WELLSBORO, PA — Fifty race cars, the infusion of millions of dollars to local area businesses rivaling a national convention, and MTV star Travis Pastrana all highlight the 33rd annual running of the Waste Management Susquehannock Trail Performance Rally®, coming to the state forests near the Pennsylvania Grand Canyon, again announce the coming of spring in Tioga County.

Citizens & Northern Bank, Waste Management return

Presented by Citizens & Northern Bank and Waste Management, STPR®, which is round five of the Rally America Championship Series, will take place June 5 and 6, 2009 in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania. The rally, promoted by the Finger Lakes STPR® Motorsports LLC committee, is chaired by Meridith Croucher, from Newark, New York (Rochester area), and she pointed out that last year’s major changes in the rally were all a big hit with both the rallyists the locals.

“Having the two spectator stages at the Tioga County Fairgrounds, using the Waste Management roads, and going to a two-day format with only daylight racing all turned out to be successful changes for STPR® last year,” said Ms. Croucher, who heads up a team of nearly 400 volunteers that make the rally happen.

“This has become a very popular family event, especially with the Fairground stages, where kids can get up close to the rally cars, meet the drivers, enjoy some refreshments, and then watch the cars battle on a closed course for competitive times and a chance to win the event,” she said.

The Fairgrounds stages cost five dollars for admission each day.

Alcohol-Free

One of the changes made several years ago – the transition of STPR to an alcohol-free event – has helped enhance the enjoyment of the rally for everyone, and made the administration of the event, both in town and in the woods, easier.

“As the sport of performance rally continues to evolve, with younger competitors and new fans, we must adapt our event to the changing times. As we work with the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources to strike a balance between recreational use of state forest land and preserving the beauty of the land, all parties agreed that alcohol had no place in the rally environment,” she said.

What is STPR®, Performance Rally?

The Susquehannock Trail ProRally (STPR®) was first conducted by the Finger Lakes Region, SCCA in 1977, with the assistance of members of other sports car clubs in the Rochester, NY area. Members of these clubs (Triumph Touring Club, Corvair Owners Club, MG Car Club and others) had experience with previous performance events such as the Snowblower and Lunar Lunge which ran out of Rochester as early as 1965 and were part of the M.O.N.Y. series (Michigan, Ohio and New York), the forerunner of the SCCA ProRally series.

In the United States, performance rally teams have a driver and co-driver (or navigator) for each car, and the competitors race in segments (or stages) on closed public roads, trying to get from the beginning to the end of the stage as fast as they can. Unlike other forms of motorsports, there is no practice allowed, and the course is not revealed to the competitors until the navigator receives the route instructions before the start of the event. The navigator then barks out the route instructions while the drive proceeds – sometimes at speeds exceeding 100 miles-per-hour – through forest, desert, and logging around at events around the country. The cars, all street legal to allow driving on public roads between racing stages, are compact and sub-compact cars with varying amounts of performance modifications depending on the class they are running in. The sight of these cars, running at speed through the woods to beat the clock, makes exciting spectating for the fans who come out to watch performance rally.

STPR® was the last of the great endurance events on the national schedule maintaining the one day format and is designed with a high stage/transit mileage ratio and, thanks to the outstanding cooperation of the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR), some of the best and most demanding roads in the country. In 2008 STPR changed to a new 2-day format to better utilize new competitive content, and give spectators more daylight viewing options. The Super Special Stages at the Tioga County Fairgrounds sponsored by Subaru and will once again run once on Friday and once on Saturday. STPR has six spectator locations to show the sport to maximum advantage in all its exciting aspects to the public and media.

The Waste Management Susquehannock Trail Performance Rally®, presented by Citizens & Northern Bank and Waste Management is a National Rally, approximately 264 miles long with approximately 127 miles of competitive stages. The Sherwood Forest Rally is a Regional Rally (for competitors who are not running for national Rally America Championship points), coefficient 2 that includes Stages One through Six and is approximately 47 miles. The Finger Lakes Rally is a Regional Rally, coefficient 3 that includes Stages Seven through Thirteen and is approximately 80 miles – both Regional rallies are run in conjunction with the full national event.

Rally car racing is considered the extreme sport of automobile racing and is often described simply as "real cars, real roads, real fast." This all-season motorsport sees drivers and their co-drivers take modified road cars to the limit as they achieve blistering speeds over courses that cover more than 100 miles of gravel, dirt or snow-covered roads.

