Skoda Rally Blog

I never sleep well when I’ve got something important to get up for the next day.  This goes doubly for rallying, as not only do I have something important to do, but also something to worry about – is the car going to fall apart?  As a result I woke up about 5am, and didn’t really get back to sleep, so I got up and went to put some fuel in the car – this would also give me a chance to warm the engine up and check on the coolant situation.

I went to the (high quality!) Murco down the road, and put the fuel in Paul had told me – 25 litres.  I was the only car there, so a bit surprised when the guy asked which pump – I looked outside, prompting him to look, but he didn’t, so eventually the standoff was broken when I said.  No wonder he’s working the graveyard shift!

Which pump, Einstein?

A couple of runs up and down the road confirmed the car was running OK, but that wasn’t my main issue, so once it was warmed up OK, I went home and left it to cool down.

Ready.

Checking the header tank an hour later showed there was water in there; this was the first time this had been the case, so a tiny fragment of hope appeared on the horizon.  I got everything else packed in the van (not a lot – I don’t have any right-size spare driveshafts at the moment, so if anything of significance broke it was game over), and waited for Paul to come over, as it was a 12:29 start for us.

We got to the service area about 11am to find pandemonium.  Service is now at Creekmoor park and ride, and it’s too small and cramped for everyone to use it, mostly because the different event schedules mean there are people coming in to service while others are leaving, and doing so via a single narrow access/exit road which was currently being blocked by an Army land rover on a trailer.  When they eventually moved, we went to find our space, only to see that someone had parked in it.  Once they’d been found (they seemed surprised we wanted the space!) the guys next to us thoughtfully moved over as much as they could and we got everything set up:

My own van, at last!

I checked over a few last minute things that I’d forgotten – tyre pressures (fronts were too low) and oil level (also low, but understandable as I lost a fair bit when changing the oil cooler and kept forgetting to check it).  No problem, there’s some in the van.  Except there wasn’t.  I had every other fluid I could possibly need (and a few I couldn’t ever need), but no oil.  On the upside there was plenty of time in the road section to get it done, and two petrol stations directly on route.  No need for panic.

There was a slight panic when I was being interviewed by the chap from the Daily Echo and the Clerk of the Course revised our start time – forwards by 10 minutes, so suddenly we had 11 minutes to go, which isn’t crazy, but when you’ve not done this for a long time and you’re in charge of everything and have already had a couple of oversights, it’s not the most comfortable thing to have happen.

We got strapped in and headed off.

Queuing to set off.

We stopped at another Murco to sort the tyre pressures out and put a litre of their finest oil in, and then headed to the stage arrival.

For us the rally starts at SS4 – Ringwood South.  This is clearly my bogey stage as the only two times I’ve retired on the Sunseeker have been there – a blown diff in the Skoda and a snapped driveshaft in the Seat.  This combined with never having finished an event in the car meant I was a little worried, and being completely rusty (having not driven on gravel for 18 months) didn’t help either.  I decided to take it steady from the off.

Now it begins.

Into the stage, it all comes back quickly – you suddenly remember why you do this, and work for hours and hours on the car, and spend buckets of money on parts that you might trash.  The feeling was electric, the car was feeling good, although there was no grip at the back – it was really loose and all over the place wherever there were any corners and sometimes in a straight line too if there were bumps, of which there were many.  We got past the bit where the diff exploded, and then the bit where the shaft broke, and I started to get into a bit more of a rhythm.  Paul’s navigating was as good as ever; he’s super-composed, and calls each corner nicely in advance, and if there’s any doubt in what’s going on, he will re-state it when we arrive at the corner in question.  Re-assuring stuff.

Each year you hope to improve as a driver.  Well, I do.  I’ve never claimed to be anything other than totally average, and when there’s a lot at stake I guess you drive accordingly, but the car felt good (if loose), and I wanted to get hairpins much better; they’ve always been a slow bugbear of mine, so I decided to take a bit more speed in and make use of the upright hydraulic handbrake the car has to get the back end round.

All I know is that I’ll never have another rally car without one.  It gives you so much control over the back of the car, allowing you to get it to oversteer so nicely, that I ended up using it in more than just the hairpins – squares and some sixes got the treatment too.  I was deliberately being careful on the engine and transmission, so as we went out of slower corners (which were very cut up and so there’s on/off traction which is the kind of thing that breaks shafts) I wasn’t using full throttle, but trying to act as a traction control, so I was sure it was slow (and the times confirmed this), but I didn’t care.  I was more interested in getting a few stages done, and for the most part it was good – the car felt to be on the limit on many corners, and faster would have been a bit too loose.

With SS4 out of the way, it was time for SS5, Ringwood North.  This is the longest stage of the rally by some margin (over 10 miles, compared with 4.7 for the next nearest), and one I’ve always enjoyed as most of it doesn’t get too cut up, so you actually get a chance to drive the car, rather than engage in damage limitation.  In addition I knew that Tammie and the kids were going to be there, so it was doubly important to get there!

Off we went, and the back of the car felt like something had broken; I later realised it was just the bumps on the uphill climb that made it feel that way; the left rear felt really loose.  Once we got going, though, it felt good.  The stage was way more cut up than in previous years, so there were some sections reminiscent of the (frankly awful) Wareham stages which are thankfully missing from this year’s event.  A few miles in we came to the open area of the stage where the pylons run through it, and Paul said “there’s Tammie” – no idea how he spotted her, but I could definitely see someone jumping around and waving their arms, which I thought would be Sennen!  Into a hairpin right, and on the slow exit I could see Mabel jumping around and waving her arms too – it’s funny how you can recognise someone even though you’re rather busy doing something else…

The next section of the stage was good – I got more of an idea of what gear to take specific corners in (as the gearing is totally different to the Skoda it takes a bit of time to adjust so you can be certain and commit to a corner and trust in the notes), and once this took shape I think we went pretty well.  I was still taking it easy on the acceleration out of tight corners, but got the hairpins right with the handbrake, and in a few places wanted more power, which is also a good thought to be having.  There were some fast flowing sections that were really slippy and there were a few scares in places, but I only got it really wrong in one place, heading off the road for 20 yards or so, but thankfully only being in some bushes.  This led down into the slippy, tight section where there’s a concrete bridge you could easily come a cropper on, and at that point the car behind us caught us up, so I let him past and got through the last part of the stage OK – not fast, but it was pretty bumpy and rutty in places and we saw a car off who’d totally misjudged the heavy braking at the end of a long 1R so at least we weren’t in the bushes.

