Premier Rally

Our penultimate outing of the year saw us head to Mansfield for the Premier Rally. The rally started much later than usual ensuring that the second half of the rally would be in the dark. This was an interesting variation to the rally which allowed a more leisurely start to the day. Michael O’Brien & Patrick Walsh took a dominant victory in their Focus WRC from the similar but older model of Robert Swann & Darren Garrod. Completing the podium were Phil Brown & Andy Bull (Impreza).

RAC Rally

Another epic 3 days in Northern England and Southern Scotland was had by all, even if the weather conditions proved a little trying. Now in it’s 6th year the Roger Albert Clark had it’s sixth different winner as Gwyndaf Evans took a comfortable victory, only letting the pace ease in the final two stages. He was co-driven in the Viking Motorsport Escort MkII by the 2008 winning co-driver John Millington. Behind them was an impressive Jeremy Easson & Alun Cook in their Escort MkI, who kept the car on the road and out of any major dramas. The main battle on the final day was for 3rd place. Paul Griffiths & Sam Collis (Escort MkII) just held on by 3 seconds from the hard charging Steve Bannister & Kevin Rae (Escort MkII).

Tempest Rally

Our annual trip to the Aldershot/Farnborough area saw us take in the 2009 Tempest Rally. Now in it’s familiar format of two rallies, one for 4WD and one for the 2WD crews, we managed to take in several stages. In the 4wd rally Will Nicholls & Nick Broom (Impreza WRC) took a comfortable victory once the attentions of Marcus Dodd & Alun Cook (Accent WRC) disappeared with retirement at the mid-point of the event. It was the Focus WRC pairings of Andrew Barnes & Guy Simmons along with John Lloyd & Adrian Cavenagh who took second and third respectively.