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Jaggy Bunnet Rally News - August 21, 2011 Scots Abroad Although Gary Jennings won the Ulster Rally, Martin McCormack was second and took maximum BRC points, but David Bogie and Kevin Rae did their Dulux British Rally Championship hopes no end of good with a fighting fourth place in their Mitsubishi Lancer on the two day event at the weekend. Luck was with them this time when they hit a rock on the first stage, but didn’t get a puncture. Main title rival Elfyn Evans also struck the same rock but punctured a tyre on the Subaru and lost over 2 minutes. Thereafter, Evans fought back to sixth while fifth was Bogie’s other main title rival, Jonny Greer in the Skoda Fabia S2000. David was lucky again when he had to run through SS5 with one slick and one intermediate on the front end having clipped another stone in SS4. Greer had his moments too when he landed badly in the verge after a jump and damaged a rim in the same stage. Peter Taylor broke his Clio’s gearbox and Alex Laffey put the Fiesta seriously off the road on SS12 tumbling through the trees into retirement. There was more good news for the Scottish contingent (for a change!) when Garry Pearson and Laura Marshall finished third in the British Rally Challenge event with an amazing run in their little Nissan Micra Super 1000. Jacke Rowe had a comfortable win in his Fiesta R2 from the Fiesta ST of Jamie Brown, but our pair were only 19 seconds behind Brown taking a superb third place overall. Considering their lack of experience on Irish tar, that was a simply marvellous result. Only 23 seconds behind them was another Irish tarmac newcomer, Ruary MacLeod with Neil Thomson in the Honda Civic. Jim McRae and Pauline Gullick won the FIA Historic Class in their Porsche 911. David Bogie now leads the BRC on 94 points from Evans, 80 and Greer, 77. Meanwhile over in Germany, Kris Meeke was battling for fifth place with Peter Solberg when the MINI suffered a power loss on the penultimate stage and retired. Kris thinks it was alternator related but he was stranded mid stage. ** The Skye Gravel Sprint, Saturday 27th August This year’s Skye Gravel Sprint will start from Highland Motors in the village of Borve prior to the first run of the day which is at 10.00 am. There will be 6 runs in total and the club are hoping for 35 entries this year although there is no entry list as yet! Spectators can park at the Struan Hill Road side which will be controlled by Portree and District Rotary Club. Borve is north west of Portree off the A87, look out for signs after Drumuie and just before the junction with the A850. ** Motor Sports Week It would appear that plans are afoot to organise a number of events between the Colin McRae Forest Stages rally on October 1st and the Rally of Scotland the following weekend on 7, 8, 9 October. The idea is to create some form of national motor sports week or festival to make the most of the rally stars who are coming to Scotland. There’s also talk of the new Museum of Transport in Glasgow hosting some sort of motor sports flavoured event. The festivities will get under way on Friday evening the 30th September when the Colin McRae Vision charity will host a Rally Forum ahead of the following day’s Colin McRae Forest Rally. Star guests will include Stig Blomqvist, Phil Mills and Jim McRae. The event is likely to be staged in the superbly appointed Moness House Hotel & Country Club, just outside Aberfeldy. So mark the date in your diary now, more details and timings to follow. ** It’s amazing the things you find out when wandering around the service areas at rallies. It was Allan Little at the Solway Coast Rally who informed me that his co-driver Emma Nicholson was now working abroad in a place called Northamptonshire where she works in a modern industrial estate called Silverstone. He then told me she was working for an outfit called Force India, which led me to think she was delivering curry-outs on a moped. Nope. She works as an aerodynamicist with the F1 team which employs another Scot by the name of Paul di Resta. Whilst at Loughborough University she had a work placement with Ricardo, the world renowned automotive research, development and engineering firm, but turned down a job with them when she qualified to go and join Force India. I’ll ask he a bit more next time we meet up, eh? It would appear that sometime Scroot Jim McDowall has been doing a bit of wheeling and dealing recently, and in a convoluted set of automotive and financial manoeuvres, has ended up owning Calum MacKenzie’s MkII. That’s bound to cause havoc in the household now. Young Jamie had his first event as a driver on the Solway Coast, but had to drive the Ford Focus, because Dad refuses to hand over the Avenger which Jamie really wants. But who’ll drive the MkII? Or is it only passing through the south west? Co-driving for Jim McDowall on the Solway Coast was one David Kirkpatrick. The last time he was out was 1986. What is it with rally drivers? Andy Kelly has named his new Ford Escort MkI ‘Walter’ while Mark McCulloch has called his new Subaru ‘Monica’. When asked why he had done so, Mark shrugged and said: “I’ve always given my cars a name.” Andy was even less vague: “I don’t know why. Some of the boys in the ‘Kelly’s Heroes’ team came up with the name and it just sort of stuck.” Quote of the month ... Ian Paterson always takes it badly when he marks his rally car. And anyone who has seen just how well the motor is prepped and turned out at the start of every event will understand how fastidious he is. So when he does bend it or scrape it, he gets annoyed. And he bent it on his home event, the Solway Coast. Not badly, but when the car struck the road sign, it dented the wing and the door although the car was stuck on top of the sign’s concrete base. Also, he was in the hunt for the win, chasing down David Hardie, so that probably annoyed him too. But as he sat there waiting for the disconsolate Ian to return to service, brother Alan Paterson said: “It’s a good job we’re not at the Granite City in Aberdeen – we’d have to put up with him in the van all the way home!” And finally ... Jordan Black, that erstwhile crumpler and rebuilder of Peugeot 205s was faced with a big decision the other weekend. Apparently he was at his girlfriend’s house when Aeilidh’s parents suggested they get a ‘curry-out’. Now I’m not suggesting for a minute that ‘the only child’ is spoiled, but he did have to phone home to ask his Mum what it was he usually ate when she ordered a curry-out! ****
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