Brown ends rally season on a Manx high

 

Rochdale rally driver Steve Brown rounded off his season with a fine performance on the Pokerstars rally on the Isle of Man last month. He finished 16^th overall and first in class in his 1300cc Nissan Micra.

From a start position of 30 Brown made good progress on the opening day of the event to lie in 25^th overall and 4^th in class at the overnight halt. A storming performance in the Mintex Racing, Fuchs Titan Race, 710 Oil's, PIAA, Sabelt UK and Six 80 Ltd Aviation Asset Management-backed Micra on day two saw him take the class win as well as moving up to 16^th on the overall leaderboard.

“After a strong run on the Rally Isle of Man in September I decided to return to the island for the Pokerstars,” said Brown. “It’s a fantastic place for rallying, the stages are a great challenge and to come away with a class win rounded off the season perfectly.”

“We’ve had a mixed year as far as the MSA Tarmac championship goes but we had two good results on the Tour of Epynt and the Jim Clark National so I’m happy with that. The two non-championship Isle of Man events went very well and I’m delighted with the results we achieved on them.”

“It has been a good learning year and hopefully we can put the experience to good use next season. Thank you to all my sponsors for their support.”

Brown will have a new Micra ready for 2014 but he has yet to finalise his plans for competing.

“I think I’ll be doing a few of the Tarmac championship rounds in the new car but the first few events will be used to develop the car.”

“I will be keeping the existing Micra too and that will be rebuilt over the winter. If the budget allows I hope to return to the Isle of Man with it to try and further improve my times there.”

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Sykes storms to second in class on Rally GB National

Stourbridge’s Richard Sykes ended his rally season in fine style when he followed in the wheel tracks of the best drivers in the world to take second in class on the Rally GB National event after three tough days of competition.

The rally used the same stages as Britain’s World Rally Championship round so it was a unique opportunity to compare times with the 2013 World Rally Champion.

Day 1 saw Sykes and co-driver Jonathan Boucard tackle the Hafren, Myherin and Sweet Lamb stages and a brilliant performance meant he led his class at going into the second day in his Bathams Brewery, Boroughbridge Marina, Silverstone Tyres and G I Sykes Ltd-supported Citroën C2 R2 Max.

“The opening day went really well, we had no problems and set some great times to head the class although we were only 7 seconds ahead of Phil McVay in second,” said Sykes. “It was my first time with Jonathan in the co-driver’s seat but we quickly gelled. Emma Morrison, who sat with me on the last two BRC Challenge events, was co-driving for Phil which was slightly surreal – we had gone from being a team to rivals!”

The battle between Sykes and McVay continued on day two with McVay taking the lead as Sykes hit a bale on a chicane, damaging the side of his car and losing a few seconds. More time was lost in the Kimble Park stage. Sykes had been due to start the stage in daylight and had not fitted spotlights but delays on the rally meant he did the stage in the dark and was hampered by only having the normal car headlights.

“We did a DVD recce of the stages and the chicanes were not built when the DVD was produced so we didn’t know how tight they were. The first one was really tight and it caught me out. The rear side window got smashed and the bodywork bent but we were able to carry on although the time loss meant Phil, who was going really well, passed us for the lead.”

“Having to do Kimble Park on the standard lights lost us around 11 seconds in just over a mile as it was a tricky tight very dark stage, the type you only loose a rally on not win one.”

A fine performance on day three meant that Sykes ended up just 8.7 seconds behind McVay at the event finish and he also finished 13^th overall.

“The final day was really good, we had a clear run and were pushing hard to keep the pressure on the class leader. It’s a little disappointing that we couldn’t do enough to get the class win, we paid a heavy price for those 11 seconds lost in Kimble Park. I am more than happy with second though and I’m delighted with 13^th overall out of 55 finishers considering we were competing against 300bhp 4 wheel drive cars in our little 170bhp 2 wheel drive C2.”

"Jonathan did an excellent job and by the third day we were well on it. The event has left us totally elated and I can’t wait for next year now.”

“I’m hoping to contest the BRC Challenge again in 2014 but I may have a new car. The current one will be for sale shortly, if it sells then we’ll be out in something different next year. Thank you to all my sponsors for their support this year.”

Image courtesy Dave Johnson

Images from the Roger Albert Clark Rally

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Images from BCCC Walters

 

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Images from the Mull Rally

 

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