RALLY NEWS NO.4
Sweet Lamb/Sunday 09.30
UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 6
HAFREN
1st (2) Austin
MacHale/Brian Murphy (Focus WRC) 1.25.36.7
2nd (4) David
Higgins/Daniel Barritt (Lancer N) 1.26.52.1
3rd (6) Jon
Ingram/Shaun O'Gorman (Focus WRC) 1.27.22.5
4th (5) Sebastian
Ling/Ian Allsop (Accent WRC) 1.27.28.9
5th (8) Rory
Galligan/Greg Shinnors (Lancer N) 1.27.37.6
6th (7) Gareth
MacHale/Paul Nagle (Corolla WRC) 1.28.09.8
7th (14) Stuart
Jones/Ross Butler (Lancer N) 1.28.32.2
8th (15) Richard
Gower/Aled Davies (Accent WRC) 1.28.36.1
9th (11) Paul
Wedgbury/Gemma Price (Impreza N) 1.28.46.9
10th (21) Lorna
Smith/Dave Robson (Impreza N) 1.31.51.2
Austin MacHale powered his Focus WRC
through this foggy Hafren stage 17s faster than David Higgins,
reinforcing Austin’s lead at the front of this International Rally
of Wales. Higgins wasn’t exactly hanging about, 2nd
fastest overall. MacHale reported a steady run, no drama, a bit
misty but OK. David Higgins said. “The stage was a bit rough in
places, I hit a fairly bad bump early on and was reasonably
cautious after that. A problem with the Group N is that when you
slow down it takes a while to get back up to speed. The fog was
quite bad in places, it seemed to be particularly where there was
no tree line as a guide.” Jon Ingram in 3rd wasn’t a
particularly happy bunny when he finished the stage. Jon reported.
“We had trouble with the brakes again and then the windscreen
misted up after the water splash, couldn’t see a thing.”
Sebastian Ling in 4th told us about a misfire in his
Accent for most of the stage, but still his time was good, 3rd
fastest, 23s quicker than Ingram in front. With just 2 stages
remaining it looks like these 2 are going to have a rare old
battle for 3rd place.
Rory Galligan is 5th
on the road this morning, 2nd in Group N, the Oldcastle
man saying “I went a bit gingerly at the start, but we had a
reasonably good run although I fluffed the hairpin in the bowl”.
Gareth MacHale commented. “I wasn’t prepared to risk all in the
fog”. Gareth still had a respectable time, although his 6th
place could come under some threat from Stuart Jones who went
really hard this morning through that Hafren test.
Further stories included
Richard Gower stalling his Accent at the hairpin in the bowl.
Lorna Smith was slightly off the pace of the gpN cars in front,
Lorna treating the fog with respect. Paul Wedgbury had a good run
in the Prodrive Group N Impreza, but at the same time Paul lost a
small bit of ground to Stuart Jones. Aaron MacHale is now up to
11th in his gpN Lancer. Iwan Rees 12th in
his GpN Impreza. Barry Clark is 13th and said. “That
was my worst stage of the rally, I thought I was driving very
poorly and then I stalled in the bowl”. Evan with that Barry’s
time wasn’t too bad.
Conrad Rautenbach had a good
run this morning in the little Citroen C2, now up to 15th.
Robbie Dale/Glenn Patterson leading F2 in their Clio. A further
retirement this morning was John Lloyd/Pauline Gullick. They were
10th overnight in their Subaru WRC, but the car has
stopped in Hafren. That leaves just 26 cars still running in the
International.
Looking back slightly, the
news on Matthew Wilson/Scott Martin following their stage 5
accident is that Matthew has a broken wrist and Scott has a broken
leg. We wish them both a speedy recovery.
Some results from
yesterday’s Panaround. Ian Joel won in his Escort Cosworth from
Wynne Humphreys. Ieuan Rowlands was 3rd overall in his
Peugeot 206. Paul Walker was 4th in his Escort Cosworth
and Simon Moore 5th and best of the Peugeot 205’s from
Matt Barker in a similar car in 6th. James Wozencroft
& Rob Fagg won the Stars of the Future in their Suzuki from Neil
Coalter/Neil Anderson in their Civic. Andrew Glove was fastest of
the Land Rovers from Gary Mitchell, although somehow or other Gary
has managed to acquire a 10m road penalty, otherwise he would be
leading.
Finally for now many thanks
to John & Aidan Fields from the MacHale service crew for fixing
our little RallyNews display unit! More news from Dolgellau.
BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON www.rallynews.net
