Jim Clark Rally Report

[corsa]

GMC-MOTORSPORT

In association with

Beatson’s

motorsport

 

www.gmc-motorsport.co.uk

 

Jim Clark National and Reivers Rally 2006.

NATIONAL RALLY 8TH OVERALL

REIVERS RALLY 5TH OVERALL.

 

Burnside’s Davie Hatrick teamed up with Dunblane’s John Marshall for this double event weekender.

National Rally Friday/Saturday 7-8 July

The team headed down on Thursday morning to complete the recce of the stages to ensure the pacenotes were correct to every detail and the service crew prepared the car for the evenings shakedown at Floors castle.

With several hundred spectators lining the 1.2-mile route the crew used the shakedown to confirm the new active gearbox and differential settings were working together well. After a few runs and a couple of visits to the service area the car was ready to attack the tarmac of the Scottish Borders on the Friday night.

Friday saw the car put through scrutineering and all the usual checks carried out before the Crew headed out for the ceremonial start in the centre of Kelso and then onto the first 22 mile loop of Abbey St Bathans, Edrom and Langton.

Abbey was a 12 mile stage and at around 4 miles in we clipped a rock and suffered a puncture, this lost us around 90 seconds as we decided to drive the rest of the stage with the puncture rather than stop and change it and lose more time.

Edrom and Langton, both relatively short stages proved to be none less demanding and we completed them both in very competitive times.

With a quick 10-minute service it was back out to do another loop of the three stages. A better run this time saw the crew complete the stages with no dramas and end of leg 1 in a well-earned 15th overall

Saturday, the rally route was made up of another 10 stages totalling 169 miles on some of more open roads the county had to offer. With sweeping bends, flat jumps, blind crests not to mention the water splashes, the 1000mtre long straights where the car was pulling a top speed of 128 MPH it was entertaining. The leader board was gradually looking better for us and with a few of the top cars dropping out due to mechanical failure or accidents we were also turning up the heat on the crews immediately in front of us.

We had a good battle with Tim Finch, in a Ford Escort Cosworth (the current leader of the North of England Rally Championship) and Bob Dennis in a Group A Subaru.

At mid point on Saturday we studied the results to find we had rocketed up the leaderboard to 11th overall. With us closing in on both Tim and Bob we knew if we kept the pace up and ensured the notes and timing were spot on then we were in for a possible top ten. We had another big moment over the Swinton crossroads whereby over the downhill jump the rear end went nearly vertical causing a few heartstopping moments in the car prior to landing.

With the A class roads being used for a few of the stages the speeds we were reaching were mindblowing, and with there being very big jumps the car was getting some BIG air over them with no doubt many photographs to come!

The last two stages saw Tim Finch off on a big jump destroying his Cosworth and Bob Dennis losing time to us and having a massive spin right in front of us, allowing us to overtake and take more time out of him.

At the end of the last stage we calculated that we had in fact clinched 8th overall in the National Event. The whole team was overwhelmed by the result especially since over the last couple of events we had experienced some mechanical failures.

The Team headed happily back to the central service area at around 9pm that Saturday night to begin preparing the car for the Reivers Rally on the Sunday morning.

Reivers Rally Sunday 9th July 2006

 

With the crew having worked on the car until 10pm the previous night changing the up pipe to the Turbo and suspension geometry checks the car was now ready for another days rallying around the Berwickshire countryside.

This rally is a counting round for the Scottish rally Championship and saw the forest crews changing their cars set up for this all Tarmac round.

We knew that with their being some of the biggest names in Scottish rallying in the Rally a top 15 might not be possible due to the talented drivers out that day.

The format for the day was 11 stages split into two sets of 4 and 3 stages to finish the day. The first loop of three stages in the morning were started with a bad stage and I suppose just off the pace. Or so we thought until we found that we were 8-12 seconds clear of the two competitors in front of us, which gave us both a boost going into the next loop of three.

We had no incidents to report but a couple of late calls by myself meant John had to brake/change gear/and steer with a touch of panic all at the same time! Sorry.

By the lunchtime service halt we were sitting joint 11th overall and very pleased so far.

As the afternoon wore on we kept the pressure up and as more of the front runners dropped out to mechanical failure or accidents we reached 7th overalll. The last three stages of the day saw a big push by the crew and with that a well deserved 5th overall.

The whole team was overjoyed at the result and headed home with a smile on all faces.

With only two weeks to go till the next event at Albamarla airfield for the Turnbull Trophy Rally the Crew of Davie Hatrick and John Marshall split up to enable Davie to go back to navigating in his own car.

The last few rallies have been very enjoyable for myself and I am very happy to have helped in bringing home the recent result on the Jim Clark and for that I thank you John.

 

Davie Hatrick

www.gmc-motorsport.co.uk

 

[micra_wrc]

well done davie and john, you guys must be chuffed with the results [<)] []

".....The last two stages saw Tim Finch off on a big jump destroying his

Cosworth and Bob Dennis losing time to us and having a massive spin

right in front of us, allowing us to overtake and take more time out of

him."

we were there and saw the car in

front of you spin at the last corner.  hats off to the cool

manoeuvre where you neatly went past him and across the finish

line [Y]

[dougster]

Fantastic first hand report Davie.

Nice to see you and meet John at Edrom start on Friday.

 

[derek_robertson]

Well done Davie, an excellent result[]

 

[H]

[road warrior]

[]

Great report, and congratulations!