Class A6 championship leaders Leeroy Poulter and Henry Dearlove head into the second half of the Sasol South African Rally Championship with a six point lead over their nearest rivals and aim to extend that further after some major development work has been undertaken on their IMPERIAL Toyota RunX by preparation firm RacePrep.
With three consecutive class wins, and ending as the leading front-wheel drive car twice (in 8th and 7th positions overall) from their last two outings, Poulter cautions against unrealistic expectations. “The pressure is on from all sides because everyone now expects us to repeat those results. We have to be careful not to get too clever and end up taking ourselves out”.
“The goal remains to win the class A6 championship and it’s gone well so far, although sometimes I feel I’m holding on for dear life. I know there is more time to come from me as I’ve yet to reach what I feel is a mistake-free rally; braking at the right time, turning in and accelerating and so on, which I hope to improve by the end of the year. I’m also afraid of breaking something so I’m still finding the balance between speed and how much punishment the car can take”, Poulter added.
The production car racer and former karting champion’s thoughts on the Volkswagen Rally are down to earth: “The Volkswagen Rally is a very fast event and the A7 cars will be a real threat. You can never discount Tjaart (Conradie) as he is a tough rival. After he beat me on the Sasol Rally tarmac SuperSpecial, it’s game on between us. I want to do something special at Scribante”.
Champion co-driver Henry Dearlove agrees that the Scribante stage that concludes Friday’s VW Rally action will be a make or break stage: “Ideally, we’ll be able to build up a bit of a lead on Scribante as Leeroy has no preconceived ideas about how a rally car should handle on rally tyres on tarmac, whereas other drivers are used to the semi-slicks we used to run and have to adjust their mindset about how the car will handle”.
“The laps around the PE Oval should be good fun as well because Leeroy is millimeter perfect in his cornering. The Longmore Forest stages are very similar in nature to those on the Sasol Rally, just not as rough so there shouldn’t be any major problems there”, Dearlove said.
On his driver’s mid-term report card after four of the eight rounds making up the Sasol Rally Championship, Dearlove said: “He’s a natural talent. Even though we did very few stages in Natal, I was immediately comfortable in the car. The Sasol Rally was the big breakthrough for us in terms of Leeroy fully committing to my route notes. I can now deliver all the information instead of limiting the instructions I give him and if he has a blind crest and I say keep left, he listens without hesitation. The best is still to come”.
The RacePrep Team has been hard at work on their IMPERIAL Toyota RunX during the six week break. The shock absorbers have been extensively rebuilt with the help of Toyota Motorsport, in addition to a thorough revamp of the suspension settings to dial out the understeer that has plagued Poulter all season.
“The biggest mid-season development is the new engine Hennie van der Linde built for us, We expect great things from it”, said IMPERIAL Toyota Team Principal Rod Hering. “Toyota Motorsport’s help with the shock absorbers is going to make a huge difference. We have a good car for the rest of the year, so we’re quietly confident going forward”, Hering concluded.
The 11-stage Volkswagen Rally starts in Uitenhage at 12h30, heading straight to the Longmore Forest for three stages which will be repeated on Saturday morning. The PE Oval is also run twice, with a short tarmac stage in Uitenhage preceding the Scribante track stage, which is set to run under floodlights for the first time. The rally ends at King’s Beach in Port Elizabeth on Saturday afternoon.
– Credit: Supplied.