Stage rally explained with Scion Racing's Matthew Johnson

When someone talks about rally, they could be talking about a few different things. For instance, there are road rallies, where drivers cruise along country roads in everyday cars with the goal of not getting anywhere too soon. There is also rally cross, where monstrouly powerful motors and all wheel drive systems are stuffed inside diminuitive little race cars so that they can compete in a form of moving demolition derby over paved tarmac, loose sediment and often jumps. However the one we are talking about here is stage rally, where driver and codriver race against the clock over stretches of road that aren't even suitable for driving. We recently caught up with Scion Racing Rally xD driver Matthew Johnson at the Oregon Trail Rally just outside of Portland, OR where he served up some first hand knowledge as to how stage rally realy works. Matthew talked about what it is like to compete against the elements as opposed to going wheel to wheel and goes into detail about everything from the different types of machines that compete to why stage rally is so popular around the globe.