Helmets off and the car sounded really squeaky, but that’s just how they often are; I think the rear top mounts are the source, but everything was where it should be, so off to Somerley for SS6

Oh to be in the countryside.

This went fine, aside from the first section which is out of the back of the estate, and where the road is really rough, so it would be easy to hit one of the many posts.  I managed to avoid them.

What I didn’t manage to avoid was the collection of many pheasants who had decided to show their dedication to rallying by getting too close to the action.  Normally I would do anything I can to avoid hitting any kind of animal when on the road, but they showed no sign of moving, and I didn’t think it would be safe to stop (plus they probably wouldn’t bloody move anyway), so I just went for it and hoped they’d move.  Some did, but one beautiful male didn’t, and I felt us hit him.  I said sorry (because obviously they speak English and would hear it), and carried on… into another group, who also got hit.  The rest of the stage went pretty much without incident, other than seeing a few cars off, and passing the Chevette that had passed us in Ringwood North at the end of the stage – we later found out their engine had seized.  There were a few other cars by the side of the road, but off to service it was for us, on a nice easy road section.

Half way there.

After being washed off and waiting to go into the regroup control as we headed into service, I had a chance to chat briefly with Keith, an avid rally fan who always mails to wish me well before a rally, and it was nice to say “still going” to him, rather than “it’s dying”.  What was even better was opening the bonnet to find the header tank still had perfect level in it.  I guess it was just settling down and getting rid of an airlock or two – something that the ABF is known for.  Great news.

In service, I found the cause of a new rattle – the sumpguard rear mountings are a sliding fit and I guess previously mud or whatever had stopped them from rattling, but now it was.  Nothing was loose, just some play in it, so that was fine.  I also found the rear wheel bearings had a fair bit of play in them – not good as they were fine for the MOT – so I adjusted them a bit tighter but erred on the side of caution rather than too tight, which would mean they’d overheat and break up.  There wasn’t a lot of play in them, but the car definitely felt better after this, so it’s amazing what a small change can make.  Around us, though, big changes were happening – the escort crew we were next to was putting on a brand new set of four tyres – probably the same cost as our entire event!

Ready to go again.

After a brief bit of food, it was time to go again.  The service area was much more empty now as quite a few teams in our area had packed up and gone home, so it was much easier getting out this time, and off we headed for a new stage, Uddens White Sheet.

Usually a favourite of time, I really enjoyed this one, as it has a long flat out blast (where the car was a bit feisty in places, so definitely steering angles need to be fine-tuned), then a few square corners and into a forest section with some flowing bits and a succession of sixes, which I usually enjoy, and did this time aside from being a bit worried about the proximity of spectators at one point after what happened last weekend.  I got a grip on myself though and got on with the rest of it, and it all felt good.

Next up, re-runs of Ringwood South and North.

Second run, here we come.

Ringwood South went much better this time, having got the hang of what gears to use and extended my use of the handbrake, it felt to be going well.  The car was still skittish at high speed, and there was still next to no grip, but it felt good.  This is what it was all about – the times really don’t matter, it was the time that mattered.  There were a couple of moments where the road was so rutted that I thought we’d not get out, but thankfully the artificial tightening of some of these corners had been removed to reveal new road which meant it was much better for us – this is a really good idea and I hope it gets done in the future as it can be the difference between breaking the car and not.

Before Ringwood North there was a short delay and a chance to speak to some of the other crews.

Time for a short break.

Car 90 was a Fiat Stilo, the only other FWD car in our class, and it turns out we’d been faster than him for most of the day, which was pleasing.  They wanted to take it easy and get a finish as they are doing demonstration runs at Rally GB next month, which sounded like fun, and now there were only 2 stages to go, so it made sense to just consolidate and get round.

Our target for the day.

When we eventually headed into the stage, I felt like I’d already had a good day and wouldn’t mind if we didn’t finish, but still wanted to get to the end – I was surprised that I’d enjoyed it enough already to think that way, but didn’t have to think about it again as we headed off once more into an even more rutted and washboard-like stage, the first section of which was now pretty bad.  The middle was great, though, I really felt I’d got the hang of things again, and most of this part flowed OK.  Towards the end (where the concrete bridge is) I was a little more careful, but it felt better than the first run, and I knew where the big ruts and dips were to avoid, making a fair bit of time up.  We passed through what looked like a very scenic mist at one point, and towards the end I could see the Fiat, which spurred me on a bit more, but once we got to the end of the stage we could see an immense amount of smoke coming from the right-hand-side of the car, and it smelled like clutch or brakes overheating to me – really not good.

By the time we got to the passage control where the stage goes onto the road, the Fiat had cried enough and stopped.  We crept by and it was off to Somerley Park, a different version of the stage from this morning.  The first bit was much the same, including the carcasses of several pheasants, and mourners gathered around, which, sadly we also hit a few of.  I really did feel bad about that, but there really was nothing to be done.  The rest of the stage was really, really  rough.  I wish there had been a camera on the car as at one point there was an acute left which had been dug up to hell – we nearly didn’t make it through it, and it’s the same every year there, but this one even more so than usual.  I thought we’d got a puncture as the right front felt odd after a big hit, but it seemed OK and the end of the stage came up pretty quickly.

We’d finished.  All we needed to do was get back to service and then Poole Quay.  Which usually would be easy, but due to a less-than-ideal section in the road book (not particularly well drawn tulips, combined with no distances) meant a Benny Hill-style run around the spectator car park, with us being chased by the Army land rovers.  Eventually we got out OK, and got back to the service area in good time.

Back again.

Finally, on to Poole Quay, which was still pretty busy.  We had a chance to say hi to a few people including Gary Hayter, and then over the finish with the Mayor saying well done, and – this is a first- the ladies from whichever ‘Gentlemen’s Club’ is sponsoring the event were still there.  This has never happened before – they are usually off as soon as the top 3 have been through!  One of them even cracked a smile as we waved as we drove along.

Over the ramp.

And that was it.  Back to service, pack up, drive home.

Lonely Service Area.

I’ve got a fair few things to do, the first of which is clean the car, but nothing is damaged badly, nothing fell off, and the car didn’t miss a beat all day.  I’m pretty sure the skittish nature of it is the toe angle needs sorting out, and it needs decent rear tyres (I was running modern Kumhos on the front and not great Dunlops on the back), but for now I’m going to rejoice in having finally finished an event in the Ibiza!  What a difference new driveshafts make.

