On March 18th and 19th the town of Le Touquet, situated in the north of France, served as headquarters for the 13th edition of the Rallye Historique Le Touquet for classic rally cars. Not less than 20 teams had registered for this event which is 576 km long and consists of 273 km special stages.
Silver Arrows was present with driver Bart Vanhaverbeke and co-driver brother Frits Vanhaverbeke. Their ambition was to do better than last year when the team had to retire on the first day as a result of a mechanical failure.
On Friday’s program were two sections of three stages separated by a super special on the dam of Le Touquet. With a sixth and two fifth places in the first three stages the Silver Arrows team completed the first section in fourth place at 1min 39s from leader Laurent Bayard with a Porsche 911 Carrera SC.
Bart Vanhaverbeke explains: “We started off with the wrong tire choice as we left the service park on intermediate tyres. However, just before the start of the first special stage it started raining very hard. Moreover, the roads were full of mud so you could hardly see their edges. We therefore agreed to not take any unnecessary risks and take it easy.”
In the second section the team set a fifth, seventh, fourth and a third time and ended the first day in a strong fourth place 3m 52.7 s behind leader Laurant Bayard and only 35s behind Jean-Pierre Levasseur in third place. Bart Vanhaverbeke explains: “In the final stages of the day we attacked, bringing us closer to the leaders. We had a bit of luck at the end of the sixth special stage when we noticed we had a flat tire. We could however finish the stage and change the tyre afterwards without any time loss or penalties.”
For the second day another five stages were scheduled. Meanwhile, the rain clouds had disappeared and a beautiful sun had started shining on the roads around Le Touquet. During the ninth stage Christophe Terriou, at that moment second in the standings, went off road with his Porsche and hit a tree forcing him to retire. As a result Bart and Frits Vanhaverbeke moved up to third place. Their main competitor and winner of the 2009 edition of the event Chistophe Regnier also had to retire with a mechanical problem in the ninth stage. This meant that the team now had a comfortable lead of 2m 32s to their closest rival. The next stages were completed without taking any risks in order to secure their third place. The team even managed to increase its lead on the other competitors.
The first podium of the season was a fact and proved to be a very good achievement. Bart Vanhaverbeke explains: “Winner Laurent Bayard is a local and very experienced. He recently won the Routes du Nord Rally in the modern category. Second placed Jean-Pierre Levasseur has been driving historic rallies for many years and knows his Porsche inside out. With these competitors in mind we are very happy with our third place.”
– Credit: Silver Arrows.