Saturday 2 November 2013

Rally - Inglis wins Crail

In pouring rain, Alistair Inglis powered past Stuart Baillie over the final two stages to clinch victory on the Kingdom Stages Rally by 12 seconds. But doing what he had to do was Ian Forgan. Finishing 10th overall, and 2nd in his Blue Tarmack Scottish Championship class, was enough to clinch the title of Scottish Rally Champion for 2013.

Bob Grant lost out on a top four finish when the Subaru's diff failed on the final stage and Gerry Gaffney was disheartened not to finish in the top ten when the crew took a wrong direction at the split on the final stage! Sean Will also lost out on the penultimate stage when he punctured a front tyre and he too dropped out of the top ten and John Rintoul in the wee Skoda also lost out on a top ten finish when the co-driver reached across to switch on the wipers in the rain - and switched off the fuel pump. It took them 2 minutes to realise what had actually gone wrong.

All these last minute problems left a strange look to the top ten with John Paterson finishing third overall in his Millington MkII while equally impressive was young Ross Marshall in his 1600cc MkII in fourth place. We always knew he had it in him, but it's been hidden for a wee while, but Kenny Moore got his Hillman Avenger into the top six with fifth place ahead of Lee Hastings who sideswiped a chicane with the Subaru on the penultimate test.

Bruce Edwards clawed his way back into the top ten after his earlier indiscretion with 7th while first time out for a while was Jamie Stewart finishing 8th in his 2 litre Peugeot 205. Neil Thompson had a good run into 9th with his Corsa and Ian Forgan just managed to make the top ten after a very cautious run, doing just what he had to do to get the points to clinch his first Scottish title.

And if anyone thinks single venue rallying is not scary, think on this, Crail + Rain = Aquaplaning. In fact there was some serious aquaplaning going on out there at times with a wide eyed Alistair Inglis telling me: "There were a couple of times round the back of the airfield I was flat in sixth gear and the car was drifting as if it was on a gravel stage. The trouble was, it wasn't, it was water."

Leaderboard after 6 (of 6) stages:
1, A Inglis, Mitsubishi, 76m 56s
2, S Baillie, Subaru, 77m 08s
3, J Paterson, Escort, 78m 07s
4, R Marshall, Escort, 78m 47s
5, K Moore, Avenger, 81m 40s
6, L Hastings, Subaru,81m 43s
7, B Edwards, Darrian, 81m 50s
8, J Stewart, Peugeot 205, 82m 14s
9, N Thompson, Corsa, 82m 30s
10, I Forgan, Ford Ka, 82m 44s

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