July 15th, 2010

Dispatch from the road: Rally London-Mongolia, Part 2

Drive Like A Woman Editor-in-Chief, Michele Shapiro is setting off on a rally from London to Mongolia. She will be driving with Parag Khanna, Mikhail Zeldovich and Jen Mueller. Jen will be starting with the team in London and Michele will be meeting the team in Moscow and will switch places with Jen. The team will be driving a 1991 Land Rover Defender ambulance. Upon arrival in Mongolia the team will donate the ambulance to a local hospital. Drive Like A Woman will be posting dispatches from the journey.

Click here to read Part 1.

London: The Rally Begins
-Written by Jen Mueller

“Oh my God, it’s a giraffe.”

And there in the distance …?

“Rhinos!” Parag called happily.  “I LOVE rhinos!”

Day one of the rally was an absurdist’s dream.

Our team gathered at the ambulance—parked, somewhat conspicuously, on a shady suburban street—at 8:30 in the morning.  Parag and I had met for the first time the night before at Mikhail’s private club near Covent Garden (hey, this team parties in style).  We left the “when you’re in the middle of Russia” jokes to our friends, who were happy to supply them.  Parag was heading off to do some work before going to bed; I was finally clean, but exhausted from the day and, at 11pm, very much in need of dinner.

On Saturday morning we were in slightly better condition, and the excitement was contagious as we rumbled down the quiet London streets and onto the highway.  In addition to Mikhail, Parag, and me, our numbers included Misha’s fiancée Amanda and my friend Tonya, both along to send us off in style.

The launch was held at what the understated British might describe as an unlikely location:  a safari park on the grounds of a country estate about an hour north of the city. We were late for the pre-party, but we arrived in time for the main event:  a caravan tour of the park.  Including the gated lion enclosure, prominently marked with signs from its main sponsor:  Tiger Balm (no, no tigers were in evidence).
“This is so cool!  But . . . I don’t think they have lions in Mongolia,” I pondered as we watched a lioness watching us.

Behind us, a long line of our fellow vehicles stretched out, including two identical versions of our own Land Rover (their owner had also purchased them from Derrick, but had painted them solid white and cleaned them up; we looked like a country cousin), a Subaru, and a kitted-out jeep driven by two very excited Italians.

Back in the parking lot, they gathered us for an inspirational speech by a former rally participant.

Among his words of advice:  “You will be robbed as you head east!  And the robbers will all be wearing police uniforms.”  Also:  “That red line showing a nice straight road running from Russia into Ulaanbaatar is the greatest single lie in the history of cartography.”

Then it was time to start our engines.  The drivers, including me, took our places.  Parag was walking stiff-kneed after his two hours at the helm; the Land Rover seat is uncomfortably close to the steering wheel for my 5’6 frame; for his 6’1 form, driving was going to be painful.

A film crew that had spoken with us earlier was waiting at we processed past the exit.

“Alright guys, any last words?”  the reporter chirped.

“Mongolia or bust!” Misha cried.

“And those odds are about 50-50!” I chimed in from behind the wheel.  And we were off.

We were soon on the motorway heading down to Folkenstone, where we were going to take a car train through the Chunnel to the continent.  We were booked on the 4:50 train.  It was a drive that normally should take about 90 minutes.
“Oh no,” Mikhail said, looking at his Blackberry Googlemaps application.  (This will serve as our GPS for the European part of the trip.)  “Two stretches of bad traffic ahead.”

We were through the first stretch and going about 55mph up a hill when I realized that the engine wasn’t responding again.  I steered her into the shoulder and we coasted to a stop.

“Oh, shizzle.”  Parag climbed out of the back.  We popped the hood and ran through the same fluid checks we had performed the evening before.  We tried to simulate our experience with the cops by pushing it, but no luck.

I kept trying the ignition.  Suddenly there was a cough, and the engine caught.  I pressed the gas, and she roared to life.  Parag and Misha sprang to action.

“Get in, get in!”

We merged back into traffic, spirits improbably high again.

“It will be tight with the traffic, but we should still make our train,” Misha announced.  That was before we hit the standstill traffic.

And then the engine went again.

Denial was turning out to be an unproductive tactic.

“You have got to be kidding.”

This time, waiting didn’t seem to help.  We called Derrick, who consulted with a mechanic friend and suggested that we should check our fuel relays. We opened the fuse box and wiggled the connections.  We popped the hood.  When a passing Dutch Land Rover driver pulled off to help, we borrowed one of his parts to check to see if we had a faulty connection.

Never before has AAA seemed like such a good investment, though we had to wait a long time before the tow truck made it through the traffic jam.  The cab of the tow truck was wide and clean and air-conditioned.

Ah.

Our very nice driver deposited us at a rest area parking lot with the promise that a service technician would be with us . . . eventually.  With this being Saturday evening and everything closed on Sunday, the technician was our best hope at an answer.