Back in the day, Friday night on the Sunseeker meant driving through Bournemouth Gardens.  It was an iconic event, and probably a major contributor to me wanting to start rallying; as well as the forests, there was this totally out-of-place drive through a town centre gardens.  Not any town centre, but my town centre.

However, things have changed – for the last few years the start has been a ceremonial one on Poole Quay, and tonight it was time for that.  After a last minute change of plan I arranged to meet Paul in the car park before the CS1 control, one of the three on tonight’s start, and in the car park all the cars were ready to go:

In impressive company.

Once Paul had got suited up and ready to go, it was time to be off, and head to the Quay.  We booked in and parked the car, once people had got out the way (mostly people who were supposed to be helping us park!).  Said a quick hello to Gary Hayter who’s looking after the Quay this year, and said hello to a few familiar faces.  Paul’s wife Clair was down with their kids Miles and Evie, and we wondered off down the road to the pointy end of things, where all the proper rally crews were, with the BRC and historic crews all in wonderful shiny cars, and all making positive noises about the stages condition when interviewed, which is a good sign for tomorrow.

What is not a good sign for tomorrow is the car – it appears that it has a water leak;  it has been fine up to now, but the header tank was empty when I got back from scrutineering which isn’t good.  I refilled it before leaving for the start, and it was on my mind all the time we were there.

We were down at the Quay for an hour or so when we went back to the car, and found Tammie and the kids there, by the car, so we said our hellos and then it was time to queue up and get going.

In the queue on the quay.

As I moved off, the car made a new noise, which I realised later was the diff freeing up – I’d forgotten that it takes time to bed in and then will get a bit noisier, so that’s OK, but it took a while to realise it!  Time went into fast-forward at this point, although during that time I bagged a ride as a navigator on the Tempest on November 2nd, so that’s a bonus.  A quick interview before the podium gave me a chance to make my excuses before tomorrow, and tell the world that I thought the head gasket was on the way out, and then off we went, once the Mayor had taken his flag off the windscreen (and me and Paul joked about running everyone over who was stood in the way!).

The view from inside.

I dropped Paul off to get a ride back home with Clair, and came home – the car behaved itself all the way which was nice, temperatures looked spot on, and the water level seemed OK, so hopefully it was just a level issue, rather than anything else, but I’m really not confident.

Anyway, tomorrow is tomorrow.  It’s a late start (we are due out at 12:29pm!) so we’ll take it as it comes.  It’s been a loooong time since I’ve done this, and it really should be about having fun, shouldn’t it?  Let’s see how far we get.

In case you didn’t already know, before you start a rally, you have a number of things to do – the car needs to be noise tested, and then scrutineered to ensure a) that the car is safe for you to compete in and b) in some cases ensure that your car is eligible for the event.  In the case of this year’s Sunseeker, it’s only a) that is needed; there are no requirements in terms of car specification, other than ones that everyone has to comply with.

I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again.  I hate scrutineering.  It’s the last obstacle before you start an event, and it means having your work examined closely, which I shouldn’t be worried about – I’ve never had a car fail scrutineering as I check everything before I take it – but I always find it unpleasant.

This year, it’s doubly so.  The last event I finished as a driver was Sunseeker 2011, which was 30 months ago.  In that time I’ve had a fair few mechanical issues, not only with the rally car, but also with everyday cars; over the summer I spent a lot of time doing up a van for everyday use, and it turned into much more work than I thought, and a little problem with a driveshaft bearing caused me a lot of scratching of my head, sucking air through my teeth, and generally thinking that I’m mechanically incompetent.  Getting the Ibiza MOT-ed was a big step forward, but there’s still the ghost of inability lurking on my shoulder, and those nagging doubts were there all the way to the service area.

This year sees big changes to the event, notably that the service area is now at Creekmoor park and ride instead of Canford Arena, so it’s a fair bit further away from my house (boo!), but it’s fully tarmac covered (hooray!).  Hopefully the weather won’t be too windy as it’s a bit exposed in places down there.  Noise test is down there, so it was my first visit to the area, and it’s well set up with some of the top teams already in place and working away as their cars will have been doing recce and shakedown.  The noise test was at the end of the service area, and passed easily (92dB, the limit is 100dB, which anyone who knows will tell you means my car seems nearly half as loud as it could do), and then it was off to scrutineering with just the tiniest bit of excitement and feeling that I belong once more starting to grow.

Scrutineering was at “Bump!” a body repair place, and once there (over an hour early, which is OK in this event) there was the usual queue of cars – a mint-looking Mk1 Escort behind me, it looked like a show car, plus some other cars that you don’t want to hit:

Trying not to hit the Ferrari.

There were of course some marshals and some people who’ve come to have a look.  Had a chat with a few of them, got everything ready, and after about 10 minutes, in I went.

The Central Scrutinizer will see you now!

With everything unloaded ready for scrutiny, there was a delay – the scrutineer’s online identity was being stolen, and he had an important phone call to take, so I now had a wait which seemed like eternity, with everything ready to go – a bit like going to the Doctor, taking your clothes off to be examined and being left in the room.  It was probably only 5 minutes, but it seemed like an age!

Thankfully, the next scrutineer (who does the event every year) took over, checked everything out and all was OK.  Phew.  Closed the bonnet, double-checked the pins and off I went, nice and slowly.  On the dual carriageway, gave it some beans, it felt lovely, so I said that.

Out loud.

What happened?  Yes, of course – the car started to misfire badly.  I couldn’t believe it; you couldn’t write something like this; it works fine for ages and then THIS. I limped home slowly, and thought the worst on the way.

Thankfully, what had happened soon became obvious.  When checking the car over (as he should!), it looked like one of the HT leads from the coil to the spark plug had come loose, and come out when I gave the car some beans.  Pushed it back in, and it was perfect.  Took it for a little drive just to make sure.  All is well.  The car is ready to go, and Paul’s on his way back from work so we’ll go down to Poole to do documentation and then we’ll be ready for tonight, the ceremonial start at Poole Quay.

Ready to go…

Today dawned much warmer than usual, and although a bit damp, it looked like being a nice day.  How do I know this?  Because I woke up at 4:30am for no good reason other than having had a very weird dream about knowing I’d done the event, but not being able to remember it!

