RallyCross Victory for a Saab 9-5 Aero

Posted on 21. Nov, 2007 by Ryan in 2000-2009, Enthusiasts, Saab Stories

Photo Credit: Jeremy Olson

Greg Abbot, a devoted Saab Enthusiast who hails from Minnesota the land of Swedish Immigrants, E-85 and Saabs has recently provided Saab History a nice writeup of his account of his recent rallycross victory in his Saab 9-5 Aero.

Greg and four others that frequent the Saab Link forum participated in what is titled the “Dirty Jack-O-Lantern Rallycross”; which is located near Cannon Falls, Minnesota.

Here is his writeup in his own words:

Tue, 20 Nov 2007

RallyCross Victory for a Saab 9-5 Aero

By Greg Abbot

Sunday I and few other local Saab nuts went down and competed in the last Land o’ Lakes Club SCCA RallyCross event of the season – which consisted of a 1.4 mile run on a dirt course set up in a soybean field.

I competed in my 2000 9-5 Aero; there were two 9-3ss’s, an og9-3, and a rusty SPG competing as well. Which was a pretty good showing for Saab, out of 30 cars. There were also 12 Subarus, an Audi 90 Quattro, a highly-modified Chevy S-10 AWD with a Corvette motor; and a bunch of other less impressive cars.

I was not able to compete in the stock FWD section, largely because I have added a Quaife LSD to my 9-5. (duh) The c900 also had to compete in Prepared FWD because it did not have a cat.

I won 1st place in the “Prepared FWD” section, and 10th place in the overall standings; and the SPG took 2nd place, 14th overall (which I took pride in, because I used to own it). The other three Saabs finished 1-2-3 in the stock FWD section, behind us overall.

All of the Saabs finished ahead of most of the Subarus. Low-end torque FTW. (Although personally I thought some of the Subie drivers were complete pansies — I was competing in my daily driver in my first RallyCross, and I was way more aggressive than they were).

The track has many places which were very loose — I thought my 3800- pound car would be at a disadvantage, but I think the weight and the LSD really helped cut through the loose dirt faster than some others. I was running 215/55/16 dedicated snow tires, which worked well.

And any event where Saabs outnumber Hondas 5-1 is a good thing !

The overall winner was not a surprise – the modified S-10. It had two drivers, and the two of them finished 1-2 overall, .07 seconds apart.

Tags: 9-3, 9-5, Automotive Component Group, car, Driver, Minnesota, new 9-5, new saab 9-3, saab, saab 9-3, saab 9-4x, saab 9-5, saab 9-5 wagon, saab 900, saab 9000, saab 99, Saab Automobile, saab ng900