So there we sat in our 1991 Land Rover.  Parag surfed the internet.  Misha made a few calls.  I worked on the team blog from my computer.  All this technology and we weren’t going anywhere.

One AA van after another came to the parking lot, but none had us on their service queue.  We had rescheduled our train for 7:50, but at this point it was unlikely we would even be seen before then.

“Are you waiting for help?”  A technician called over.

“Yes!”  I hopped off the back of the ambulance and went over to explain the situation.  We weren’t on his list, but he came over after helping another car.  He asked me to try the ignition, then rummaged around his van and sprayed something into the engine.  I tried again.  It turned over.

We were flummoxed.  “What IS that stuff?”

He handed me a can labeled Easy Start.  “Be careful with this.  You just spray it here—“ he indicated “—and it should help.  But this is a temporary solution, right?  You still need to get this looked at.”

We were on our way again.  “I’m beginning to love this car!” Parag declared as we drove up to the train terminal.

“You were meant to be here ages ago,” the woman checking us in complained.  But she put us in the queue for the next train.

The car died for the fourth time as we were driving down the ramp into the train car.

“No, no, no!  We are so close!”

“This is only supposed to happen when Jen is driving!”

“Do you guys need mechanical assistance?”  One of the train workers was heading over to us.  “We can arrange a tow.”

“No, we can get it going!”  We sprayed the magic spray into the engine.  Nothing happened.  And again.

“Look, if your car is disabled then I can’t let you on,” the attendant said.

DID THE CAR MAKE IT ON THE TRAIN? CLICK READ MORE TO FIND OUT…

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July 13th, 2010

Dispatch from the road: Rally London-Mongolia, Part 1

Drive Like A Woman Editor-in-Chief, Michele Shapiro is setting off on a rally from London to Mongolia. She will be driving with Parag Khanna, Mikhail Zeldovich and Jen Mueller. Jen will be starting with the team in London and Michele will be meeting the team in Moscow and will switch places with Jen. The team will be driving a 1991 Land Rover Defender ambulance. Upon arrival in Mongolia the team will donate the ambulance to a local hospital. Drive Like A Woman will be posting dispatches from the journey.

London, Pre-Rally:
- Written by Jen Mueller

“I thought I had anticipated every eventuality.  But this, I did not see this coming.”

I gazed over to where Mikhail sat staring out the windshield at the London rush hour traffic swerving around us.  A Land Rover turns out to be quite the obstacle when it cannot move.

“Oh, I can definitely say that this was the part of the trip I was dreading the most.  I was ready for anything to go wrong today.”

Misha shook his head.  “I thought we would break down in Siberia or Mongolia.  But this!  We haven’t even started the rally yet!”

It was about then that the cops pulled up…

Yes, our big adventure had started off with a bang.  And this was not the first—or even the second—fraught situation that Mikhail (aka Misha) and I had found ourselves in during what was supposed to be a quick outing up to Doncaster, about 180 miles north of London, to pick up our Land Rover for the rally launch the next day.

I suspected things were not going according to plan when my phone rang shortly after 7, the second time that morning that Misha was calling in advance of our meeting at King’s Cross for a 7:35 train.

“Jen, where are you?”

“I’m just leaving my hotel,” I replied.  “What’s up?”

“Our train was canceled.  We have to try for the 7:20.” Misha said.

“Right.  I’m on my way.”

First I had to get there.  Thanks to Ryanair’s totalitarian weigh scales, I knew that I was toting close to 80 pounds of luggage (much of it camping gear for the team and wine from France).  I was a bit more than half a kilometer from the train station, but a bus or taxi would be too risky a wait.

The platform was empty as I came huffing around the corner at full steam around 7:17.  A lone figure stepped out of the train and waved a crutch.  (This may be a good point to introduce the reader to the not-insignificant plot point that Misha is recovering from torn ligaments and a broken bone and can walk neither far nor fast.)

“Success!” I gasped, flopping on the seat next to him.  “And –“ I pulled out a stash from my hotel buffet “—breakfast!  Let the adventure begin!”

At Doncaster, we took a cab to LRS Offroad, the outfitter who had helped us with repairs and registration for our vehicle.

And there she was.

“Oh, WOW.”  We both leaned forward in our seats.  There was only one vehicle before us, and it was not small.  This was not a contemporary SUV, nor a car built to British scale.  It was a retired British military 1991 Land Rover Defender, and it meant business.

Derrick, our mechanic, came out to greet us.  He seemed politely surprised to meet Misha’s surrogate driver, but not overly concerned.  After giving us a tour of the ambulance inside and out (yes, it really has a siren and stretchers; the flashing light is there too, but temporarily down so we’re not stopped in Russia), he handed over the keys so I could take it for a spin while Misha took care of paperwork.