I loaded the car up with some spares and various service items, the jack and a few wheels, and got ready.  Paul came over about 8, we loaded the tool box into the car, and then headed off to service.  When we got there it was neatly organised and not very busy – our end had the National crews in there and most were similarly equipped to us with just a van and a tarp out, rather than the mega setups often seen further up the order.  We got ‘set up’ which consisted of getting the tarpaulin and 4 wheels out (which for once weren’t actually needed to stop it blowing away as it was still and pleasant), and checked over a last few things, setting up the power supply for Paul’s phone and camera mountings.

Service set up.

We were ready with plenty of time spare, and when the time came (after triple-checking everything, as ever!), we headed out to the first stage, Gore Heath.  On the way we filled the car up as we had no idea of consumption and the erratic fuel gauge needed more time to be trusted, and got to the stage with enough time to get set up and set the tyre pressures.  The start looked hard to get away from as it was so rutted and it certainly was.  Once into the stage I was instantly reminded of the first few times I rode a motocross bike – lots of power, but lots of wheelspin and just a general feeling of ‘skimming’ over the surface rather than driving on it – the car is pretty powerful but being FWD you break traction quite easily so as soon as it hit the power we were wheelspinning in first and second.  I had no idea what gear to take given corners in, and this would take a few stages to come.  Although it felt quicker than the Skoda, it certainly wasn’t quick – I was all over the place, frankly.  As it was only 2 miles long, it was over quickly enough, and off to SS2, Wareham Main.  This was much the same – the terrain here is mostly pretty soft, so it cuts up really badly in places, and there was still a lack of grip, confidence and probably ability too.  When we got to the faster sections with straights, the car was all over the place – it seemed to grip and grab quite a lot, and I’m not sure if it was the ATB diff fitted, but it seemed way more skittery than the Skoda, which didn’t help on the longer straights which the stage has.  We passed an Escort pulled over to the side of the road (with the crew out, waving us past) – later I’d find out they had a fire inside the car with the fuel tank having been punctured, so that must have been pretty hairy for them!

We got to the end OK, but it was clear that I had my work cut out – the car was a fair old handful compared to the mild-mannered Skoda, but Paul agreed it was best to build up speed and get used to it rather than bin it early on (or indeed at all).  The road timing to get to SS3 was really tight, but we got there with seconds to spare – the irony is than once you’ve got to the arrival control with lots of panic you usually have a couple of minutes waiting on the start line (we did with no-one else about as the escort on the stage before was the car in front of us), but into SS3 and it was much the same, although some of the soft sections were hideous – Paul said “it’s like a beach” at one point as it was just soft sand with foot-deep ruts.  The car was bouncing all over the place and it felt like we’d never make it through a couple of them, but we did.  Good – Wareham was out of the way, even if the oil and water temperatures were really high by the end.

Back to service, and the only issue so far was the right indicator not working.  It was only a 15 minute service so we didn’t have much time other than to check the obvious stuff and make sure levels were OK, then off out again for SS4, Ringwood West; this is a shortened version of the “Ararat/Plumley Wood” stage of old, which would be running later on as SS8 and SS12.

Ready for Ringwood.

The road section was pleasant, and the stage generally went a lot better; the terrain here is much firmer gravel for the most part, so on the longer straights the car wasn’t anywhere near as unstable, and despite a few missed gearchanges it went pretty well, getting more of an idea of what gear to take corners in (which is critical as the engine is quite peaky and the gearbox not close ratio enough for it to always be right in the power), but getting up the steep hill (about the only one on the event really) was so much quicker than the Skoda – indeed quick enough that I think Paul needed to adjust his pacenote speed a fair bit as stuff was coming up quicker.  We got passed by a very quick escort in this stage; I tried to keep up and found that on top speed we were similar, and indeed into the 2 corners I saw him for we weren’t too bad either, but getting out of them he just had so much traction compared to us – he just shot forward.  I can really see why people love Escorts.  Again overall, I think we’d improved on this stage, and it felt more like it, but still the braking was a fair bit off, and I was shy of going flat out at high speed as the car was still scary at speed.

SS5 was Somerley, another new layout this year.  The notes at the beginning of the stage were…. well, we both thought we were in the wrong place until a 90 left about a mile into the stage – they just didn’t seem to make sense, which didn’t help with my confidence, but once we got onto a more familiar bit and the notes worked OK it went pretty well; there were high speed 2 and 3 corners which were taken a bit slower than they should have been because again I was concerned that the car was all over the place and here there were logs laid down by the road; hit one and it would be over.  Very over.  Again, though, it was much quicker than the Skoda would have been, and as ever there were sections at Somerley that were just hideous – cut to death usually on 90 degree corners where you’re almost a passenger as the ruts control the car completely.  The tarmac section by the house looked to have been clattered by a few as there was straw everywhere, and then back into the forest with a really high speed section, which I took as quickly as I dared and was getting a bit more confident with the car again.  The end section is a tight and rutted bit, never a favourite but it went OK.  We got to the end of the stage with a hot car and a reasonably satisfied crew, and off to SS6, Uddens.

Although Uddens is only short, it’s one of my favourite stages as it has a good section at the beginning with some great corners – 6s and squares, and for the most part is good surface.  Clearly someone skimped on the repairs after last year as one of the corners had some massive potholes in it – not something it has ever had before, so it’s not great to see that the £500+ per mile that’s paid to the FC doesn’t look to be well spent.  The corners are the only place real damage occurs to the roads, and it can’t cost that much to repair this sort of thing properly.  Anyway, aside from that it went pretty well, although the car wasn’t entirely happy flat in fourth for about half a mile at the end – it got hot and seemed to lose power so I backed off a bit, unfortunately.  6 down, and back to service.

This time we had a fair time in the holding control (15 minutes), having had 10 minutes or so waiting to go into it, during which time I’d fixed the indicator issue and spoken to James from Motorsports News, and we took the time to phone people while we were in there (and Paul was advising his sister on a new laptop purchase!), and into service.  Again, nothing too serious to do – everything was OK and the indicator had been the only issue on the car so far, which was a good thing.

Look at the shadows! It's SUNNY.

