Biographical Data Name: Brian Vinson Team Owner/Driver Personal Data: Age 32, married to wife Kim. They have two children, Rebecca and Kristian. Outside of rallying, Brian has several interests, some of which include taking his children for walks, reading classified ads and teaching his daughter to go vrrroommm... vrroommm... Background: Brian currently works as a Vehicle Dynamics Engineer for DaimlerChrysler, which requires tire testing and suspension tuning on the new line of Dodge Ram trucks. Experience: After spending most of his youth dreaming about racing, Brian began Autocrossing his 1976 Triumph Spitfire at age 18, winning the 1987 North-Eastern Pennsylvania Regional championship in a 1972 Triumph GT-6.. Later that year he built a 1979 Mazda RX-7 which took him through roadracing driver’s school and several years of SCCA Improved Touring competition. He won the Giants Despair Hillclimb with his Mazda in 1988. After moving to Michigan, Brian teamed up with a friend to run an ITB Volvo 142. That lasted 3 years until the untimely demise of the Volvo against a retaining wall (he was NOT driving…). 1997 brought an ITS Datsun 280zx to replace the Volvo and also marked the beginning of the rally bug. A co-worker loaned Brian some european rally videos which “set the hook”. While still roadracing, Brian talked his brother-in law Richard Beels into doing a couple of TSD rallies, just to experiment. A strong desire for speed left them longing for the thrill of Performance Rallying. The pair talked Brian’s co-worker into selling them his Golf Gti and they set out to “try” rallying. One year later in 1998, they became Nationally Licensed and won the U2 class at Ski Sawmill's Rallyright School. He ran 4 more events before seriously chasing the championship in 2000. Brian won the Production Class Championship in 2000, finishing 6 out of 6 rallies entered. It was a hard fought battle coming down to the last event of the year. His list of wins include: SnoDrift, STPR and Wild West, (using Trevor Donison’s Production class Neon).