Skoda Rally Blog

After a rather stressful Saturday night service and having booked the car in 20 minutes late to try to get it running better, I didn’t have a very good night’s sleep, and only got 6 hours in bed anyway (I think I was awake for about two of them, plus I had the weirdest dream about getting a dog (Rufus, from the place where I keep my trailer) to the finish of some kind of event!

Sunday morning was reasonably good, in terms of weather, and we all set off in Al’s car to service, as of course the Recce Felicia which Paul and I had been getting about in was currently up on axle stands with no rear suspension.  Paul was his usual positive self, and said that we’d see how it went – essentially, it is what it is, and what will happen will happen – and was once more a perfect foil for me fretting over what would happen.

We got to Parc Ferme and started the car up, and it ran roughly for about 30 seconds, and then played ball, behaving perfectly as we went to service to load up and set out on what would hopefully be a full day’s rallying with 4 stages; Resolfen which was long at 30km, and Margam which was about 8km with a final section out in the open in the park itself with a big watersplash right at the end.

The road section out to Resolfen 1 was much shorter than Friday or Saturday, but still a reasonable distance, and long enough for the car to break down or play up (but then I guess 200 yards would be that!), but it was fine until we stopped for petrol (filling up with some 99 from Tesco), and then for a mile or two it really stuttered, and nearly stopped completely, with us stuck on a roundabout for a bit… but then it cleared, so I took to thrashing it and then coasting to slow down rather than trying to keep a constant speed, which seemed to work well; it didn’t play up again on the way to the stage.  We arrived about 15 minutes early, and parked up on the forest access road, and it was interesting to see the different approach methods used by different drivers; some were just driving up, while others were really warming the car up as they went, weaving and left-foot braking as they went.  When we got going, Paul said it would probably be a good idea to do the same, to see how much grip we now had from the lower and much softer/bouncier rear end, so I weaved until the back went out, which was a lot earlier than it would with the Proflex on.  We got to the start and then it was time to go into the stage, so we lined up and away we went.

The stage layout meant that after an initial downhill section there was an open hairpin left, and when we went round that it was apparent that there really was a lot less grip than before – the back end was all over the place, which was a bit worrying as the next section was along the side of the mountain, with some fast (for us!) 1 and 2 corners, but I thought we’d see how it went, and bouncy is the first word that sprang to mind.  For the first time I really knew what proper rally drivers were talking about when they talk about needing to back off a bit; I think I needed to take a few mph off on corners, and whenever there were some bumps then it definitely needed to be taken slower as the back would be up in the air, having bottomed out first and then rebounded skywards – not confidence inspiring but after a few goes I think I’d recalibrated enough to get on with it instead of worrying about tumbling down the mountain to my ultimate doom!

Paul was as ever being spot on during this, commenting on how the car was behaving and being positive about how it was going, and once we’d got over the first bit it was going well, all things considered!  The engine spluttered a couple of times, but this was while I was being tentative round a series of bends, so I gave it a good thrash to stop that happening again, which seemed to work.  We got out to the open section up top, and there were lots of spectators there, who probably wondered why we were going so slowly, and particularly down the 700 yard run to the square right, but there were bumps about and I really didn’t want to ping off of the track to a DNF because of a bouncy back end!  We got caught by Nick West again, and got out of his way, and it was interesting to follow him for a bit (until he got away on the longer straights and rougher stuff) and see what lines he was taking and where he was braking as well.  There was a huge rock in the road that I couldn’t avoid and hit with the left front, leading to a dent in the wheel – you could just hear it knocking on left-handers, but we’ve done that before and it soon gets worn away as it wasn’t too bad, so we kept going, hoping it wouldn’t go flat; the next big right-hander showed it was still up, so that was the last we thought about it. We got to the end of the stage pretty happy really.  As Paul said – “One down”.  He also showed me the time card and said “We’re going to fill this all in”.  I said I hoped so!

We had a car wash, and then out onto the road section, where the car played up again – it didn’t want to run at all at one point, but we kept it going thanks to a long downhill section, and that seemed to be the technique – if possible just run on a closed throttle for a while and then it would behave.  Through a town and back onto the road, and then up to Margam, where we parked up on the road outside and got ourselves ready, then drove up to the start, taking care over the bumps we’d noted on recce on the way into it, which had got worse – we thought we might get stuck at one point…

Margam was rough to begin with – the car just didn’t want to get going on the first section, but once it opened up a bit, we finally got some speed up, taking care over the 5 left we’d spun on during the recce, and taking some “interesting” lines through the pair of hairpins (OK, I got it pretty wrong, with the car pointing all over the place, and Paul saying “well, that’s one way to do that”), and then round the back section down to a gap in a wall where I lost the car momentarily, stalling the engine and heading straight for one of the posts; I saw Paul tense up and brace for impact, but managed to get round it – I bet it looked interesting from outside!  Then there was another fast section and into a 6 left through some woods where I’d said on recce that someone would stick a car in, and lo and behold, there was a triangle out, marshals saying keep left, and then an Evo which had been installed at a rather interesting angle shortly after the corner….  We carried on to the open section at the end and tried not to make the same mistake as on the recce run, and it went well, other than backing off over the bump (but still having the back end bump up), and probably braking way too much for the watersplash which almost stopped the car anyway.

