Wyedean Rally Report

Saturdays Wyedean Rally marked the start of the BTRDA Rally Championship, which would be a challenging event for both Hugh Hunter/Andy Marchbank and Matthew Cathcart/James Morgan as both crews lack seat time in their respective cars.

After spending 2 years away from rallying Matthew Cathcart could not wait to get back in the driving seat again and was relishing the chance to drive the Ford Fiesta R2. Partnered by James Morgan, the crew headed into the opening stages in with a steady approach. Setting times in the top half of the field, Matthew/James arrived at service in 39^th place from a starting position of 51^st. After service a mature drive by Matthew with James keeping him right the pair maintained a good pace and stayed out of trouble to finish the event 28^th overall and 2^nd in class and beating British Rally Championship rival Mark Donnelly in the more powerful Renault Clio R3.

After selling the very successful Ford Focus 01 WRC, Hugh Hunter was still getting to grips with the newer Ford Focus 03 WRC. Partnered by the experienced Andy Marchbank the pair set quickest time on SS1, second quickest on SS2 and quickest again on SS3 despite the tricky conditions to arrive back at service with a lead of 45 seconds.  The next 2 stages saw that lead decrease as Hugh/Andy had a puncture on SS4 losing 10 seconds then dropping 3 seconds to 2^nd place Charlie Payne on SS5. The penultimate stage was to bare the bad luck as now with only one spare left a double puncture on this stage meant Hugh/Andy would have to limp to the end of the stage and through the final stage if they were to make the finish but heading to the last stage the tyre came off the rim and signalled game over for the crew. The improvements made to the car over the winter seemed to have made Hugh and Andy more comfortable in the car and proved they still had the pace to mix it at the top of the leader board.

Go onboard with Matthew and James as they tackle SS1 and SS7.

 

 

 

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