2022 Ojibwe Forests Rally

Photo from the Ojibwe Forest Rally Facebook page.

The Ojibwe Forests Rally is happening this Friday (August 19th) and Saturday (August 20th).

Erick Nelson with the Ojibwe Forests Rally explained, “It’s a car race, but it’s different from what a lot of people are used to seeing, especially in our area…Most of the event is actually on gravel-forest road zoned by the Minnesota DNR, so we get permission to shut those roads down. The guys race (there’s two people in a car). They race one at a time through the forest about a minute a part and whoever has the fastest time at the end of the two days, that’s your winner.”

According to Nelson, even though Friday morning is technically the start of the event, teams begin arriving in the early part of the week to do things like taking notes on the roads (details on curves, turns, change in elevation, etc.) and private testing.

Friday, competitors will start at Gladen Construction, which is about 35 miles from Park Rapids. This is being used as the service staging area. Then will they travel to the forest about 7.5 miles north of Akeley for four stages or sections of competitions from approximately 1:30p-3:30p. After that, the cars will return to the service area for a break, during which time they can fix/repair anything. Then they will go back out to the forest and run the four stages again (from approximately 5p-7p), making it eight total stages of competition on Friday.

Saturday morning, competitors will once again start off at Gladen Construction. Then they will go out north of Osage (to the west of Park Rapids) where they will run five stages (two roads twice and then one additional) beginning at 10:30a. Following that, they will drive to Detroit Lakes. Four competition sections will take place on Soo Pass Ranch (using a lot of the area that We Fest campers were at earlier this month). These stages start at 5:45p. There will be a podium celebration on Saturday at 9p.

Several big names are participating in this year’s event, including Travis Pastrana, Ken Block and Brandon Semnuk. Nelson said, “We’re fortunate with our placement in the series. We tend to get the big guys because the championships are getting wrapped up here.”

Forest stages are free to the public to attend. Gate entry to Soo Pass Ranch is $10. VIP, which features better views, close parking, an exclusive t-shirt and a complimentary food ticket is $60. There is also camping available for this event.

The event will be live-streamed here.

For more information on the Ojibwe Forests Rally, including the spectator guide, click here and here

Story photo courtesy of the Ojibwe Facebook page.