Half way through, so out to SS7, Ringwood South.  This was the stage in 2009 where the Skoda LSD exploded, so I still have bad memories of one corner, so was pleased it went well for the most part; the ground here is soft, black and loamy, much like Wareham, so there was a fair bit of bouncing around, but it went pretty well, and off to the main course of the event; SS8 Ringwood North.  This is where Tammie and the kids had gone (complete with camping stove and chairs, for a nice day out in the sun!), so I was really looking forward to them all seeing me in the car (as were most of them, even!).

It wasn’t to be.  There had been an accident and tree fire in the International event, so the stage was cancelled.  I was devastated – both for the reason above, and also because it’s the main stage of the event, which I love.  Looking it from a purely financial point of view, that’s about £100 of the entry fee that is cancelled, which is unavoidable and part of the sport, but still a bitter pill to swallow.  We turned round and took an alternative route to SS9, Somerley 2.  As we got to the arrival control, I felt the steering get heavy – the assistance had gone.  Handily there was a 20 minute or so delay while everything got in sync due to the cancellation, which gave me time to find the fault – a union had come loose, and leaked all the fluid.  I managed to tighten it up with tools in the car, but we didn’t have any fluid.  I’d have to do the stage without power steering; if you’ve ever tried turning the steering on a PAS car with the engine turned off, then you’ll know how heavy that is. It’s made harder by the fact that the steering is only 2 turns from lock to lock in the Seat, although easier due to being on gravel.

Waiting for my arms to fall off.

After a long wait, we went into the stage.  The notes at the beginning still didn’t seem to work well, but a more immediate problem was the amount of effort needed for the steering – it was really heavy, and every time we hit a bump, the feedback through the wheel was immense.  The stage went as well as could be expected given this and the moon-like condition of parts of the stage; it was like driving through an open quarry in places, more suitable for massive diggers than a little car, but it made it.  By the end we had lost loads of time, and I’d lost the ability to feel my right hand – it had gone totally numb – and the left hurt like hell.  I lost count of how many times I swore in the stage.  Back to service, and refilling the reservoir and system got the steering working OK, but the noise from the pump confirmed that it was another casualty of rallying.  Hopefully the rack will be OK, as it was mega expensive by all accounts, as it was custom made.  The steering felt a bit erratic, but I’m hoping that’s down to the pump’s performance rather than anything else.  We headed off for SS10, Uddens which was a slightly different layout this time out, but still had the nice opening section.

Waiting for Uddens.

This went pretty well, and the steering seemed OK for the most part.  I took some of the tighter corners better, making more use of the handbrake, but still suffering the power drop-off at the end, and a very hot engine when we got there.  All done, though, and a road section off to SS11.

By now it was getting towards twilight, and when we got there said a quick hello to Gary (rallydelta), and then into the stage.  Whenever it starts to get dark, my thoughts turn towards finishing; it seems that you’ve worked hard for the day and now you want things to go OK so you can finish the day well, and go home without issue.  As we went through the stage it was going well; the corners were being taken better still, and it was coming together nicely.  The stage had cut up really badly in places, and the car was suffering in those bits.  There’s a long straight with a hairpin left on it, which went OK but after it a rutted soft section, and as we headed into it, the revs just went up.  I knew it straight away – a shaft had broken, or similar.  I changed gear a few times as we rolled along to see if it was that, but it was no good. We were going nowhere.  Dammit.

We pulled over to the side of the road, got the OK board out, and I took a look.  I could see the one driveshaft looked at a dodgy angle, and a quick grab confirmed it – the outside end had snapped, inside the CV boot so it thankfully wasn’t flailing all over and causing damage, but that was that.

Of course, this has happened before, and I’m a grown man, but I was still angry.  I found out two things at this point.  Firstly that there is a LOT of reverberation in a forest – if you say something loud and abrupt, you hear it echo.  Secondly, that I’ve at least learned to take things better.  Paul was as ever immensely positive – he was clearly disappointed by it, but as he said, it’s “much easier to fix that than a blown engine or having hit a tree”.  On the upside, a plan we’d had for later came into action; he’d put some food in the car, so he set to, making a Pot Noodle for each of us after all the other cars went by and we waved them past.

Paul Burley. The Man, The Legend.

I phoned Tammie to tell her not to bother going to the Pier finish, and ask her if she could come and pick us up.  The recovery guys appeared quickly, and towed us out of the stage, and we parked up on the outlet (out of the way), locked up and went to get a lift back.

We got back to service, packed up the gear, and headed back out to the car to change the driveshaft – I thought it would only take about 15 minutes, but it took a fair bit longer than that, alas.  Massive thanks to Gary Hayter and Ricky Aitken for stopping to give us a hand on their way back from the start, hugely appreciated, and good that they got the little Peugeot to the end.  Eventually we got it all done, and drove back – the car, of course, went brilliantly and didn’t miss a beat on the way back.  On the upside, Tammie had stayed at mine and cooked a beautiful Moroccan Lamb dish (a favourite of mine from my travels on the Plymouth-Banjul rally), so that was a big upside to anotherwise bad end to the day.

So, as I write this, it’s early the next morning as I didn’t sleep too well, and I guess I need to remind myself of the positives from the event; we missed out on some of the mileage but got most of it done; if the car had died early on it would have been a disaster, and although I’m not naturally positive about these sort of things, it wasn’t a failure that could be foreseen; unless you replace the shafts with brand new ones every X miles I guess things like this will happen.  I will look into the source of the failure and see what can be done; if stronger shafts are available then that’s clearly the way to go as I don’t want another problem like this.  What’s hard is that I know that it’s another year before I can put that into action on my local event, but there you go; on Friday night I thought that even if we do go out, at least we’ve done something that many have dreamed of but few have done, and hopefully there’s no shame in that.

Tonight was the Ceremonial start for Rallye Sunseeker.  This isn’t part of the rally as such as there is no competitive element, but you do have to turn up to it – you need to be at the three time controls at the right time.  With that in mind, Paul came over about 5:30 and we headed off as we were due at 6:07, but typically there was no traffic at all, and we got there in about 15 minutes, so we parked up with some of the big boys,  and adjusted the harnesses as Paul hadn’t been in the car in his race suit before.

Only time I'll be in front of a 6R4!

One thing I’ve discovered recently is that when you’re trying to adjust them, it’s much better to undo the loops and start from scratch rather than try to feed half an inch through at a time – it was done in a few minutes, compared to the ages of flailing about we did with the Skoda.  Had a quick chat with Gary Hayter who is now in a 1600 205 and is next behind us on the road tomorrow, having sold his Impreza.  He’d had some issues with needing to change seats because of them needing FIA homologation, even if it is expired!  Handy he had a spare set in his other car and they fitted in OK, really!

