In the mid-1960’s a group of people on the Columbus, Ohio area created the Columbus Rally Club to organize endurance road rallies in central and southern Ohio, as well as a few “fun” events such as the Columbus Alley Rally.

Initially, the Columbus Rally Club organized the Sunriser 400 Forest Rally and a 400-mile “brisk” time-speed-distance rally through southern Ohio. This event started out as a cornerstone of the MONY (Michigan-Ohio-New York) endurance rally series. The Sunriser normally ran in the fall with headquarters in Chillicothe, Ohio.

By about 1970, the Columbus Rally Club (CRC) was also organizing the Tulip 200 Forest Rally as a Spring event. With the introduction of Special Stages to the MONY series, these events became the foundation for PRO rallying in the Great Lakes area. When the Sports Car Club of America began sanctioning performance rallies, the Sunriser 400 Forest Rally was one of the inaugural events in the National Championship. The Tulip 200 soon became a stage-only event as part of the SCCA Divisional PRO Rally Series.

About this same time (1969-1970) the Ohio State University had an active sports car club which was organizing time-speed distance rallies. The OSU Sports Car Club (OSUSCC), Scioto Valley Sports Car Club (SVSCC), Buckeye Sports Car Club (BSCC), and several other rally clubs began to fade in the mid-1970’s.

At that time, the die-hards of these groups gathered to form a new, consolidated club, the Central Ohio Rally Club – CORC.