The 2009 Rally America National Championship series consists of nine exciting events throughout the country in many different weather and road conditions. Top teams in the series are also invited to compete in the Summer X Games, the leading action sports event broadcast live on ABC and ESPN – with some of those spots being decided at STPR®. Among the marques typically represented in Rally America events are Subaru, Mitsubishi, Dodge, Ford and Volkswagen.

Charity Rally to Benefit Cancer Society

On Friday, June 5, the 20th annual Relay for Life street rally will take place in conjunction with the STPR® event. This year’s event will benefit the Tioga Country chapter of the American Cancer Society, and is opened to the general public.

A time-speed-distance rally designed for any legal vehicle, within the legal speed limit, on high quality paved and unpaved roads in Tioga County. This event will not use the forest roads of the Performance Rally. The instructions will have a mileage to each turn, and are intended to be easy to follow. There are no tricks or traps involved in following the course. Awards in four classes: Novice (less than six (6) rallies by anyone in the car); Stock (stock odometer & single memory calculator); Limited (any equipment which cannot accumulate time and distance simultaneously, including non-programmable calculator, relocated odometer, - SCCA class "L" equipment; and Equipped (anything goes). Door Prizes, too. No limit to the number of people in each car. Limited to the first 50 paid entries.

Registration for the charity rally is from 11:00 a.m – 1:00 p.m., with a class for newcomers to time-speed-distance road rallying at 12:30 p.m. – all at the Tioga County Fairgrounds. There is a mandatory drivers meeting at 1:00 p.m., and the three-hour event starts at 1:31 p.m. the fee for paid, pre-registered competitors is $35/car before May 25, and $40/car after that. More information can be found at http://www.stpr.org/stpr09/charity-rally.html.

L’Estage/Richard won STPR® in 2008

At last year’s Performance Rally event in Wellsboro, Antoine L’Estage and Nathalie Richard, from St. Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, overcame a blown turbocharger and heavy competition from the Subarus and Mitsubishis to guide their 2007 Hyundai Tiburon to victory. L’Estage, driving the lone Hyundai in the field, settled in early in the two-day rally while the top points drivers either crashed or had mechanical problems, and was there at the end to take 17-second win over the 2006 Subaru Impreza WRX STI of Tanner Foust (Capistrano Beach, Calif.) and co-driver Christine Beavis (San Diego, Calif.). Both Travis Pastrana and Ken Block, debuting their new Subaru Rally Team USA race cars, broke on day two and did not finish the event.

Pastrana, Edstrom won last weekend in Oregon

In this year’s Rally America season so far, ESPN reality star and champion extreme motocrosser – as well as three-time Rally America champion Travis Pastrana – leads the series in his factory-back Red Bull Subaru WRX STi after winning the event this past weekend in Oregon.

The three-time defending champion and co-driver Christian Edstrom set a blazing pace to pull into the lead early on Day 2, and held it there to the finish. It's their third win in four starts in their Subaru, and it put them into the championship points lead. Despite his dominance for the last several years, however, Pastrana has never won STPR®. Second place went to Rockstar Energy's Tanner Foust and co-driver Chrissie Beavis. The team put in a consistent drive all weekend and were cruising to their second-place finish when they spun out on the final stage and struck a rock with their Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X -- almost costing them a position. They managed to hold on, finishing just 3.6 seconds ahead of the Polish team of Andi Mancin and co-driver Maciej Wislawski.

A flat tire on Day 2 cost the NOS Energy crew of Andrew Comrie-Picard and co-driver Robbie Durant a minute to the leaders, and they finished in fourth place in their Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX, just 2.8 seconds behind Mancin. It was a disappointment for Picard, who had battled hard to regain the podium. The finish drops him from first to third in the championship standings, behind Pastrana and second-place Foust.

Travis to Star in ESPN Movie this Summer

ESPN packed Travis Pastrana's Subaru WRX STi with 3D high-def video camera technology and recorded what it would look like to run with Pastrana as fast as possible on gravel roads. The footage will be used in a nationwide theatrical release this summer.

Travis Pastrana is the top action sport star making a name for himself in the world of Freestyle Motocross, X Games, and his crazy stunts. Between landing double-back flips in FMX competition, jumping out of an airplane without a parachute, or performing on MTV's Nitro Circus, Pastrana devotes his time to rally racing.