Wrc Rally Australia 2011

[raybak]

Sorry double post

[raybak]

Hi all,

Just back from Rally Oz, we were competing in the National event in the trusty EVO 5 Lancer. Broke a front right driveshaft on the 2nd Super Special Thursday night, had to rejoin Friday morning with a penalty for DNF'ing. We were 39th so the only way was up. First stage for Friday was Shipmans, there were cars off everywhere. Was so slippery, you couldn't judge the roads by the colour as you usually can with the different soil types, mostly the road was grey and you could go from grip to no grip without any visible difference. Saw Block off in a tree, went woohoo we beat Ken Block

The next stage was Brooklana where Loeb rolled, we were on the start line getting ready to go when they canned the stage as it was blocked by Michael Boaden. We eventually transported through and it was extremely slippy even at transport speeds. Loeb didn't look to happy when we went past.

Next stage had to be regreened so another wait of about 40 mins, was stretching the day out for us and we had only completed one stage competively. Had a bit of a go through the stage and were 15th, not too bad up against a lot of newer cars like EVO 9's and such with electronic diffs.

Next was regroup then service, but they didn't close up the field in the regroup, isn't that what a regroup is for? We were still over an hour behind the front ARC guys who had got through before the 4th stage was blocked.

Did the repeat of Shipmans, even worse this time with more cars off, water splashes were a lot deeper the second time through. Hopefully there's some good photos of us going through the water splash at the main speccy point on Shipmans. Next to Brooklana, we hada book in time of 5.22pm and the road had to be opened at 5.30pm for the residents. The Stage Commander made the call to can the stage, this was a smart move as there were residents there waiting to get into their houses. Also the next stage was canned as well, so we did 3 forest stages for the day.

Back to Regroup and did the 2 Super Specials again, this time not breaking anything but doing a loop on the 2nd run losing us about 10 secs.

Saturday was much better weather, with some awesome stages to be run. I wreckon Welshes has to be one of the best stages in OZ. We had a shocker of a day with broken power steering early on and not enough time to change it at service. Derek now has arms like Popeye Also had an electrical problem that manifested itself on the last Super Special, the car died on the start line and it took us about 3 mins to find the problem so we did 7 minutes for the stage.

Went spectating Sunday as the ARC field only ran the first 2 days. Went to main speccy point at Arrawarra(AKA Sherwood Rd) plenty of people there but not really a good spot, went to the enthusiast point for the 2nd running of Plum Pudding and it was much better. Then headed over to the water splash at the Power stage, this wasn't a speccy point but was near a road closure that we all know, there were around 200 people there. Was some interesting lines through the water splash, Block was very quick and as you can see by his times they were pretty good. Henning came out of the water splash and seemed to be like a pinball going up the road bouncing off banks on each side.

Overall I think it was a good rally, we managed to salvage some points and will be going into the final round in Victoria with a 3 way battle for the championship so all is good.

Had a good chat with Ogier on Sunday night, he's going to not even think about changing teams until the season is over, he is focussed on doing his job at the moment then will assess things at end of season.

Loeb wasn't very chatty, I think he was over it a bit and just wanted to get home.

We will be running at Coffs next year, they are going to run the event as a stand alone ARC just to keep some continuity. Great location for a rally, great people, just need a better Super Special

Ray

[MikeD]

....Hirvonen has a realistic chance, by snatching a 3-2-1 finish in the remaining rallies. Points:

Maybe on planet Pluto but not on planet earth. Did you actually follow Hirvonens tarmac speed in Germany? Did that give any indication that he could finish in top 2 on a tarmac event this season?

The chances of Loeb having a DNF on tarmac are far smaller than Hirvonens. After all Hirvonen is behind and has to try and drive over the limit to prevent Ogier and Sordo from taking points from him on tarmac.

It's not gonna happen and that's why Malcom's teamorder was a joke! Latvala won fair and square and should have taken the win.

Malcolm would look again like a complete dork if this happened and tactics had not been played.

He don't need tactics to look like that

[Mintexmemory]

Nice inside view from Raybak

[bretddog]

Maybe on planet Pluto but not on planet earth. Did you actually follow Hirvonens tarmac speed in Germany? Did that give any indication that he could finish in top 2 on a tarmac event this season?

The chances of Loeb having a DNF on tarmac are far smaller than Hirvonens. After all Hirvonen is behind and has to try and drive over the limit to prevent Ogier and Sordo from taking points from him on tarmac.

It's not gonna happen and that's why Malcom's teamorder was a joke! Latvala won fair and square and should have taken the win.

If Ford can't find more speed they can just as well give up. Excluding Mikko's puncture, he was about as fast as Sordo in Germany. The 2nd position is of course the event where Loeb would retire.

