Round two of the national rally championship got underway in Whangarei last night, with two runs through the short Pohe Island super special stage a precursor to more serious action, comprising eight special stages today and a further eight tomorrow.
With four Otago-based drivers involved, and all seeded inside the top-20, there is plenty to keep an eye on up north as the rally unfolds.
Top seed, of course, is Cromwell’s Hayden Paddon. He’s been New Zealand’s preeminent rally driver for more than a decade and having won the opening series round in Otago by well over five minutes, he is targeting further improvements this weekend.
For Paddon, taking his Hyundai i20 AP4 to victory this weekend is almost as incidental as it is inevitable; his main aim is to keep as sharp as possible behind the wheel as he prepares for the far more demanding task of returning to the World Rally Championship scene in the WRC2 division a couple of months from now.
Seeded fifth this weekend, making it to Whangarei has been something of a silver lining in the cloud of a disrupted Extreme E international series for Emma Gilmour. Originally, she was expecting to miss this national round, as it was going to clash with her second Extreme E event for McLaren. But round two of the Extreme E series — to be held in Sardinia — has been rescheduled for early-July, giving Gilmour the opportunity to contest this weekend’s national rally.
Gilmour made a strong start to the NZ championship here in Otago, running in the top three on the opening day, and eventually coming home fifth after her Suzuki Swift AP4 suffered a brake issue at the start of the second day. The Dunedin-based driver was the only competitor to finish inside the top ten on every special stage at Otago and she has every reason to be pushing for a podium result this weekend.
Carrying the ninth seed for Whangarei, Central Otago’s Ari Pettigrew is targeting further improvement as he gets to grips with the complexities of a four-wheel-drive AP4 car for the first time this season.
Having won two-wheel-drive class honours in the national championship last season, the 23-year old is rightly seen as a rising star in the sport, and he justified that tag in the season-opening Otago Rally, setting a string of top-five stage times, and coming home seventh overall in his Holden Barina. He actually finished seventh overall in his old rear-drive BMW at Whangarei last year and should be looking to finish inside the top five this weekend.
Rallying purely for fun these days, Bannockburn’s Duncan McCrostie has been awarded the 18th seed after taking his Mazda 2 AP4 to 16th place on Rally Otago last month. Having a fun event free of any major dramas is probably McCrostie’s top objective for this weekend, but if things play his way, I can see him finishing inside the top ten. Whether that is possible or not will depend, to an extent, on whether the very high finishing rate among the leading contenders that was a feature of the Otago Rally, continues in Whangarei this weekend.
Moving beyond the parochial, former national champion Ben Hunt (Skoda) is going to be the favourite to finish ‘‘best of the rest’’ behind Paddon, or perhaps even take the win if Paddon falters. Others to watch for at the sharp end of the field will include rising star Robbie Stokes (Ford) and Raana Horan (Skoda), who joined Paddon on the podium at Otago, and Matt Summerfield (Mitsubishi).
- Editorial. Photo: David Thomson
