One of the little-known events at the Affiliate Summit in Vegas next week is that there’ll be a competition with a first prize worth $4,995 being given out. I am pretty surprised that as of the last update, there’s only 4 (yes, FOUR) participants in the running for this prize.

If a 20% (1 in 5) chance of winning a $5,000 prize (and an opportunity to contribute to a worthwhile cause) doesn’t excite you, I’m not sure what will…

Enter the Great Affiliate Road Rally, where you get to race against other Affiliate Summit West attendees for a chance to win a booth at the Affiliate Summit East tradeshow/seminar Aug 10-12 in Boston, MA.

Yes, the prize is transferable, and I’ve got word from Affiliate Summit co-founder Shawn Collins that a second and a third prize might be added too.

It’s a “bring your own car” (BYOC) competition, so you can pick up a remote controlled car at Target, Wal Mart or order it from an online retailers like Amazon or a RC specialist.

The event will be held indoors, so only electric cars will be allowed and it’ll be conducted in the same room as the keynote address (seating capacity of about 1,000…!), so you can expect a pretty big room.

To separate this from being a pure drag race, Shawn says he will fiendishly set up obstacles along the race route, so it’s not just a matter of getting a F1 car or a Nissan Skyline and hitting the throttle as hard as you can.

I’ve noticed that Affiliate Summit founders Missy Ward and Shawn Collins have gone all out to raise funds for a selected charity at every event and this Affiliate Summit is no different.

The beneficiary is the Starlight Starbright Children’s Foundation. Great Affiliate Road Rally participants can make a minimum donation of $100 at the Affiliate Summit link to Starlight to secure your entry.

I have my pit team already putting one of my cars through its paces…

Pit mechanics Bianca Wee putting the car through its final paces

So my team and I will be ready for the rally.

I am hearing that Shawn might be driving his “salami car” to serve as a pace car… (or to perhaps transform the race into a demolition derby…)

What’s a “salami car”? Watch the video below:

There’s a rumor that the great affiliate race queen Lisa Picarille (AKA Revenue magazine editor-in-chief) might be flagging off the race with a checkered flag….or a napkin… so there’s a Kodak moment right there…

Here’s a list of the current road rally competitors:

• InternetGeekGirl.com / Stephanie Agresta – $100
• Shopping-Bargains.com / Mike Allen – $100
• Affilisites Ltd. / Benjamin Bertisch – $100
• ZacJohnson.com / Zak Johnson – $100
• ShareASale / David Zelken – $100

For updates, you can visit the Starlight donations page.

To participate you should visit the road rally participation page ideally before this Friday. More importantly, you should order or buy your race car ahead of time.

Take note that with recent Department of Homeland Security regulations, you will need to wrap lithium batteries (most RC cars use these) in plastic. And you will need to put your RC remote in your check-in luggage.

In the meantime, my daughter Bianca was asking, when’s the Affiliate Motorcross coming up?