There was simply nothing to gain from letting Latvala win. Instead, now they are still in the game, and with increased pressure on Citroen.

Maybe you feel one need a decent chance to justify such tactics. But imo a 5% chance will suffice. Citroen obviously also take the threat seriously, hence their team orders. So both Ford and Citroen respect the probabilities. If you disagree with them and say they both make silly management, ok, I don't.

Risk is a function of probability and consequence. Low probability does not dictate low risk.

[Barreis]

It's boring without action.

[TKM Jnr]

Wasn't at this one driving. After competing in the last 2 rounds of the ARC, we went up just to have a look and did some spectating. Was still a good weekend away.

We were on SS6 Shipmans 2 on friday, then on Saturday out to Valla and Valla 2 (SS13 and SS17).

The best one would have been Bucca 2 SS24 on Sunday.

Took some video just on a phone, here is some from shipmans, more to come later tonight.

Friday - Shipmans SS6 - YouTube

Tristan

[MAXYrally]

Hi,

A bit of insight from a competitor's point of view at Rally Australia: we entered the WRC section in a Group N Ford Fiesta ST and ran at the back of the WRC field. There were only three 2WD cars in WRC, Harry Hunt in his DS3 R3, us and another Fiesta driven by Adrian Coppin.

Unfortunately recce did not go smoothly: another competitor forgot that in Australia we drive on the left side of the road and we were lucky to avoid a head on crash at highway speeds! The recce car was written off, but at least nobody got injured and we were able to continue, even if that was without side windows and with some airbags hanging from the roof.

Apart from that we had a very good event, only had some troubles with the rear wheel bearings on Saturday morning but that got fixed at service. Friday was incredibly slippery, the roads have a clay base and the tyres just slide on it without getting any grip. With so many WRC cars off the road we were 16th at the end of day 1.

The roads on day 2 were completely different, very fast and real pleasure to drive. Welshes is probably one of the best stages in the ARC at the moment, with Grace a close second! We had to keep in mind that this was also part of the Australian Rally Championship, so we did not take any crazy risks and bagged good points for the 2WD class (which we are currently leading).

Day 3 was back on narrow forest roads which got quite rough on the second pass, but the weather was nice and we had a lot of fun driving without any championship pressure. The first stage, Bucca, was really nice but the power stage was not bad too given that it did not make a good impression when we did recce. In the end we won Group 8, finished 22nd in WRC, 2nd 2WD in both WRC and ARC.

This was a very different Rally Australia compared to 2009, there were a lot of spectators and all of them were very friendly with no rock-throwing locals in sight. There were issues with they way the Coffs SSS was organised, something to be expected for a brand new event.

We will be back in 2013, hopefully joined by more Australian crews!

Raz

MAXYrally

[6789]

Hi,

A bit of insight from a competitor's point of view at Rally Australia: we entered the WRC section in a Group N Ford Fiesta ST and ran at the back of the WRC field. There were only three 2WD cars in WRC, Harry Hunt in his DS3 R3, us and another Fiesta driven by Adrian Coppin.

Unfortunately recce did not go smoothly: another competitor forgot that in Australia we drive on the left side of the road and we were lucky to avoid a head on crash at highway speeds! The recce car was written off, but at least nobody got injured and we were able to continue, even if that was without side windows and with some airbags hanging from the roof.

Apart from that we had a very good event, only had some troubles with the rear wheel bearings on Saturday morning but that got fixed at service. Friday was incredibly slippery, the roads have a clay base and the tyres just slide on it without getting any grip. With so many WRC cars off the road we were 16th at the end of day 1.

The roads on day 2 were completely different, very fast and real pleasure to drive. Welshes is probably one of the best stages in the ARC at the moment, with Grace a close second! We had to keep in mind that this was also part of the Australian Rally Championship, so we did not take any crazy risks and bagged good points for the 2WD class (which we are currently leading).

Day 3 was back on narrow forest roads which got quite rough on the second pass, but the weather was nice and we had a lot of fun driving without any championship pressure. The first stage, Bucca, was really nice but the power stage was not bad too given that it did not make a good impression when we did recce. In the end we won Group 8, finished 22nd in WRC, 2nd 2WD in both WRC and ARC.

This was a very different Rally Australia compared to 2009, there were a lot of spectators and all of them were very friendly with no rock-throwing locals in sight. There were issues with they way the Coffs SSS was organised, something to be expected for a brand new event.

We will be back in 2013, hopefully joined by more Australian crews!

Raz

MAXYrally

What car number? I'll forward some shots, got you at a jump in Bucca

[Livewireshock]

Anybody got any pictures of Saliuk from Rally Australia?

Saliuk at PWRC Testing - Rally Australia 2011
Hope this works.