos for the story), somewhere on the high side of 60 to 80 cars showed up for the start of the race rally, and Roy reports that this year's start contained more high-end, solidly-prepared cars than in years past, including a trio of Audi RS4s, one of which, of course, was driven by Mario Andretti, as well as a couple of Spykers, one of which was piloted by Olympic hero Carl Lewis. The other Spyker, right off the bat, didn't fare so well. Driven by the company president, it got nailed by the fuzz before it reached the Poconos. In fact, according to the traffic on the Polizei scanner, the po-pos didn't have enough squad cars to respond to all of the reports of Bullrun activity.

On a lighter note, Troy Hanson, affiliated with Hayden Christensen's "Don't Fuck With The Sith, Bitch" team, ran out of gas in the Shelby GT-H Safety Car — replete with roof-mounted lights — short of the Jersey-Penna border. A New Jersey State Trooper pulled over to assist, and upon seeing markings on the Mustang indicating that Hanson was an IRL driver, the Indy Racing League-fan peace officer got Hanson topped up and then gave him a 120mph escort to the Pennsylvania state line. Whoever you are, inverse-of-Buford T. Justice, we salute you.

Meanwhile, the non-participant Polizeis were offering an escort to a peleton that included our boy Skiny in an Audi A6 4.2.

The first car out, a Saleen S7 that Alex predicted would break down, failed fifteen minutes after its departure and showed up last to the jambalaya lunch and lap of the track at Pocono.

Speaking of the lap, the Ward/Haller '54 Studebaker apparently dominated the on-track proceedings, and according to Roy, is the coolest car of the event, hands-down. We'll be blasting along in the Stude soon enough, wearing a cool shirt (and we don't mean fashionable — the thing's essentially a Cup car with a Studebaker body; needless to say, there's no air conditioning compressor hooked up to the 305-inch, 650hp small block.)

As for the favorites? The two most experienced teams on the rally are the Rawlings and Collins teams, with Rawlings in the 750il that he finished last year's rally in after his crazy-ass hot rod took a dirt nap, and Collins in a Ferrari 550. The main contender against the veterans is the Ford GT driven by Rob Ferretti and Noah Lehman-Haupt, who apparently have pretty much duplicated Team Polizei's law-enforcement-avoidance setup. Worryingly, their car — a vehicle that Noah rents out from his Gotham Dream Cars business, already has bald tires, and the GTs are legendary for blowing clutches during such events. But if they can keep it together, Roy thinks they've got a shot. The kids hit Toronto tonight.

As our date with the last few stages draws nearer, we'll keep you posted on the happenings. [Thanks to Alex and JF for the reportage and photos.]

Related:
Bullrun Madness!; Scotto On the Bullrun! [Internal]

So, as the kids in the cross-country, rich-people-rallying community (and those who obsessively follow such things) know, the Bullrun kicks off tomorrow in Spinelli's backyard. What only a few kids know, is that if all goes according to plan, Davey G. will be an embedded reporter with the crew of Kevin Ward's absolutely nuts-of-a-cheetah '54 Studebaker along with La Carrera Panamericana Unlimited Class co-founder Bret Haller, as well as with a few other crews for the last three days of the rally, catching a flight to an undisclosed locale, and then hauling ass (at legal speeds, of course — it's a rally, not a race), back to Los Angeles. Sadly, we won't be partying with Andretti, as he's apparently wussing out and only driving the beginning of the festivities.

Rallying Cars and Racing Stars; Racing Legend Joins Automotive Rally [ForbesAutos]

Related:
[Internal[