Consistency has been the Local knowledge no doubt had key so far for WA’s Tom a bit to do with Smart’s speed, but Wilde and his Subaru. ARC heats aren’t easy to win, and the Nambour local did a sterling job to finish with a 21.7 second lead over Harry Bates’ Toyota Corolla S2000. Running in the APRC field, Nathan Quinn was third in another Lancer Evo 9, but more than a minute behind Bates. Fourth place went the way of Tom Wilde and Sam Hill in their Impreza WRX, nearly a minute clear of the consistent Molly Taylor and Bill Hayes in fifth. Taylor suffered damage to a rear lower suspension control arm late in the day, but that was replaced by the Les Walkden Rallying team at the end of day Keough’s Audi Quattro S1 replica in service. third place. Brad Markovic’s miserable season The exciting Thomas Dermody continued and ninth (and last place) rolled the ex-Alister McRae Ford Escort was the best he and Scott Beckwith RS1800 on stage five and wouldn’t recould manage in their Subaru. Gearbox appear on day two. and clutch problems hampered their day after an off-road excursion on just HEAT 2 the first stage. The rain arrived for Sunday’s stages Both Mark Pedder and Justin Dowel and conditions were treacherous for all are also having seasons they’d rather crews. forget. Pedder’s Peugeot 208 Maxi Simon Evans started day two like a suffered engine problems on the man possessed, setting the fastest time second stage and retired, while Dowel by 23.1 seconds on the first stage of the had suspension failure on his Hyundai day as he strove to take a much-needed i20 Proto on stage three. heat win. He won the second stage as Only nine cars in the ARC field made well, but the tricky conditions caught it to the finish on Saturday afternoon. out the four-time champion on the Cutters Reverse test. Evans’ Subaru slid Neal Bates once again proved too off the road at speed and ended up on good in the Classics, driving his Celica its roof. to a three-minute victory over the similar car of Clay Badenoch, with Mal The car was badly damaged, but the
Evans Motorsport team repaired the car in order for Evans to arrive at the final control of the day, and secure one championship point – something that may be valuable later in the year. Tom Wilde was putting in one of his best drives of the year, winning stages 11 and 12, but by the time crews arrived back in Imbil for servicing after the opening four stages, the weather was getting worse. Smart still led comfortably from Bates and Wilde, but all the talk was on the weather, and the quickly deteriorating road conditions. With the final four stages all repeats of the morning’s tests, organisers made the wise decision to cancel all the remaining forest stages, except for a super short 1.20km blast on the Kandanga stage used on the first day. That gave Bates his first stage victory
Harry Bates finds himself leading the championship after 3 of the 5 rounds.
2016 National Capital Rally - Heat 1 1. Evans/Searcy 2. Reeves/Gelsomino 3. Quinn/Calder 4. Wilde/Hill 5. Taylor/Hayes 6. Patton/Webb 7. Harding/Thornburn 8. Hatton/Allen 9. Markovic/Macneall 10. Clarke/Preston
Subaru Impreza WRX, Subaru Impreza WRX STI Spec C Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX Subaru Impreza WRX STI Subaru WRX STI Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X Subaru Impreza WRX Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX Subaru Impreza WRX Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX
1h07m35.2s +1:18.7 +2:07.0 +2:58.8 +3:53.1 +4.00.9s +5.21.1 +6.04.7 +6.52.1 +7.29.3
JULY 2016 - RALLYSPORT MAGAZINE | 25