Shedding Weight

I've been working on my 2000 Subaru Impreza 2.5 RS Coupe for awhile now.  From the brink of a cancerous death and stuttering heart problems to a facelift and motor transplant, this rust bucket has come a long way since I picked it up in September of 2013.  However, I haven't been easy on the car even while repairing and improving it.  It's my rallycross car!

At a recent NRSCCA Rallycross event, I was sharing the wheel with a good friend slinging Nebraska clay around the I-80 Speedway.  Conditions were a little tricky that day, as the sticky clay was contrasted by the slippery grass and weeds on some corners.  My co-driver went a little wider than planned on an opposite-lock-inducing turn.  The car jumped and bumped through the dirt clod ridden field but we made it through and finished the rest of the run with his best time of the day yet.  As we pulled into line to have another go, one of the course workers said "Nice run, but you're missing your bumper!"  My co-driver and I laughed it off like a joke until I looked in my rearview mirror.  I could only see the upper fender, not the edge of my rear bumper.  I opened the door and leaned out further.  I turned to my co-driver and said "Well, he isn't wrong."

We stepped out of the car and just laughed.  The whole bumper had been ripped clean off of the back of the RS.  Sure enough, a corner worker walked up from the course with a big silver bumper, still intact.  We continued the rest of the runs that day making jokes with everyone about "on course modifications" and if we were now in a different class for weight reduction.  It's only partly the fault of my co-driver, as the bumper didn't have much holding it on.  Instead of 18 plastic clips it should've had from the factory 15 years ago, this RS bumper was being held on by 4 clips and 3 Zip Ties.  The edge caught on the debris and, once it broke free, there wasn't much else to stop the rest of it from breaking off.  It'll get repaired and re-installed, but it was a good laugh among some great runs at rallycross.