Two down, two to go.

The road section went OK – the car didn’t play up at all, and we were back at the service in point in plenty of time, and got out and had a chat to several people, including Rob Pike about next year’s Rallye Sunseeker, although the Skoda will need a LOT of work before then…

We got into service, and there wasn’t anything to do, really; all the issues we’d been carrying were still there; rattling top mounts, a knackered gearbox mounting and so on, but I gave it a check over anyway, and then we had some food; by this time Ian and Al had gone home so it was quite quiet; we saw that Duncan from BRF’s car had a transmission failure, and was looking unlikely to get out for the final two stages, and it always seems so cruel to have got that far and then not finish, but then it’s probably better than going out on the first day and doing next to no stages….

We set off again, and repeated the same road section, although this time while I was filling up Paul went to McDonald’s to get a Big Mac, which he ate on the way, and then produced a Hamburger as “dessert”…We waited in the same place again, watching people come by….

.. and then set off one the course closing car turned up behind us, and soon enough we were into the stage.  I’d noticed that the car felt even more bouncy on the road section on the way to the stage, and this was soon confirmed as I “warmed up” the car on the way in – it had even less grip, which would be fun as the National rally had also run through the stage by now, so it would be pretty cut up, I thought.

I wasn’t wrong – there were a lot more bumps and areas of real roughness as soon as we got going, and this carried on throughout; the car felt quite dicey in places and again I didn’t want to chuck it off the road, having had so much trouble and come so far, but I still wanted to give it a good go.  About half way in there was a long straight with a bank on the left and trees on the right, and we were going pretty quickly down it (nearly flat in fourth) when we hit a bump, which chucked the rear up in the air and we went right – left – right as I tried to get the car back under control – I was convinced we were going off as we only narrowly missed a big pile of rocks, but somehow we ended up with it pointing in the right direction (I remembered to try not to over-correct and do an unintentional pendulum turn), and off we went again, although for the next couple of K I took it easy, probably too easy as we got caught by Nick a lot more quickly this time.  There was a LOT of noise from the back of the car, which I thought would be the tankguard dragging because the back of the car was so low, plus the rocks that the FC seem to think are a repair to the road as well!  In the end I think we were only slightly slower than the first run, so it wasn’t too bad overall, and we’d done 3 stages of the 4 of the day.  If we didn’t finish now, at least we’d have had most of the fun, if not the glory.

The final run to Margam went fine, with the car behaving aside from sulking a bit in the run through one of the towns, and it was difficult to clear it as the only way is a flat-out thrash so I did some left foot braking to work the engine hard while not speeding, and this seemed to at least keep it going… and then, into Margam for the last time; one way or another this would be my last ever WRC stage, and the last for a Felicia too.

Margam had really cut up in places too – the beginnning was mega-tough and the now-slaughtered tankguard was dragging on the floor for much of this part of the stage, but it only had 5 miles to keep going through, so we got on with it; on the stage there was a narrow section through posts over a cattle grid where Krudda’s S1600 Swift was firmly buried (with an OK board out though, thankfully), so the next posts were taken a bit gingerly, but at least I made a better job of the next hairpin combo, and even got to overtake Al-Shamsi on stage (admittedly with a problem), handily I he moved out of the way very neatly for us, just before the Evo deposit point in the woods where it had already been removed from!

Finally, out into the open, I gave it a good thrash, trying to take the square left as quickly as possible but it wasn’t spectacular, I’m sure.

But more so than stalling the engine in the watersplash (my fault, not the car’s), and then over the finish.  We’d done the stages, I couldn’t believe it and celebrated with gratuitous horn beeping!

So, out into the road section, and we waited around for Nick West to come out of the stage, and then followed him very, very closely until we got to Cardiff, where a problem developed – the engine just stopped, completely.  We’d hit a bump just before this and the mapping box for the ECU had fallen off the dash and then the car just stopped.  A quick check showed that none of the sensors were reading at all, and it looked like the ECU had failed.  So near, yet so far, but we still had a chance – if we got the car to the controls in Cardiff then we could still be classified as finishers, so we pushed the car the 300 yards to the regroup in control and spoke to Gary and Johnathan the Competitor Relations Officers who told us that officials of the event (such as Marshals) could assist, but members of the public or our team couldn’t do, and then helped us push the car round to the Service In control along with another official whose name I don’t know (but am indebted to!) and then the half mile or so to the service out control – James Attwood from Motorsports News offered to help but was advised that it may be illegal so it was best not to; we had 10 minutes to do this, and we managed it in 6, by which time I was rather hot and tired, but at least we’d made it.  We quickly got the WRC tracker out (and were helped by one of the ISC staff who was very helpful), and then got the timecard signed as we were in time then.  We had actually finished, and had only to get the car to Parc Ferme “in a reasonable time”, which would be possible with a bit more push work, but we couldn’t go over the finish ramp without the car, and pushing it there was NOT an option (too far and too many inclines), but I wanted to take another look at the ECU with the laptop, so plugged it in, and started the software.

