THE CALEDON WAR - and there is a FORD as well!
author: Leon Botha
|
|
Fernando Rueda - one of the 'local drivers' in a Toyota S2000
|
It's Route Note time again! Today hopefully the notes will be send to competitors in the Cape and Natal and the rest will be able to collect from our offices in Pretoria from 08h30 tomorrow morning.
Notes can also be collected by arrangement from the Rallystar track on Saturday during the HiQ RallyStar Sprint.
Next week and Friday - from the very first stage the war between Volkswagen and Toyota will without a doubt be on!
At the time of writing this article Conrad Rautenbach's entry is in a Ford Fiesta S2000 and that will boost the Capetonian crowds interest - Caledon or not!
It makes the demise of the Basil Read bizzhub Ford Fiesta of Wilken an even bigger pity as that would now have really injected some serious petrol into many fan's motorsport Aortas!
Can you imagine this already over kill S2000 situation with two Ford's trying to swat the Polo and Auris onslaught?
Rautenbach can drive a left-hand-drive car and he will unlike Charl not take it easy to get used to the car. Hergen and company can therefore expect some serious negotiation for the lead from the word go!
But …one would have to be an idiot to underestimate the striking power of the Fekken/Kuun/Habig combination from the Volkswagen camp or to think that the Toyotas can not keep up - never mind keep up - beat most things that come their way!
The Cape is not Natal and for that matter Natal is like nothing else. There you can get bitten for being cheeky - where the Cape at least shows a bit more sympathy for small mistakes.
Now before you think we are going to participate in sissy country - the Cape has a nasty habit to reel you in, reel you in, reel you in and then kick your ass to kingdom come!
The approach speeds are mostly high to more difficult corners and one small miscalculation can lead you to the road of no return!
The less experienced drivers will in many cases swear at their inability to brake on the right spots - mostly because you approach everything at the bloody speed of sound - then when they actually get the balls to overrule commonsense - that is where the panel-beating fun begins.
Now before we even go there - allow this poor bald-headed boepie with a fair amount of interest in and love for the sport - to beg of you to keep every car going - we will need them for the rest of the year.
Many years ago while involved in the mother's mother of dices with a well-known driver he came to me on the second day to say that as I will not be able to make up the deficit I incurred when I had to stop for cattle and lost almost a minute - if we could not tone the pace down a bit?
As in my case - I am sure it will not help to ask you to take it easy?
So - seeing that I got the adrenaline started a week before the rally and that no one will now take it easy - let us - the fans start planning our trips!
Suntan lotion - Rallystar caps - cameras - booking in and around Caledon - overdrafts on the petrol card - sandwiches (not the liquid type) and a pair of clean underpants just in case you stand on the wrong side of the corner to try and take a Rallystar winning picture - which incidentally we will pay R500 for! Not a picture of the onderbroek - a picture of the car that caused the onderbroek to be replaceble!
The road works between Caledon and the Cape is not bad anymore - but if you have to drive from Gauteng or so to the Cape - please limit your night driving and take extra care. Remember go through fences, go down a mountain but don't have a head-on!
|
|
