Report from Motorsport News of 24th October 2007

After 15 years of trying to win the Bulldog Rally, Andy Burton finally nailed the rally last Saturday. Burton and co-driver Shelley Rogerson set three of the six fastest stage times on the MSA Hankook Gravel Rally Championship finale to win by 19.2 seconds in the famous Peugeot Cosworth.

“I’ve always dreamt of winning this event,” said Burton. “I think they used to call it the ‘other rally’ because everyone used to do it as a warm-up for Rally GB when it was the RAC. It’s a prestigious event. Apart from breaking our steering rack on the first stage, our day was pretty trouble free. That made the last two stages nerve wrecking because I was waiting for something to go wrong.”

After the steering rack broke, Burton lay seventh overall after the first stage. His brakes were failing intermittently and Rogerson had a bad cold. He fired back by being fastest on the next stage to move up to second overall, and fastest again in stage three to take the lead.

Going into stage four, Dyfi Main Two, Burton was leading newly crowned MSA Gravel Rally champions Marcus Dodd and Andrew Bargery (Hyundai Accent WRC). The difference between the experienced drivers was a tenth-of-a-second so all eyes were on the service inboard to see who would have the biggest smile on their face when they arrived after the stage. But only one driver emerged.

“Marcus and Andrew have gone off,” said a shaken Burton, clearly worried about his friend and rival Dodd, who he was trying to get through to on his mobile phone to double check the crew were okay But as more cars came into service, they revealed that Dodd and Bargery were already spectating by the time they had passed their stricken car.

“It was my fault,” said Dodd afterwards. “On the second stage, we’d had an overheating warning light come on the dashboard. It happened again on stage four and I was looking at it on a straight. When I looked up again we were about 30 feet past the braking point. The wheels locked up and it was slippy, there was a culvert and it flipped the car up and over onto its roof.

“Then the car caught fire, just burning oil off. The way the car landed both doors were jammed in the ditch so we had to climb in and out through the windows. So l got in and got our extinguisher but then brake fluid on the hot turbo caught fire too. A fireman came along with an extinguisher and there was so much smoke from it it was hard to tell if our car was still on fire or not. Anyone who said we were badly on fire probably saw that smoke, not fire smoke. The car will go for a rebuild now, which was due and the panels we have bent were already bent so the damage isn’t bad. It’s a shame, people told us we had been close on Andy at that point.”

Having already tied up the MSA Gravel Rally title in Killarney in September, losing points did not bother Dodd but he had taken his first National A rally win on the Bulldog in 1997 in a Ford Escort Cosworth so a tenth-anniversary celebration win would have been a treat.

Championship runner-up Steve Perez had Howard Davies co-driving for him in his Ford Focus blitzed the opening stage, Dyfnant One, to finish almost ten seconds clear of Jon Ingram and Ian Allsop (Subaru Impreza WRC). But after stages two and three they lay third blaming a bad tyre choice. “Our school report would say ‘should try harder’,” joked Davies. But it wasn’t all bad - by second service they were second overall and Perez said, “There was a big Focus-sized hole enticing us in at one point in the last stage, we did well to avoid that.” Perez had clean runs through the final two stages to remain second, “Our wrong tyre choices on the middle stages just messed up our whole day We seemed to have the right tyres for the previous two stages on the car all day.”

Ingram had had a bad start to his day but set the fastest stage time on stage five, Gartheiniog, three seconds clear of Perez. “It’s been a mixed day,” said Ingram. “This morning my car just wanted to crash. But I’ll go home happy after setting a fastest stage time, it shows we can run on the pace. Earlier in the day, we were fed up because, on the Plains Rally, we had been able to give chase to Andy Burton but here he took a lot of time out of us and we don’t know why We lost time with a puncture today too on stage three, from then on it was really a test to learn the car for next year.”

Group N honours went to Limarick driver Errol Clarke and co-driver Neil Ewing, who had said their only plan was to make it to the end. “We’re trying to get more used to the forests and notes,” said Clarke. “We’ve done rallies at home [in Ireland] like the Dogleap and Lakeland Stages, but we need less oversteer and tidying up.”

Former Peugeot 206 Super Cup front-runner Ieuan Rowlands rejoined the rallying community last month to drive a Mitsubishi Lancer E9 as course car on the Plains Rally Having failed to finish with mechanical problems, Rowlands was back in the caron Saturday to compete on the Bulldog. After a break of around three years from the stages, Rowlands immediately showed he had not lost any form. Spectators raved about the way he was throwing the Lancer around the stages, saying he was the most impressive to watch throughout the field. Although he completed all six stages of the rally, Rowlands finished as a retirement, having gone OTL in stage four.

“The coil pack, or something to do with the fuel, packed up,” said Rowlands. “We pulled in halfway through stage four to look at the car and, after ten minutes, it suddenly started again. ”

Before that Rowlands had been fourth overall and leading Gp N: “For our first time driving a Gp N car competitively we’ve been pleased with the times. We might try to do the Cambrian in the car now to finish the year off.”

Other leading retirements included Subaru Trophy champs Jock Armstrong and Kirsty Riddick. Armstrong had gone into the event with the chance to win the national Gp N title with his rival Phillip Morrow sitting the event out but the challenge ended on the second stage when their Subaru Impreza crashed off the road, rolling twice.

Local late entry Sebastian Ling and Aled Rees also suffered. The ever-smiling Welshman arrived at the first Dolgellau service well ahead of the reest of the field. “The turbo’s knackered,” he said. “We think a wheel might have melted off it. We had no boost in stage one and sat out stage two to come straight to service. ” Ling used the final four stages of the event as a test and was fourth fastest on every one.

Going into the Bulldog the Gravel title, Evo Challenge title and Fiesta Sporting Trophy UK titles were already decided. But that did not mean drivers were taking things easy - probably the opposite with no titles at risk.

After 65.52 miles on six stages, there were 26 finishers, and a whopping 21 retirements. Whether they were finishing off their championship year or getting a crucial signature to entering Rally GB in December, the look of relief on the faces of every crew that finished was obvious.