Rally Australia or How to alter the WRC outcome in one easy lesson

[elephino]

Well I had an eventful trip out west to Rally Australia. It started off quite well.

On the Thursday, I just happened to in the right place at the right time when, just after a late breakfast I stepped out and just happened to see a Subaru support truck pull up and park. I thought 'well isn't this nice..why didn't I bring my camera today?'. At this point I thought it'd be a good idea to hang around and see who else turned up. Good move really...after talking to one of the drivers about this and that, more teams started to arrive along with the first rally car, a Corolla. Then some more waiting and a Ford truck arrives. At this point Toyota and Ford start to set up a little display. Soon a Subaru turns up. To cut a long story short...Seat, Hyundai, Mitsubishi and Peugeot all arrive (and in that order too).

At this point I notice a Ford Focus road car, so I went to have a peak at that as they are not on sale here. Another good move. I started to talk to a guy from Ford (I wish I could remember his name though, he has been on TV before...but I can't remember who he is). An interesting discussion about the Focus (this was a 1.8L evaluation model), if Ford do import it, it will be the 2L one so as not to clash with the Laser. Also, this guy from Ford agreed that the styling of the Falcon did not work well, especially the 'sad' rear end. After some time wandering around picking up some freebies (Focus poster, Subaru info booklet), finally some drivers turned up. Sainz, Moya, Auriol and Giraudet arrived. Having noticed Toyota setting up posters and stuff, I lined up early and picked up the posters, stickers and cards. I did some more wandering amongst the teams but finally had to go and meet someone for lunch.

Due to other commitments, the only day of rally action I could watch was the Friday, not that I'm complaining because there was more than enough action on and off the track. It all started in the morning. Going to York to look at the service park there. On the way saw a group N car and thought 'good, going the right way then'. At this point I remembered I'd forgotten my camera..oops. So after going back again to pick it up, it was decided to go to Mundaring instead and watch the Atkins 1 and Helena stages with a stop in the middle for the Mundaring service park. Again, another good move...never thought forgetting my camera would be so good. Finally got to Mundaring and knew we had to turn off somewhere. We went right through and turned around, saw a sign for results and as we passed that I saw that the car sitting off to the side had 'spectator information' or something similar on the side so I said to stop and I'd ask. As we pulled over past a street I looked down it, and there was part of the service park. Anyway, I asked about Atkins 1 and received a map, a results sheet and directions on how to get there. So off we went.

Driving down the road to the stage we saw a sign and some cars and thought we'd see if we found the right place...almost was. It was the start of the stage. A little further down the road was the spectator car park. After parking the car, finally got to hear a rally car at full noise. Sounded great. A short walk later...all up hill and we were rewarded with a nice little dirt road. Part of the stage it seems. Not quite as obvious as circuit racing really. A minute or so later there was an airhorn and some whistles blown, then the sound of a rally car on its way. A Peugeot 206 WRC. It came down, round a tight corner (out of sight) then past where we were standing and off out of sight again. A good start to the day. The next car through was another Peugeot, and this time the camera was ready. Horns, whistles, car, corner, nothing. He stalled...off again and not sounding very healthy. So we wandered around the spectator area, looking at what was around, taking occassional pictures and finally came to the interesting bit. A section which is essentially a downhill right followed by a tight left up a hill. A nice spot for photos (as will soon be able to be seen here at 10 Tenths). McRae is just spectacular to watch.

After a short stay there, enough to watch the main contenders go through, thought it would be good to get some food and look at the service park. At some point I noticed a surprisingly large number of Subaru WRX STi cars around, only 400 were to be imported and at most 398 are left (one crashed in Rally Tasmania, the other was crushed before it got here). I ended up counting 6, not bad really. To get back to the story...we enjoyed a nice stroll through the service park, seeing what was happening to the cars, what was being fixed, how relaxed the crews were to fix things, and in the case of Auriols' crew, how desperate they seemed to be to get the car working again. So a few photos and a hotdog later, off again to watch the Helena stage, a little further along from Atkins 1.

The spectator section of Helena is more open than that for Atkins 1. After a long wait, the zero cars passed by and finally some rally cars came through, much to the relief of the spectators. The main section of this area of the stage is basically some slight wiggles then a 90ish degree right then a slight crest and away into the distance. Not a lot to be said about this bit...the cars that we saw came through quite nicely, a few photos taken, some annoying people avoided and a number of cars with flat tyres (a terrible sound hearing it scrape along the ground). A few long gaps were appearing between cars because of all these problems and with things to do that night we decided it was time to leave and head back to Perth. This may start to sound repetitive but, another good move.

We walked back to the car, drove down the road, turned on to the road back to Mundaring and saw a sign for results sheets. Seemed like a good idea to stop and pick one up so we did. Upon receiving it we started to pull away and suddenly had to floor the accelerator not to be hit from behind by none other than Tommi Makinen, who had just come around the blind corner before the results bit. Instead of braking like most people would do, he drove over to the other side of the road and passed us. Some quick thinking and I had the camera out in a flash...unfortunately no film. So after loading the film took a couple of shots of following Makinen as a nice momento of the trip and could say that we almost took out the world champion. He sticks to speed limits well, as he should, including the 30km/h road works. He soon pulled over and let the short train of cars through, most of whom probably didn't know he was at the head of the queue. After enjoying a good laugh about that we continued on through Mundaring and off towards Perth. Next thing I know, I am being told we were being attacked by a fluro car on a side road. McRae had bunny hopped towards us as we passed the road he was coming out of. He was then following us back to Perth, so we slowed up so I could take some photos from different angles and wave and beep the horn (as you do).

That, finally, is the end of my adventure...well all that I'm going to tell you lot about. The pics will be up soon, not sure when the ones of Makinen and McRae will be up though as they are still in the camera.

[elephino]

Wow..that's longer than some essays I wrote for school...oh well, if you get as far as reading this, well done.

[Chuck Lantz]

...great post ! ...thanks