Ford pair wins rally
They led from start to finish, winning the first five stages of the rally on the trot, and but for a slow puncture in stage nine after they clipped a fence and lost the Fiesta's roof vent and rear wing, it was plain sailing for the Ford crew.
Another dominant performance by the Ford Performance team of Mark Cronje and Robin Houghton saw the pair chalking up their third consecutive victory in the 2015 National Rally Championship by winning the inaugural Secunda Motor Rally in their Ford Fiesta S2000.
They led from start to finish, winning the first five stages of the rally on the trot, and but for a slow puncture in stage nine after they clipped a fence and lost the Fiesta’s roof vent and rear wing, it was plain sailing for the Ford crew.
“With the vent sheared off we struggled with dust in the car, but the team did well to fix it and we could cruise to victory,” an elated Cronje said afterwards.
For Henk Lategan and Barry White (Volkswagen Sasolracing Polo) it didn’t work out so well.
At the restart they were 26,9 seconds behind the Ford pair and quickly made up over 10 seconds in the opening stages, but their charge was ended when they clipped a gate post 5km into stage nine, which broke the right rear wheel of the Polo.
With their retirement Giniel de Villiers/Carolyn Swan (Castrol Team Toyota Yaris) moved up into second place, but were under pressure from Hergen Fekken and Pierre Arries in their return debut for the Volkswagen Sasolracing team.
Fekken/Arries slowly closed the gap on the Dakar champion, but in stage nine a broken wheel scuppered their chances of a good result, while teammates Gugu Zulu/Hilton Affray, who lost 30 seconds due to a time penalty when the gearbox on their car was changed, were now up to third.
Meanwhile reigning champs Leeroy Poulter/Elvéne Coetzee (Castrol Team Toyota Yaris), on a charge after a disastrous day before, were winning stage after stage and with the demise of Lategan and Fekken inherited fourth position.
At the finish at the Lake Umuzi waterfront complex in Secunda, De Villiers/Swan were 51,4 seconds behind the winners, with Zulu and Auffray, in their first outing together, scoring a podium, another 32 seconds adrift, with Poulter/Coetzee a distant fourth.
The next round of the 2015 South African rally championship, the Bela-Bela Rally, will take place on 19 and 20 June in and around the Bela-Bela area in the Limpopo Province.
Information obtained from National Rally Championships website.
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