Skoda Rally Blog

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!

This evening was the ceremonial start for Rallye Sunseeker 2011, which has replaced the traditional Friday night stages in Bournemouth Gardens since last year; obviously I didn’t get to it last year as I was out of action, but this year was my first experience of it. On the face of it, it’s a chance for the public to get close to rally cars that will be competing tomorrow, and also for sponsors to be seen by a wider section of the public – there are lots of people who are interested but won’t be able to spend the day in a forest watching cars, and this was evident tonight.

We arrived a bit before our due time and queued up, with Gary Hayter appearing just behind us; his terratrip had broken so it was handy for us to be able to tell him which iPhone app would do the trick instead! We had a chat with the others in our class – the Becketts in the Skoda Favorit and Richard and Andrew in the 1275GT Mini, and had a good laugh. The mood down at the Quay reminded me of the queue on the barrage for Rally GB’s saturday evening stage – everyone was chatty and there was an air of excitement. The crowds were HUGE – I really wasn’t expecting anywhere near as many people to be down there; when we arrived it was difficult to move in some parts of the quay, and this lasted the entire time; there seemed to be a fair wait and it did look as if we would be waiting around a lot longer than our original due time, but once the cars got moving it went smoothly; even though we were last but one over the ramp (we would have been last but it looked like car 70’s driver had gone AWOL and they appeared when there was no chance of them overtaking us!), the crowds were still solid – driving up to the start itself the crowds were very deep, with people asking for autographs and saying hello, and the commentator keeping things moving with each car taking about 30 seconds while the mayor held a flag over the windscreen in true ceremonial style – he was very chatty and enthusiastic which was much appreciated by us as normally by the end people have had enough!

We drove off through even more excited crowds, and back home – quite a different experience from doing the two seafront stages but still a good PR exercise, I’m sure. Tomorrow will be completely different, however, and it’s time to see how well we can go; I have heard reports that some of the stages are really rough this year, with some tricky sections as well, so it will certainly not be easy for anyone!

Today sees a couple of important things for tomorrow’s Rallye Sunseeker 2011 – having got documentation out of the way last night, scrutineering needs to be done, and then there is the ceremonial start at Poole Quay this evening.

I woke up reasonably early and got all the stickers on the car – this was not to my usual high standards, and I’m blaming thin vinyl for my poor efforts.  Next up was getting some tyres changed, and the chaps at Kinson Tyres were as obliging and efficient as ever, so after that it was time for noise test at Canford Arena, which was passed easily enough, but I noticed that the throttle was sticking – it was difficult to get a precise opening, which is really crucial when trying to get the engine at 4500rpm, and obviously will be when driving the car in anger as some precision is needed in mid-corner to avoid either going hideously slow or off the road!

Scrutineering was down at Oops! near Poole, and I followed Craig Breen’s fiesta most of the way down there until he went in completely the opposite direction, so either he was lost or he wasn’t going there anyway; either way I got there in plenty of time and got the car scrutineered, which went OK apart from the electrical cutoff T-handle breaking when I tested it (I’d removed it all last night and oiled the cable, checked it all worked fine and again this morning, and then it breaks THEN.  Typical!), which I’ve now replaced.

So, technically all ready to start, but still a few things to do – sort out the idle speed (which had risen due to the throttle stop screw working loose), sort the throttle pedal/cable, and also the intercom extension which got broken in Rally GB – handily the UK importer of the connectors is in Poole, so that was easy enough – thanks to Claire at Pambry Electronics for her help today, much appreciated.

I got back, got the idle speed sorted, and found that both throttle pedal and cable were to blame, so lubrication seems to have helped there a great deal, and the intercom was fixed soon enough.  Time for lunch and CRACK!  I’ve broken a tooth.  Which isn’t ideal, but at the moment it doesn’t hurt too much, and handily I have the dentist this afternoon anyway (rated right up there with scrutineering and MOTs for me in terms of dislike), so hopefully he can patch it up.

Just about ready to go...

This evening’s start is at Poole Quay, and we are due at 18:54 and will be out of there by 20:06; hopefully the weather will hold up as it was nice earlier but is looking increasingly grey; I don’t fancy standing about in the rain for an hour, but apparently tomorrow is looking good.  We start at a rather relaxed 10:12am so should have a nice easy morning setting up at Canford Arena (well, what there is to set up, anyway!) and hopefully a smooth and rewarding day on the stages.