PEDLEY RALLYING

Last Sunday saw us competing in our first event of the year at the Croft race circuit for Darlington Motor Club's annual Jack Frost Stages. After a very early start, we arrived at the venue at around 7.30am and met up with our fellow competitiors John Deegan and Chris Smith in the Honda Civic Type R (Car 35) and Nick and Heather Stamper in their Subaru Impreza (Car 17).

The conditions were damp and cold, but we all had high expectations of the event as John had previously done very well at the venue, winning the class last year in their old car, the Suzuki Swift. Pre-event favourites to win were Tony Bardy in his Nissan and John Stone in the newly built Metro 6R4.

Our first drama of the day came when we attempted to take the car off the trailer and she refused to start, so we had to push the car off and into the service area. After gentle coaxing and a boost from the power pack, she fired into life, but gave the first clue of the battery problems we were to face later in the day. Scrutineering was a slow process with us finally getting through as car number 1 left the line on stage one After the scrutineers had finished, the car again refused to fire up and it meant a long run back to service for Dave to pick up the power pack. Finally getting back to our service area, we had a couple of minutes to spare before heading off to stage one, so had no time to change tyres.

The track conditions on the first stage were so slippy, running on slick tyres was a complete disaster and effectively ended our day before it had really started. The battery charging problems also resurfaced, when the alternator failed, making it impossible for us to use the electric power steering pump and also making it essential that we changed the battery in between each stage and charge up the spare battery whilst we were out on stage.

Despite the problems, Chris started to put some impressive times in moving us up from 7th in class after two stages to third in class after six. The battery problem then caused more concern as the last two stages were to be run in the dark, and due to the alternator not charging the battery, we were unable to use the lamp-pod properly, this was very nervy as Chris was getting a sight of the track ahead, then turning the lights out!!!

At the end of the day we managed a very hard earned 3rd in class and 49th overall, although big thanks need to go out to Dave and Bob for keeping the car going on a very fraught day in the service area. John and Chris has a great run in the Honda also coming home 3rd in class and a fantastic 11th overall. Nick and Heather had a less enjoyable day when they kept losing four wheel drive in he Subaru and had to drive most of the event on rear wheel drive. 

The biggest drama of the day would be left for the presentation when the fastest man of the day John Stone was excluded for a spare wheel infringement following a protest by second place man Tony Bardy, and as a result, Bardy inherited the win.