The “spin” was mostly in first gear through the parking lot of the local industrial park.  “Whoa,” I muttered (actually, I muttered something a fair bit stronger, but this is a family blog).  After clambering up behind the wheel (on the right) and kicking her into roaring, shuddering life, I waggled the stick shift in search of reverse and eased backwards without the aid of a rearview mirror.

By the time I was on my second lap of the parking lot—one that involved a number of k-turns and long reversals; the ambulance has an impressively wide turn radius—I realized that all employees at the garage next to LRS had stopped working and were regarding my progress with folded arms.

“Just one thing left to do,” Mikhail announced after we’d loaded up our bags.  “We should lock the back doors just to be safe.”

Which is when we found out that none of our keys fit the back lock.  “This won’t really work for parking in London tonight,” Misha observed.

Derrick looked crestfallen as he wrote out directions to a nearby locksmith.  “I hadn’t even tried that lock.  I feel like I let you down!

As it turned out, the problem would not have been solved by the procurement of the proper key.  Derrick’s directions led us to a nearby strip mall and to John, and young and earnest master locksmith who took on the lock assembly like a personal challenge.  We paced anxiously.

An hour later, John had determined it was not repairable.  Our only option was to install another padlock on the door, something he was kind enough to do.

After a quick stop for a pub lunch and another for gas, we were finally on the motorway to London.  We swayed and lumbered in the slow lane for most of the way, hitting the city, as I had been dreading, at rush hour.  The roads slowly became narrower as we moved through a series of multi-lane roundabouts.  Between the heat of the engine and the sweltering summer sun, we were baking.  But we were within three miles of our destination.

That was when the engine died.  Moving to start after a light turned green up a small incline, I suddenly realized that we had no power.

“What’s going on?”  Misha asked.

“Hang on.”  I tried again; it caught and died.  Then refused to catch again.  We looked at each other.

WOULD THEY GET THE CAR STARTED AGAIN? CLICK READ MORE TO FIND OUT…

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July 11th, 2010

Very Creative Parking Technique

We’ve posted several ads about women and parking but this is the most creative we’ve seen yet. Check out this video from Mazda courtesy of veryfunnyads.com.

July 09th, 2010

More Women are Starting to Design Cars

Although most car designers are men there are plenty of women who are making their way up the ranks.

Wired Magazine recently wrote an article about female car designers and it mentions: Kimberly Wu at Honda, Kerrin Liang of Hyundai, Michelle Christensen at Acura and Christine Park of Cadillac (who designed the interior of the XTS). We have a few more to add namely, Christina Rodriguez at Ford and Fairuz Jane Schiecht who helped design the innovative (and environmentally friendly) interior of the Fisker.

So why are there still so few women designing cars? Wired writes, “Of the 15 to 18 people who graduate from the center’s transportation-design program each year, only two or three are women. It’s the same at Art Center for Design in Pasadena, California, where one in 10 graduates is a woman.” The magazine goes to to note that women make up about 30 % of the global design staff for BMW and 20% at GM.

Designing cars isn’t always all about horsepower and torque. In the article Park says that Coco Chanel is one of her influences. When Drive Like A Woman heard Park speak recently she compared tires on a car to shoes in an outfit. When horsepower meets heels, what a fantastic combination!

Watch Michelle Christensen discuss her design the Acura ZDX.

 

 

 

July 07th, 2010

Aussie Brooke Leech First Female to Join CAMS Young Gun Program

Australian Brooke Leech, 17, is the first female to earn a spot in the CAMS (Confederation of Australian Motor Sport) Aussie Young Gun driver development program. She’s done well on the karting circuit and was tapped to move up and join the program.

Leech will compete in the Aussie Racing Car Series starting this weekend on Phillip Island.

Also racing in the series is Ruth Bowler, the only other female beside Leech in the series. Bowler is currently in 22nd place out of 38 drivers.

July 05th, 2010

Not a Good July 4th for Women at Watkins Glen

Three women (Danica Patrick, Milka Duno and Simona de Silvestro) raced in the Indy series at Watkins Glen on Sunday July 4, unfortunately none of them did particularly well.

Danica Patrick ended up in 20th place out of 25 drivers. Simona de Silvestro was doing the best of the ladies. She had started in 15th place and moved up to 10th. However, she made contact and did not finish the race. Milka Duno ended in 23rd place. Will Power won the race.

Currently in the standings, Danica Patrick is 11th, Simona de Silvestro is 20th, Milka Duno is 23rd, Sarah Fisher is 24th and Ana Beatriz is 29th. However, not all women drive in every race.

July 03rd, 2010

Jennifer Garner Helps Stranded Motorists

Actress Jennifer Garner recently came across two women who had run out of gas on the streets of Los Angeles.

According to EOnline, instead of passing them by, the A-lister stopped filled up a can of gas, paid for it, brought it to them and even poured it in the tank herself!

Women helping women on the road, we love it! Jen, you get our Drive Like A Woman hero award for the day!