APRC Japan - Rally Hokkaido

[Rally Hokkaido]

It was showery today on the first day of recce. More showers forecast for Friday and possibly light showers on Day 1 - nothing like the flooded roads of last year, hopefully.
I was at Cusco's test of their new Evo 10s on Tuesday.
Both cars are built to the normally high Cusco standards.
Sumiyama's car was set up quite different from Yanagisawa's and he was trying different springs and shock settings to stop it 'pitching' in the fast corners. See attached low quality pics.
Yanagisawa was noticebly quicker and the car seemed more settled in the corners. The only issue he had while I was there was the fire extinguisher self-discharging!

[Rally Hokkaido]

second pic

[Mirek]

Live results will be here: http://www.rally-hokkaido.com/pc/e/index.html

[morganmilan]

Any link to entry list, please?

[Mirek]

It is in the live-results list I posted above...

http://www.rally-hokkaido.com/pc/e/aprc/slist_day1.html

[Rally Hokkaido]

]It is in the live-results list I posted above...

http://www.rally-hokkaido.com/pc/e/aprc/slist_day1.html

Err, that is last year's start list.

Scroll down this page and you will find it

http://www.rally-hokkaido.com/en/competitors/

[Mirek]

Ups I was confused because the result link on rally homepage links there and didn't notice it's 2008 entry list...

[morganmilan]

Thank you very much, Mirek and Rally Hokkaido

[Rally Hokkaido]

Plenty of action in Day 1.
The day stayed fine, though the stages had been softened by the previous days' rain. Ruts soon formed on all the slow corners.
Toshi Arai went out in SS3 when a balljoint tore out and the car did a sudden left turn while flat out in fifth - they were lucky to escape major damage and will restart!
Cody and Katsu were swapping stage wins all day until SS8 where Taguchi suffered a puncture and elected to complete the longest stage without changing it. He lost about 50 secs to Crocker and sufered some wiring, etc damage from the disintegrating tyre.
Guarav Gill was in a solid third until SS6 when a slight miscue put him off the road and his Evo10 into a gentle roll. He will also restart tomorrow after he MRF Team fitted replacement front & rear windscreens to the car.
Yanagisawa has been charging all day in his new Evo10 and will start tomorrow ahead of Emma Gilmour who had an incident-free run except for when she nearly ran over David Senior who was trying to slow her down at the Gill crash scene!

[ProRally]

Congratulations to Cody Crocker for winning APRC Hokkaido 2009 !!