UNOFFICIAL LEADERBOARD AFTER STAGE 9 Somerley North

1^st f(2) Barry Johnson/Stewart Merry (Impreza WRC) 35.45.5

2^nd (7) Craig Middleton/Robin Hernaman (Accent WRC) 35.57.3

3^rd (5) Steve Perez/Neil Dashfield (Focus WRC) 36.02.4

4^th (4) Paul Bird/Ian Windress (Impreza WRC) 36.03.3

5^th (14) Richard Gower/Aled Davies (Accent WRC) 38.09.5

6^th (12) Steve Hendy/Mark Milton (Escort WRC) 38.09.8

7^th (16) John Lloyd/Pauline Gullick (Impreza WRC) 38.14.0

8^th (9) Steve Fleck/Anthony Ettlinger (Impreza WRC) 38.14.8

9^th (21) Rob Smith/Alun Cook (Impreza N) 38.41.2

10^th (20) Alistair Tough/Alistair MacKay (Impreza N) 38.50.0

11^th (15) Ollie O'Donovan/David Moynihan (Impreza WRC) 39.10.9

12^th (24) Wyn Humphreys/Mark Lewis (Impreza N) 39.56.8

The positions at the top of this Rallye Sunseeker changed dramatically just before 2^nd service when the leads cars had visited Mt. Ararat and Somerley stages.  Marcus Dodd had built up a very convincing lead but his Hyundai Accent WRC ground to a halt in the Somerley stage when the clutch cried enough.  At the end of the Mt Ararat stage another former winner, Roger Duckworth, decided to call it a day when his Impreza WRC developed gearbox and brake problems.  In general it wasn’t a good day for Dodd team as Marcus’ father Harry retired his Accent WRC with hydraulic troubles earlier today. 

Barry Johnson now leads the rally in his Impreza, even if the car is looking extremely secondhand.  Barry has crashed his Subaru into the bales at about 4 different junctions through the last couple of stages, also had a puncture.    Craig Middleton holds on to 2^nd place despite his Accent suffering a jammed open throttle and a half spin. Steve Perez switched on to a K type Pirelli for his Vodka Kick Focus and he feels a lot more comfortable with the car, and is looking pretty solid in 3^rd place, although Paul Bird is less than 1s behind in 4^th.  Current Champion Bird  said as he waited to go into service. “We’ve still got no 4^th gear its really frustrating, its one gear you don’t want to lose on this rally. I’m up and down the box, losing time”. 

Richard Gower lost quite a lot of time in stage 8 when he spun his Hyundai and got jammed between a ditch and a tree, but still holds 5^th place with Steve Hendy 6^th.  Hendy really struggled through the Somerley stage, saying “A lot of the major corners were narrowed right down with bales or logs and we couldn’t get the car flowing, couldn’t get it sideways”.  John Lloyd has improved enormously over the last few stages and he has come from outside the top 10 to bring his Subaru into 7^th. Steve Fleck is showing as 8^th in the results but Steve is more than slightly worried that he may be in trouble with the officials for working at his Subaru less than 100yds from a control area. 

Rob Smith is 9^th and leads group N from Alistair Tough. Rob made a poor choice of tyre for the last oop of stages, lost a few seconds and is happy just to hold on to his gpN lead. Wyn Humphreys is 3^rd gpN in his new Subaru N12.  Wyn has tried more cuts in his tyres, says it has made a big difference, it’s a different car.

Ollie O’Donovan has been losing time over the last couple of stages, Ollie saying that whenever he puts on the handbrake there is some sort of technical glitch. The car is locking the wheels and then the engine stalls. He reckons he hit every bale in the Somerley stage and the front of the car is now damaged. Retirements from earlier include Geoff Jones in the new Impreza clubman machine. Geoff set a fastest group N time in stage 3 but then the car suffered a split pipe to the cooler and the crew went over maximum lateness getting the damage repaired.  Geoff’s co driver Paul Morris said. “When we were still going it was 15 out of 10 in the fun factor”.  Another retirement is young Emma McKinstry, her Lancer stopped with a recalcitrant fuel pump. David Golding’s Impreza has gone out with a broken gearbox.

More news later. BRIAN & LIZ PATTERSON www.rallynews.net