Off to the first time control, and it now starts to feel like being in a rally – there was a car park full of assorted rally machinery, and lining up for a time control really made me feel like it – this isn’t just a car show, it’s a rally.  We parked up on Poole Quay in the rather large crowds and then took a wonder about (via Tesco for some food!), and looked at all the cars that are taking part – the front running event is the International BRC, which has lots of cars in it, despite the doubts of some, and they all look the part, although some are really quiet!  From what I’ve seen of the people driving them though, they’ll look spectacular enough, and the field looked strong.  We were interviewed by someone – I have no idea what for, but they asked so we obliged!   The historic cars were next up, with something like this lovely little thing:

Lovely red mini!

We wondered past all the other cars, and an uber-bling Sunseeker 34m long ship, a snip at £11M, apparently.  And then we were off – right on time, we drove through the crowds which really were massive – there were loads of people down there, and hopefully lots of them will be out and about tomorrow as the weather is going to be nice for a change.  Rick Smith (the rally organiser) opened the door and said a quick hello, reminding me of my upgrade and that I have cars behind me.  I hope I can keep them there…

Over the ramp and that was that – another quick wave to Rob Pike (the Clerk of the Course) and back home.  Car parked up, everything ready, just need to load up in the morning and then off to Canford Arena.  We are due out at 9:12, and then I’ll finally get to see if the Ibiza is too much for me!

Today has been rather odd; normally when the Sunseeker is on, it happens during half term, so I have the day off and usually scrutineer early, and then loaf around all day, playing Dirt on the Xbox, etc.  But this year it’s not, and I went to work this morning, so I spent the morning teaching, and then came home, had a quick snack and then headed off to the service park to get noise tested.  The Seat started up without any issues, and noise was passed easily – a good 6dB under the limit – as the Ibiza is a quiet car.  Splendid, so just a drive to the BIC to meet with Paul and get through scrutineering.

Scrutineering is never my favourite part of an event, as it’s always the last thing that could stop you taking part, but generally on the Sunseeker it’s been a bit of an event with it mostly held at the Littledown centre, and this year at the BIC in the centre of Bournemouth.  On the way in there were a few photographers on the roundabout, and once booked in I met up with Paul, and we had a new experience – the marshals were applying the stickers.  This would save Paul from his least favourite job, and I left them to do it as they’d obviously had hours of practice already (scrutineering started at 10am and our time was 2:30) and it would be a pro job.  Paul and I always like to have a laugh, and unfortunately for those applying the stickers it was at them – there were more creases in them than in Shirley off Eastenders’ face.

A sticker which doubles as a contour map.

Spoke briefly to Rob Pike, the Clerk of the Course, and then saw Robin Bradford who commentates on the event who said he’d sent me an email and I’d not replied!  I didn’t get it, or a chance to speak to him as we were in to be scrutineered and he’d vanished by the time we got all done.

Our scrutineer was really nice – checked the car over and was chirpy while he did so, and we had a good time doing it which is a really nice change; usually it’s like standing outside the Headmaster’s office; this was much more like it.

Pleasant experience of scrutineering!

Once we’d done the scary Fire system test (which was the first time I’d done this, and he made me press the button!), it was all downhill from there, and we parked up and got all our paperwork in order.

All done!

Everything’s ready to go, we have to be at the ceremonial start at 18:07, and will apparently go over the start ramp at 19:23 but if it’s anything like last year we’ll be there a fair bit longer than that.  The weather is still quite warm at the moment, so hopefully it’ll stay that way and dry and everyone will have a good time down there tonight; if it’s anything like last year it will be ram packed!

There’s not been much to report in the last couple of weeks; I’ve been busy working for most of the time, and the spare time I have had has been spent working on other cars, but next weekend some progress should be made on the Skoda (plus I’ve been investigating the 1.4 engine option). However, a couple of weeks ago I was sent another picture by Chris (chrispons@talk21.com), and it’s my favourite picture I’ve seen of us in the car, I really love it, so I thought I’d post it here!

I’m no photographer, but I love everything about this picture – it’s incredibly well focussed (particularly as we were going pretty quick at the time), I love the view of the road, the position of the car, the trees, the people in the background, even! Anyway, gush over!

I’ve finally got round to doing the other stages we videoed from Rallye Sunseeker 2011 – unfortunately because of the gearbox mounting issue I didn’t realise the main (HD) camera battery was getting flat and it was too late to do anything about it at the second service, and the batteries I put in my second camera (which I put on the roof) died during SS8, so I only have some video of that (which I may upload anyway over the weekend). Anyway, enjoy SS1, SS3 and SS4.

Splendid.

One of the things that went to plan for a while on the Sunseeker was video – for the first time we had two cameras, so I have made a little video of SS2 (Ringwood South), so you can see us in action…

The main footage was on a GoPro Hero HD, while the crew footage was on my GoPro Hero Wide, if you’re interested!

After the ceremonial start of Friday night, today was the ‘real thing’, Rallye Sunseeker 2011. Being my local rally it’s something special to me, and even more so given that I couldn’t take part in 2010, and in 2009 we did about 4 miles of forest stages before the diff exploded leading to a DNF (and a big bill). I was doubly gutted in 2009 as the weather had been kind in the weeks before leading to stages that were in the best condition for a very long time, and although this week the weather had been wet, I was relieved to wake up at 6:30 to find it generally looking fine and bright, although it had rained in the night.  The car looked shiny and ready for a day of forest action!

The Skoda blinks in the morning light.

By 8:30 my ‘service’ car (i.e. my Focus estate) was packed with spares, wheels and tools and ready to go; Paul arrived and we went down to Canford Arena to drop the car off and so I could go get the rally car and he could get a couple of things he’d forgotten – another advantage of living locally to the event! I came back, filled the rally car with fuel and got some water to take with us, and then off to Canford to set up. Or in reality, get a tarpaulin out to service on and put four spare wheels out to hold it down! With no-one to service for us, there doesn’t seem much point in spending a lot of time setting up for what would hopefully be two relaxed 25-minute services during the day, and there’s no way to keep the EZ-up that I have under complete control if it gets windy (and it gets very windy at Canford Arena!).  Nice and simple.

Our state of the art service area.

