Chris Collie scored his first ever outright rally victory with a win on today's Grant Construction Stages Rally at Knockhill. Stuart Walker put in some seriously quick times over the closing stages but to no avail, Collie kept clear of his fellow Lancer pilot.
"I'm really chuffed with that," said Chris, "Stuart and Lee (Hastings) have more tarmac experience than me so I was really pleased to be able to hold them off."
Stuart said: "I lost 40 seconds on the first two stages of the day pushing the car over the Finish line and just couldn't pull it all back, but that's rallying."
Lee Hastings was reasonably pleased with third just failing to catch Walker by a second at the finish: "If it hadn't been for that off on the first stage and then we had a strong smell of petrol inside the car on the fourth stage which was worrying, till Mark (his co-driver) admitted - that might have been me, I forgot to put the petrol cap on!"
Ross Hunter finished fourth as Gary Adam lost time on the final two runs with a gearbox that didn't like changing down although it was fine going up through the gears. That meant Iain Wilson finished sixth, still an incredible result in the wee Nova, which had a leaky gearbox despite ongoing repairs.
At least the snow stayed away, despite ever threatening skies, but it was cauld, damp and gey dreich - just like Monte Carlo but without the sunshine!
Leaderboard after 8 (of 8) stages:
1, Chris Collie, 40m 48s
2, Stuart Walker, 40m 59s
3, Lee Hastings, 41m 00s
4, Ross Hunter, 41m 29s
5, Gary Adam,. 41m 36s
6, Iain Wilson, 41m 42s
7, John Rintoul, 42m 08s
8, Ross Marshall, 42m 18s
9, Des Campbell, 42m 47s
10, Keith Robathan, 43m 01s
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