This past weekend was the Tall Corn Cruiser Classic down near Knoxville, Iowa. I was some what involved with the event and took Friday off of work to go down early to set up and pre-run a few trails.
I was the only 80 series there. The majority were FJC's by FAR. I'll throw up some quick pics for now.
I was the impromptu trail leader for the stock (+) class for Saturday and today- which I thought was really funny, since I had no idea where most of the trails went, and I could certainly get into more trouble than the stockers could.
Anyway- I actually had the most fun of the entire event as a trail leader on Saturday. I told Packman73 I'd take a group of stockers down on the trail as long as it was a small group, I said no more than 6 vehicles. Yeah- well... about 14 vehicles later- I was leading a group of 60% FJC's and a couple 40's, a few taco's, one 60, and me through the forests. We ended up on a trail that forced us all to climb a pretty stupid incline. You can see the 4-runner doing the three legged doggy dance at the top of the hill:
The crux of the climb was the top. The deep passenger side rut combined with the flat top unloaded opposite ends of each axle, sending most (on AT's) scrambling for traction. The only open diff vehicle that made it up was this 40- I think heavy foot combined with the shorter wheelbase helped out.
Anyway- we got all the stockers to the top and everyone really seemed to enjoy the climb a LOT. I think they all thought that they couldn't make it, but when we spotted them up and reassured them they did just fine and everyone got a big confidence boost. That was a lot of fun for me. The only folks that had to winch up the hill were the ones running open f/r diffs.
I also got to twist it up a bit. 33's DO rub on the OME heavy suspension. Not much, but a bit.
The only trail I tried that I was denied on- deep, deep rut and a corner about half way up, set my front end pitching way up. I just plain chickened out. I maybe could have made it with a really good spotter- but with the kid sitting shotgun I just had no desire to 'go for it'.
And what would the Tall Corn Cruiser Classic be without some corn?
Yeah, I know I'm going to get heat for the next pic. Bite me.