Our start time was 10:12, and after checking tyre pressures and oil and water levels, we were pretty much ready to go, and soon enough the time came up.  No matter how many times I do rallies, the time before you actually get going is a nervy one for me – it’s got better since the first time, obviously, but I always get a bit nervy and triple-check things, but we soon set off to stage 1, Uddens, which is only a small distance away, and involves the typically heavy traffic of the Wimborne bypass (and fortunately a long enough road time).   Uddens is a good stage – short but I like it as it’s a nice start to the day with some square and 6 corners to give you a bit of time to get back into it, and then a tighter, slippy section which has led to problems before!  I decided to use my HANS device, and have found it very easy to get back into; once everything is set and you’re used to it, it seems odd not to have it on, in fact.  We got ready for the stage and set the two cameras running – a friend had lent us a GoPro Hero HD to try out as the main ‘looking forward’ camera, and I set my one looking across the crew, so we could make a more interesting video of one of the stages.  And then time to go in; the nerves had mostly disappeared and it was down to business.

And business involved me braking about 100% too early for the first corner!  Last time out I’d gone in really well, but it took a few corners to readjust to getting it near right (although still not good), although the speed in the corner itself seemed fine as the back of the car was starting to drift already and it felt good – the engine was running well and those first few corners went well; we’d been warned that the middle section was slippy and rough, although it didn’t seem too bad I didn’t go bananas over it just in case.  The final part of the stage is a few long straights with square corners between them so it was a chance to get a bit of speed up (into top gear towards the end, in fact), and it went OK – not great, but not badly.  The times came up and we saw we’d taken 20 seconds out of the Skoda, but lost a second to the mini – easily done with such poor braking for most of the stage, so it felt like there would be a good battle on for the day.  Off with the helmets and HANS (not easy in my car, but doable with a bit of stretching), and off on the road section.

On the road Paul said he’d failed utterly; I was worried he’d forgotten the road book, but in fact he’d forgotten his sea-sickness pills, so we hatched a plan for him to go get some in the store which is opposite the next stage arrival; we had a couple of minutes spare but he had no luck there.  Stage 2 is Ringwood South, and I was nervous about it – it was about a mile into it in 2009 when the diff had let go, but I tried to put this out of my mind, and concentrated instead on getting braking distances right.  Off we went soon enough, and it went better.  The problem with the diff came back to me as it’s in a very memorable part of the stage, where there are posts on the right side of the road (all of which are marked in reflective yellow), and then a 90 right where the car died.  I swear I could hear some noise starting as we went into that section, but the car powered out of the right-hander perfectly and down the long straight and it was all forgotten; the task of beating the others in the class became the objective, so I tried hard to brake later for each corner and had it much better as the stage went on – tight corners were being taken in a much more capable manner than before with better lines and use of the handbrake, and it was going well until… we saw the mini broken down on the left-side of the stage towards the end.  Paul said it was a disappointment and I agreed – we were looking forward to a good battle all day and it looked like that was over; we later found out it was a double puncture and given the lack of ground clearance on the mini and the place they’d stopped that sounded about right.

A 100-yard section on the road (where we have to take our helmets off, making the timing pretty tight) led to Stage 3 – Ringwood North – which is the biggest of the event, and one to get your teeth into; it’s 10.6 miles long and I had set the target of catching the Skoda during the stage, and finally catching a non-retiring car during a stage.  While it is a long stage, much of it is the same each year, so there are sections that you remember; I wasn’t ready for some bits which dragged us off the road, and I made a mess of the braking from high speed, but most of it went well, until I span leading into a hairpin and lost about 10 seconds recovering from it.  I cursed myself and carried on, trying not to over-do it and crash as a result, and the rest of the stage went pretty well; there were a few moments (and I can always tell when they’ve been bigger than usual because I can see Paul reach for the door handle to steady himself) but overall it was good; we caught sight of the Skoda right at the end, and had taken 50 seconds out of them on the stage, so it would have been really close if it wasn’t for the spin.  Still a good performance and the times showed we were building up a lead which we may need – one thing I’ve learnt in rallying is that it’s not over until the finish line!

Stage 3 pic, by chrispons@talk21.com

Stage 4 is the new Somerley stage, and one I was glad to reach because Tammie was there with her son Sennen, and although I wouldn’t see them, I was pleased they would be there to see us.  The layout was all new, with one interesting bit where you go over a new man-made bridge;  the spectator section had a water splash, but it seemed to me from the car that the spectators were a LONG way back (and video I have seen since confirms this), which seems a pity; I know safety is important and all that, but this seemed to be going too far (literally!).  The water splash looked good on the video, though.  The rest of the stage was a mix of tight sections (and I span on a 6R 6L combination, sticking the front of the car in a hedge, although the recovery looks much quicker on the video than I remember it being), and some of it was incredibly slippy, with lots of wheelspin even in 3rd and not too much control; the forest road sections were better and the end section was just rough, muddy carnage; we both commented that the mini probably wouldn’t have been that happy through there anyway.  Again another fair time against the other Skoda and good fun.

At the time card collection I noticed the smell of gearbox oil, but thought nothing of it; we went back to Canford on the road section and at one point going round a roundabout heard a couple of loud taps on the bottom of the car, sounding like a stone or bolt hitting it.  I then noticed that the gear lever seemed to be loose as when you went onto and off the power it was moving, but after a bit of thinking thought it was more likely to be the gearbox mounting.  As we waited to get into service at Canford I took a look and my diagnosis looked to be correct; the engine could move quite freely as the new bottom mount was now disconnected from the engine, and gearbox oil was on the sumpguard as well.  Not good.

We booked in and set off to our service area (typically at the far end, losing us time), and I sent Paul off to see Gary Hayter and see if he had any M8 bolts that were at least 100mm long.  The sumpguard was off soon enough, and Paul back with some bolts.  My very worst fear was not confirmed (I had thought the casing may have broken), and it looked as if just replacing the bolts would do the trick; two from Gary’s spares box and one from the guys in car 77 (Peugeot 205), which were perfect lengths, and soon bolted back in place.  Oil was topped up with half a litre, and then it took forever (OK, 10 minutes) to get the sumpguard back on- the front of the car had clearly moved a bit, and only three of the four mounts would go in.  I was getting really frustrated as it wouldn’t go in and in addition my hands and shoulders were tired from holding it all up and I just couldn’t grip the tools.  Paul helped out by shoving the sumpguard over with his foot and we got it all back in place, put the tools away and off we went to check in, with me stinking of EP90 and covered in mud.  We made it OK, though, thankfully.

