Subaru Season

October!!  It's finally here!  Trade secret, fall is my favorite season.  The leaves get crunchy, the air gets crisp, and hills get painted red, yellow, and orange.  It's also the time of year people start thinking "I don't want to suffer through another winter in my front-wheel drive carpool-lane sedan", so work at my dealership tends to pick up.

There's a lot coming up this fall that I'm looking forward to.  For starters, Subaru is releasing it's first Hybrid, available on the XV Crosstrek platform sometime in November.  I've had a lot of customers at work who are interested in this vehicle.  My sister and brother-in-law are among those who have their eyes on this development, so I'm personally excited to see what this Hybrid can do.

There's also quite a bit going on for Rally sport.  On the larger scale, Subaru Rally Team USA looks to nab yet another Rally America Championship for the 2013 season.  However, rival Ken Block is right on their tail headed into the final event coming up in a couple of weeks.  October 17th - 19th, SRT USA will battle one more time at the Lake Superior Rally in Houghton, Michigan.  Only a handful of points separate the standings, so I hope Subaru can pull off another win!

Just a week after that, there's the "Stronger than Dirt" Rallycross event in Greenwood, NE.  At the very least, I'll be attending the event with some friends, but I hope our RS is ready enough to jump in and have some fun on the course.  There's been steady progress as folks pitch in and leave their mark on this project car.

But before we get to all of that, I'm starting off the month with a fun event for the Nebraska Subaru Owners Club!  The "Gravel Express Cruise", being held October 6th, is not for Garage Queens. We're taking a fun set of Gravel-paved roads that follow along the eastern bank of the Platte and trace the southern edge of I-80 in a Rally-style Pace-note-directed cruise!  Cars will depart one at a time to give ample space for the rocks to fly and dust to settle down.  This will avoid the cracked glass and chipped paint issues most gravel cruises have and give the event more of a Rally-sport feel in general.  I don't think anything like this has been attempted before by this group, so if all goes well, I hope to make this a regular event.

There's a lot going on that I'm pretty stoked about!  Should be a fun season!