Twyford Wood Stages - 21st April 2002

Mid Derbyshire Motor Club

Final Result - 8th 205, 3rd Novice (Award)

It had ended up being a close call and although the car had made it up to the mock rally, it was only rally worthy the weekend before the big day. Many weekends and days off work had eventually culminated in the first showing of the McRally project. With encouraging comments from the Log Book Inspector and Event Scrutineers, everything was set.

Rich and Mat took a tour of the rally course on Saturday by bike to get familiarised with the place and try to remember any tricky bits. It was worth it as they immediately were in the top 10 fastest on the 1st stages and maintained the position throughout the day. The morning stages went much more smoothly than the afternoon ones, and by the lunch break the crew were running in 8th place.

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A persistantly falling out crossmember bolt and the rear tyres fouling the mud flaps were the only things of concern for the service crew all day. Rhyd and Tom were pretty pleased considering all the carnage that was going on around us. Tony Clements (ex original 205 challenge star), Mark Andrews, and Jim Bowie all turned up to give us some support and advice, some of which might have come in handy if we had only taken it!

With the end in sight, the last two stages should have been straight forward, but Rich was on a charge having noted that a novice award was on the cards, but only if the pace could be maintained. As it was, he tried a bit too hard and ended up off the course three times. "I'm going to try to learn from this" said Rich afterwards after realising how close we were to losing it all.

VIDEO CLIPS

Both these are on the very last stage.......

The first clip (850k) is going down a straight with a load of dust on the entry to the corner. As the dust clears we pile straight into a bale.

The second clip (1070k) is on the very last run down a huge flat out section. Totally flat through the tyres and far too fast into the right hander then up a bank!

NOTE: THE VIDEO CLIPS ARE NO LONGER AVAILABLE DUE TO LACK OF WEB SERVER SPACE - SORRY