Off out now to Wareham and a long road section finished with me convinced there was no oil in the gearbox and that it was getting louder; where the bolts had been missing the casing had clearly flexed and let some oil out but we didn’t have time to check it and I didn’t think about it until it was too late; we got to the stage arrival and had some food at last, and then into the stage, run in the reverse direction from previous years.  I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again – the difference that ‘proper’ suspension makes to a rally car is amazing.  Usually Wareham has been a horrible case of attrition with lots of bouncing about and feeling completely out of control, but the Proflex seemed to transform the car; there were places where it was very difficult to drive, but no bottoming out, and much more control than before.  The time at the end of the stage showed we had beaten not only the Skoda (by 17 seconds), but also a Fiat Stilo and Sierra 4×4, which was nice!

Stage 6 was the long Wareham stage, and again the better suspension made it a far more pleasant experience than before – still slippy but took another 25 seconds out of the Becketts, which was good.  It was  a pity to see Rod Bennett’s Stilo on the finish line; it was apparently stuck in two gears at once, on what seems to be a jinxed stage for him.  Stage 7 was the last of the Wareham area stages, Bere Heath, which was pretty much as before although accessed a different way.  This went OK too, with our time not a million miles off of the remaining Fiat and the XR4X4, despite there being a LOT of water about (one cameraman was placed perfectly to get some good shots), and seeing us another 20 seconds to the good.

On the way back we had plenty of time so decided to stop at a garage to check the gearbox oil and maybe buy some if there was any; I found they didn’t have any but thought I’d check it anyway.  The car wasn’t in a queue for fuel so Paul stood behind a truck using a pump to save our place, and while I checked the level (and found it was OK), another car pulled up, so it was worth doing.  However, the woman in the car wasn’t happy about it, saying that you “couldn’t do that, if you’ve not got the car there” – she was really rude and abusive to Paul, but we put the fuel in anyway.  It was all of 10 litres and took all of a minute, and I really don’t know what her problem was.  Her husband looked like he’d had a lifetime of that sort of stuff though, poor chap!

Off we went to service and this time it was a much more pleasant experience; a bit of food while waiting in the holding control, and service consisting of just checking levels (all good aside from water which was a bit down so I topped it up), tyre pressures and putting the lamps on; we didn’t think we’d need them given the bright weather but I thought it may be useful in the last long stage both for dark forest sections and also in case we got close to the other Skoda!

Ready for another four stages, with any luck

Out again for another loop, with the first stage (now White Sheet) being a reversal of the first stage of the day; I like the stage this way round as well, and there was only one thing to watch which I took care over, and that was a jump over a bridge; there are ditches either side of the road and I really didn’t fancy getting it wrong so just backed off a bit for that.

SS8 - Pic by chrispons@talk21.com

It went OK, but we only extended the lead by 9 seconds this time round and were the same amount adrift of the Sierra so clearly I needed to push on a bit more.

Next was a re-run of Somerley (to give the spectators a quicker re-run rather than waiting while we did two other stages, sensibly enough), and it was ROUGH.

Ready for Somerley 2

Some of it was OK, but there were places where it had really cut up again; I made fewer mistakes, but actually went slower than in the morning, as I was careful over the rough sections which looked more like the moon than anything else – the ruts were massive as it was just loose dirt, and the lines were difficult to see in places as well.  However, we took 50 seconds out of the Becketts as they had hit a bale, apparently, and we could see them right at the finish, but it still wasn’t to be!

The penultimate stage was the re-run of Ringwood South, and although it went better from my point of view, it was still slower; the stage had cut up a bit, I guess, as there weren’t any major issues for me (although the now-missing bales in places were a surprise), and we came away with another 20 seconds to play with.

Stage 10 pic by eirah@aol.com

Finally, it was a re-run of Ringwood North, the longest stage of the rally, and I hoped there wouldn’t be a sting in the tail;  I really wanted to catch the Skoda in the stage, and was determined not to make the same mistakes again as earlier on.  It went well throughout, although again the stage time is actually slower than before – and this really comes down to how the stage has worn – there was one hairpin where I was amazed we even got through as it had cut up an immense amount and the car was bashing along on the sumpguard as we went round it, with both of us amazed at a) the state of the stage and b) the car making it through.  Once more we just caught sight of the Becketts right at the end, so it wasn’t to be, but it was still another 36 seconds to the good.  We’d done the stages, but still had to get back to Bournemouth Pier, and given what happened on Rally GB last year, anything could happen.

There was a wait at Kings’ Park while the cars were ‘jetwashed’ (I say this because they were little cleaner after than before!), and we had a chat with the other crews – there were certainly a LOT of cars out (it later turned out that only 13 had finished, with 15 retirements) and a few stories to tell.

Victor and Vanquished. This year, anyway.

Soon enough, it was off to the seafront; we got going OK having watched a rather heated discussion between a parent and child of a family who were living in said car park, and then I noticed my headlights wouldn’t work; sidelights were OK but no headlights.  Never mind, not the end of the world, but something else on the list of things to fix.  We got to the final control with seconds to spare, and got our timecards sorted – now we had officially finished, and won our class.  Paul’s wife Clair was there with their son, Miles (who is 7 months old), and a few photos were taken with him on and in the car (and wearing a similar expression to his dad!), and slowly the queue moved up.  An escort a couple of cars in front needed to be pushed, which I found amusing until I went to start the Skoda and …. nothing!

The car bump-started easily enough once Paul and a couple of bystanders gave us a push, but I didn’t fancy leaving it running that long, so I checked the fuse box and relays and so on, and then I remembered that there’s an oddity about the Skoda’s wiring that uses the starter solenoid as a sort of earth for some functions, and if it’s disconnected, some things won’t work (other than the starter!).  I opened the bonnet and found that was the problem, and it started up again.  Splendid.

A short wait, and then an interview with Robin Bradford while the Mayor of Bournemouth gave us our plates from Poole Pottery, photos were taken and the enthusiastic crowd greeted us – it was really good to have people still there and clapping as we left, last car to finish, but not in last place!  Once again, a great day for me, and Paul was as excellent as ever; composed and calm (even during the gearbox incident), and unflappable on the stages.

The car needs a fair few things doing to it now, but that can wait for a week or two – for now it’s time for a break as my week “off” has been anything but!