Second Hand Roads’ TSD Rally
April 26, 2026
Second Hand Roads Recap – by Ed Sain (Car #2)
April 26, 2026
Introduction: Ed Sain and his son Doug are avid TSD ralliest and members of South Jersey Region SCCA, and 2025 National Champions in the Limited Class. Second Hand Roads rally was conducted in accordance with the SCCA National RoadRally Abridge Rules and started at Subaru World of Newton. It featured narrow and twisty paved roads and traveled up and over the ridge line of the Kittatinny Ridge, a prominent ridge of the Appalachian Mountain range, with a short rest break near the Delaware Water Gap, before heading east under the Paulinskill Viaduct to end at the Long Valley Brew Pub for awards.
The annual Second Hand Roads had two events this year—a divisional series event for national points and a regional event for the “local” crowd. The divisional event (which is the version we ran in SCCA Class Limited—which requires manual computation of elapsed times for perfect scores) had a special instruction on speed changes for one tenth of a mile (or until another numbered instruction or another curve arrow) at curve arrows with posted speed limit suggestions. Although both events used the same route with mileages to each instruction, the regional event also had numerous key times to assist the participants in getting good scores (see the winning score for the regional event below!). The divisional event only had restart times at the beginning of each section and no enroute key times. The divisional participants were timed to the tenth of a second; the regional participants were timed to the second.
After thinking about the special instruction on speed changes, I decided to create a template to use the speed differential as pauses rather than trying to do the math—something that did not turn out as planned.
Leaving the Jersey Shore on an overcast and rainy morning, we drove 106 miles to the start of the event in Newton. (Which I thought was a long distance but one participant came from Seattle, Washington—a cross country trip twice!) It would seem the start was the farthest possible distance from our house while remaining in Jersey. The registration was well organized and efficient—I would note this was a truly husband and wife family undertaking. Thanks to the Subaru World of Newton for providing food and coffee at the start—very much appreciated by the participants.
Leaving the start late morning (we were car #2 at 11:02 start), we ran the traditional tire warm leg of 7.297 miles followed by the odometer check of 12.017 miles. The first CAS of the day was at 24 MPH and the first curve arrow had a posted speed of 25 MPH—which was a situation I had not considered since this results in a small gain time. So much for the use of the preplanned template—into the back seat went the form.
The day turned out to be sunny and bright and we really enjoyed the day driving around the North Jersey countryside. The first section was 15.193 miles with 5 timed controls and 23 speed changes. The second section was 10.382 miles with 11 timed controls 20 speed changes.. There was a “lunch break” after the second section that was clean, not crowded and had some snack availability (probably one of the best rest break areas I have run across) although it did not have any gas availability (not a big deal since we only covered 25 miles of TSD rallying in the morning).
After “lunch and a quick pit stop, section three was another 10.355 miles with 5 timed controls and “only” 17 speed changes. The fourth section was 15.308 miles with 12 timed controls and 49 (!!) speed changes. The fifth and final section was 11.044 miles with 9 more timed controls and 23 more speed changes. Overall, the event had 42 controls over 62 miles or roughly a timed control every mile and half—had to be on your toes all the time in this event..
The driver enjoyed the pleasant drive in the countryside, the navigator—not so much. The course required nine add time pauses, 35 speed changes in the route instructions and an additional 97 (yes—97) speed changes for the special instruction for a total of 132 speed changes. This meant, on average, the navigator was changing speeds and calculations every 2500 feet on the road. There were lots and lots of speed changes that only lasted one-tenth of ae mile—the shortest distance between a speed change was .052 miles (literally 275 feet apart). The shortest distance between a speed change and a control was under a tenth of a mile. We got a couple of poor scores because the navigator couldn’t complete the required calculations before the next timed control came up. Guess the rallymaster never had to do calculations on the fly—so maybe we would have been better off just running in Stock class (or even Seat of Pants). It also seemed this elder driver had a heavy gas pedal since we were four times as likely to be early rather than late (after a review of the results of the leg scores)— but the CAS to 10 MPH certainly did not help. Really hard to go that slow on a TSD event!!
We were able to have a leisurely late lunch at the finish, drive another 85 miles to get back home and still get back home in time for dinner. Overall, we drove 191 miles to participate in an 81 mile rally— but well worth the time and effort.
The Divisional winners were Bruce Gezon/Bob Morseberg in Class E (22.3 points), Edward Sain/Douglas Sain in Class L (198.3 points), Brian Stanton/Casey Impagliazzo in Class S (340.1 points) and Michael Acebo/ Kyle Acebo in Class G (613.4 points).
The Regional winners were Frank Kirwin Jr/Kaila Umbach as Best Novice (69 points), Lawrence Frieman/Brett Frieman as Best SOP (155 points) and Christian Acuna/Kait Milne as Best Beginner (236 points).
Looking forward to running Second Hand Roads again next year (think that would be six years in a row)—can’t hardly wait. Till then…….see you at Hackettstown Suburau next spring.
We currently have 29 teams signed up for the event and we still have room for more to join the fun!
This rally will not have any course following traps, but you will need to ‘stay on your toes’ to stay ‘on-time’, enjoy the great roads and marvelous scenery and try to arrive at each checkpoint at precisely the right time. Checkpoints will be set up along the way to monitor how well you are following the assigned average speeds. Awards will be presented to the teams who do the best job of arriving at the checkpoints at the proper times. This is a rally designed especially for people with little or no rally experience.
Event Registration is still open!
For more information and event registration – Link
Looking for some TSD Fun!
SCCA-NNJR will be hosting our annual Spring Time-Speed-Distance Rally on the last Sunday of April.
This rally will not have any course following traps, but you will need to ‘stay on your toes’ to stay ‘on-time’, enjoy the great roads and marvelous scenery and try to arrive at each checkpoint at precisely the right time. Checkpoints will be set up along the way to monitor how well you are following the assigned average speeds. Awards will be presented to the teams who do the best job of arriving at the checkpoints at the proper times. This is a rally designed especially for people with little or no rally experience.
Event Registration is open!
For more information and event registration – Link