DirtFish Rally School anyone?
 

I'm curious if anyone on the forum has been to DirtFish in Washington? If so can you sum up your experience?

I'm going to try to do this in 2019.

- Andrew

Worth every penny. I went in fall of 2016 and it was damp which was perfect because it means you get really good visibility (mind you it wasnt raining just.. haze grey) it kept the dirt on the ground which was good and the cars dont really mind either way.
I did the 1 day course RWD which was in the BRZ (also sort of the reason I ended up with one...)

They are great, you have a sit down in the office meet your instructor and the other drivers, they go over some philisophies and mentalities. if you are a tarmac person or autox person forget everything you know about cornering and braking. You turn with the brakes and weight transfer.

then you head out to the cars and get to check them out and the first thing is some boxes just some right handers then switching to left, youll be practicing lift turn brake over and over and over

you brake with the wheels turned to force weight on them. its so backwards but it works
from there you will work to figure 8s and then move out back to some of the bigger sections and slaloms. buy the video package they'll give you a thumb drive with the whole days events on it and at the end of the day

prepare to have your mind blown. an instructor will take you. IN THE CAR YOU WHERE MANHANDLING and blow your mind. we where goin 110 on tarmac and the guy just flicked it into a corner that transitioned to dirt and it held the angle. I still can't believe it.

it was so much and I cannot wait to go back for their 3 day course( money... ) I miss the area and the instructors and namely the cars.... they are whicked for being stock powered.

I'd love to do it, just a big commitment to do it from Toronto :D

East coast alternative:
https://www.teamoneil.com/

Havent attend but I've briefly talked with one of the instructors at a local 86 event and they always seem involved in the community. Keep an eye out for last minute discounts to fill classes, I've seen then offer up to 20% off, on an Instagram ad.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

Dude, if you're gonna go, I should go at the same time.

Deal! I have to start saving now but as @15limited they do have sales sometimes that will help.

- Andrew

My Wife and I are doing the 1-Day w/ STI's (she has a WRX, so thats why STIs) in June of this year for part of our Honeymoon.

They had some killer Black Friday Deals. I believe it was 50% off!

I got thumbs up from the boss yesterday. It's on!

One of my former coworkers did the 2 hour taste of rally class. He got it on groupon for a little over half price and said it was a lot of fun. He did it with a group of friends from ORPCA. It was back before they had the BRZ as an option(he has an FRS). I'd like to try it but it is a bite and a half out of the track day budget.

If you guys go to Dirtfish ask for Michelle Miller as an instructor. She's a really great friend and incredible instructor. She's also a multi-time SCCA Solo national champion.

Most. Fun. Thing. Ever.

I signed up for a 2 day RWD and only 1 other person signed up with me. So they switched us to a 1 day private. More seat time that way. Would definitely go back, but I'm going to commit to the 3 day next time.

This wasn't a casual amount of money to spend, but I didn't regret the charge on my credit card for a second.

Bonus: If you're a Twin Peaks fan, you'll be taking classes in the Sheriff's station, and driving around the old mill. How cool is that?

This one is less than an hour from home too: http://racelab.co/

She was my instructor for the 2WD/BRZ one day and was superb! One of 5he most fun things I’ve done.

I’ve also done the one day AWD school and it was also a lot of fun.

Was really eye opening to see how different the driving style is between AWD and 2WD.

Highly recommended!

Race Lab's got Crazy Leo, just sayin'

They don't have any big full day schools though, unless I'm missing something on their site. It's all packages of like 1-2 hours classroom, a couple laps of the instructor driving, a couple laps of you driving.

At least they publish somewhat of a syllabus. I'm not suggesting that Dirtfish is hiding anything but I'm frustrated by having to write them to ask for deets. That's a shit ton of money to spend based on pretty pics of their staff.

Did you see the video of him from Perce Neige?


https://jalopnik.com/the-slide-its-big-1832336869

So much fun. :bow:


https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media...a7ayrn4dw9.gif




[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vNX92GW46E[/ame]

I went back in November of '17 for the two day RWD class, and it was awesome/incredible/etc/etc. Coming from the mindset of autocrossing for about a decade, I kept doing the wrong thing, but was eventually coming into a couple turns at about 50mph and sliding through them. At 6'5", I juuust fit in my own BRZ, but with the roll cages they had... ..getting in was quite a chore XD

Probably the hardest things to get used to were waiting so late to turn in and then left-foot braking. The first was just going against years of autocross instinct while the second was just being really unfamiliar with braking with that foot.. If anyone is planning on going, I'd strongly suggest practicing left-foot braking on your own around town, but ONLY when there's nobody in front of you or behind you. You may think that you have equal control over both of your feet, but until you get used to it, you'll either be stabbing the brakes way too hard or hardly at all. Now, I use left foot braking all the time in whatever I drive, just to keep the practice up. As for what they offer in each of the classes, https://www.dirtfish.com/rally-schoo...-up-your-game/ has "Click here for course goals and driving techniques." Something else that's easy enough to practice on normal roads is learning to look at where the car is gonna be so that your mind has more time to react to stuff going on a few seconds ahead of you rather than what's happening right at your front bumper. Heck, someone's lower ball joint failed ahead of me at highway speeds while I was driving home from work one day, and such vision let me safely navigate around them as they came into my lane.

While it was expensive, it's something I'd been wanting to do for a while, and I figured that my "BRZ's" first mod should be driver education, as I knew it was more than capable of handling things far above my skill level. The instructors were awesome and you switched from instructor to instructor to get a wider range of advice. (last picture is one of my instructors trying to get a selfie with me in it standing behind the car. I'm wearing the blue coat XD )

I really wish that my GoPro I'd brought hadn't been so rattly in so many of my videos T__T I'm not sure if it was the pre-installed clips, or maybe the camera housing somehow, but I only ended up getting one or two videos that had good sound (these aren't those videos, but they're what I've got up).

[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7p8T-t2hiA[/ame]
[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q902z9oDmQY[/ame]

That smile says it all

So the annual Black Friday 25% off sale at Dirtfish goes through Monday, 12/1/2019.
The 3 day class is normally $3999 -- it's $2999 right now. I'm gonna take advantage of the sale and go back next year. https://www.dirtfish.com/rally-schoo...-up-your-game/

I wish I was stationed up there. Id be game for that 3 day class.

rwd of course..

or a 1 day awd course. i never got to man handler their sti

For folks in the upper midwest, there's also this: https://www.subaruwinterexperience.com -- though it looks like we've missed the 25% Black Friday discount.

This looks amazing. Life goal added to the list!

This is crazy :D I loved it..

I miss hooning on frozen lakes. Minnesota is great for that too.