When I saw what I saw, my heart jumped, and not because of the exercise I’d just done.  The software said “Engine Stopped” at the bottom.  This wasn’t it stating the obvious, it was that the stop button had been pressed on the mapping box we had attached so we could diagnose the problem during the day, and it had killed the engine, but interestingly it was a latching one – Paul had tried it, but possibly twice therefore re-setting it again.  I pressed it again, and it said “Engine Run”.  I walked round to the driver’s side of the car and told the guys who had pushed us that there may be a punchline at this point.

I turned the key.

The engine fired up.

Amazing – OK, we hadn’t missed out on anything as a result of the car stopping running, thankfully, but we could now go to the finish ramp, without which I think our rally wouldn’t quite have felt complete.  I unplugged, thanked the chaps and then set off for the ramp holding area, which involved us driving through the Priority 1 area in the bay, and then along the waterfront.

We parked up and I really felt elated; we really had done it, with all these ups and downs.  We spent a fair while talking to other competitors and Marshals (including Paul from BRF trying to convince me to go to Barbados next year), and Andrew Kellitt once more – it’s really good to know that key officials from the MSA take an interest in normal Joes like us as well as the works teams (who were still on the podium celebrating at this point), and after quite a while we got down to the finish ramp – here’s Nick’s Fiesta in front of ours, with a Swift on the ramp…

… and soon enough it was our turn.  While there wasn’t a massive crowd by now, there were still quite a few people there, and they were really enthusiastic about us, which was great – big thanks to them for their reception and we tried to give them a clap too after I’d been interviewed on the podium, and we’d got our finisher’s awards as well as the Class A5 trophies, which again are beautiful crystal ones with the trophy and event logo inside them in 3D.

We now had to put the car into Parc Ferme for the last time, with it parked up with all the other finishers, most of which looked pretty tidy; I did my last bit of tourism and took a few snaps, but really needed a much brighter flash, alas!

We then had a 90 minute wait until 7pm so we could get the car back after the results had been declared final, so we went to Pizza Express in the bay and got the van ready for going home and tools ready for the suspension swap – before Paul could get home we’d need to put the broken suspension back on the rally car, and the suspension coming off the rally car back where it belonged on the recce car so he could drive it home.  This was done reasonably quickly, but it was still 8pm before we left Cardiff…

The drive home took about 3 1/2 hours, partly because I was taking it easy, partly because I was really, really tired by this point, and partly because Paul called me and said the recce car was making a knocking noise or two, so he stopped at Magor services and I caught him up and checked it out – there wasn’t anything wrong, it’s just a noisy old car that’s got a knocky sumpguard on it, and he’s used to driving a 2-year old BMW!  Still, better to check than have an accident!

So, that was it.  Rally GB 2010.  My summary?  For me, I think it had everything – highs and lows.  For the first time I really think I actually drove well throughout – I openly admit I was really all over the place when first starting the recce, but I got it together reasonably quickly, and Paul was often commenting that I’d done something well, and that we “didn’t want to be going any faster than that”, etc.  Obviously I’d have been happier had the car not played up, but it all turned out OK in the end, and certainly added some drama and spice to it, and we got through it.

I have to say a few thanks – Ian and Al for being a brilliant service crew and really keeping our spirits up and looking after us; it really wouldn’t have been the same without them.  They got everything changed over on Saturday service with seconds to spare, and we would have got into Parc Ferme on time had it not been for the engine playing up suddenly again; top marks to both of them for that.  To Paul for again being a brilliant navigator and always being pragmatic and positive throughout the event, even when things went horribly wrong, and for suggesting solutions to problems, most of which worked out.  Plus providing some interesting road section banter, including the theory on sheep in Wales amongst many other things.  To Nick and Simon for being really great guys as we had a good laugh til the very end, and for helping us out when we really needed it.  To everyone who marshalled and attended the event, it was great to see people clapping and waving at us as we drove past, even when slow and bouncy!  To Tammie who has been great throughout all the build-up and the event – she doesn’t understand half the things I’m talking about (she says this, not me), but listens and helps anyway, and to my Mum for as ever sorting things out for me when I’ve not got time – she’s taken bits here there and everywhere as well as stayed in for couriers to deliver last-minute parts to get everything done in time.

It’s been brilliant doing this, and as I sit here writing this on Monday morning (at work, but thankfully there are benefits to teaching, such as setting tests!), I’m really pleased that we did it; it’s not something that I’ll ever forget, made more special by all the difficulties we had and overcame in the end.  I know that in the future I’ll be a little sad that I’ll not get to do something like this again, because there’s just no way that I can afford a newer car that’s still homologated.  I’d love to do an IRC round or two before the car is not eligible for that any more, and Monte Carlo really appeals, but it would mean a solid year of saving and even then it would be an incredibly difficult thing to do, both personally and financially.