Faber I.T. Rally Team

Robertstown Wildcat Diesel Walky 100 2009

The Robertstown Rally has always been a tough event for our team. Last year seemed like a bit of a disaster coming home in 23rd position and the year before we were forced to retire from the event after puncturing our fuel tank in the Subaru RX Turbo after one big jump at One Big Hill. I had no real expectation for the event other than to drive like mad and see where we ended up.

With my usual navigators being unavailable for the event I signed up club member David Marriner. Dave hasn't got too much experience in the silly seat but with plenty of driving experience I knew he would do a solid job. Having ridden with Rob Burrows in the RX Turbo at last years event I knew I was in good hands.

We did the recce the weekend before the event. I normally like to recce as close to the event as possible but with little leave time owing at work I decided not to take a day off to do the recce on the Friday. Recce went well, with only a couple of boggy patches which is totally different than the reports we were getting on Friday night that lots of crews had gotten into trouble that day with the massive amount of rain having fallen.

I normally like to recce as close to the event as possible but with work constraints the Friday session wasn’t to be. So the Saturday beforehand saw us see a slightly different surface with a couple of boggy patches, but by Friday it had turned into a different storey with crews getting into a bit of trouble with the massive amounts of rain having fallen throughout the week.

Departing from Adelaide on Saturday morning makes for an early start, but with a rough nights sleep from being all excited about our first major gravel event for the season it’s no problem. It’s lucky that I have good mates to help out with servicing, with Joe taking care of getting my car to Robertstown and the boys from Subareck always seem to get the right real estate at Service Park. It’s great to buddy up, so that you can share knowledge a few laughs and some competitive spirit.

One of the best stages in Australian rallying was first up. The mighty One Big Hill is a favorite with the drivers and spectators alike but there was a bit of a twist for 2009. About half way into the stage there was a jump not unlike a b.m.x. jump that had come out of no where. Not sure if the farmer nearby had made it for a good laugh but it was sure to provide some excitement for our three runs over it. It was a real kicker and impossible to take at speed. In recce we were getting the Adventra airborne at about 40km/h so had no idea how to attack it. I thought it could easily cause some rally ending damage so we backed off a fair bit over it and got through there safely each time. The stage starts out really open and flowing on great cresty council roads then tightens to some tricky scrubby tracks through creek crossings and then opens out to the triple jumps at the end of the stage for what must be the best spectator point in South Australia. I had made the decision to give it everything we had on this first stage. We set a pretty reasonable time which was good for the confidence and Dave was handling the pace well.

Stage 2 Hallelujah Hills is just a cracker. Really short but great council roads so you can just get in there and attack. Stage 3 had been shortened a lot. Normally it is about 20kms long but due to the bad weather had been shortened down to well under half, which was disappointing. The bits that were left are some of the hardest on the car for the season. Lots of rutted creek crossings that you drop into and absolutely load up the suspension and then you jump straight out the other side. It's hard work but certainly rewarding to get through there without damaging the car and knowing the work we have been doing on the car makes it strong enough to stand up to it.

After SS3 we headed back to the oval at Robertstown for the first service. Our intercooler spray pump had failed on SS2 so it was a good chance to disconnect it all and remove the 20L of water "ballast". The next group of three stages was a repeat of the first three and we were settling into a good rhythm with Dave improving his timing as we went. No major dramas in those stages and we brought the car back to the second service without any real work required to do.

We fitted up the new light pods that Joe has been building up for us. They house 4 huge Narva lights with HID inserts. One of the globes wasn't working when we put the pods on so we moved that globe so we at least had two good lights shooting straight down the middle of the road.

First up was the third and final run over One Big Hill. The sun was starting to set so it was handy to have the good lights on the car in the scrubby sections and had some fun backing the car in at the spectator point and throwing a bit of mud around the place. Next stage was a slightly shorter version of Who's Julia which suited us pretty well anyway. It included all the council road sections but missed the scrubby bit at the end which didn't bother me in the slightest. We had a good run through but had since blown another of the lights so were down to one in the middle and one outer which was making it a little hard to pick up the fast left hand corners. The next night stage of Roast Lite and the dramas continued with us falling off the notes for about the last 3km. It was pretty disappointing but that's just the way it goes with a new pairing in the car, both driver and navigator trying to adjust to each others style. We dropped about 30 seconds because of the wrong notes and were now second in our class by about 60 seconds. Back to Robertstown for the final service and top up of fuel and back out to the two night stages of Who’s Julia and Roast Lite. We had heard leaving service that the car leading our class had lost second gear but with only two stages remaining and fairly short and fast ones at that we decided to have one last push to try and regain the class lead.

We roll up to the start line on Who’s Julia. It’s a pretty magic stage with fast sweeping corners that you can really get some attitude on the car in and for the first few kilometers plenty of runoff along the edges of the road to the fence line. With the red mist now firmly in place we got a great start but our chase for that class win was pretty much lost in the second corner. It’s a nice sweeping cambered corner, what we would call a 5Right, and we went in there way to fast. I got the car turned in and stayed on the gas but just couldn’t keep the back of the car on the road and so with the rear down the grassy verge and the middle of the car scraping down the edge of the road with the front wheels off the ground (as the camber was that steep) we could do nothing but wait for it to come to pretty much a stop and luckily could then drive it off the mound and get going again. After that one we thought it was best to get to the finish so we drove accordingly. Roast Lite went without and problems in the notes and was a great way to finish the event. Dave should be really proud with how he went and how much he improved throughout the event. Great job mate.

Heading back into the finish and we hear the news that someone had been stealing equipment from service park and that someone from the rally had been beaten up trying to stop them. The news only got worse once we realized the injured person was Des Collins. I know I felt totally helpless that there was nothing we could do but wait for the police and let them go about their job. Most of the gear was recovered which is great news as most of it was from the Subareck team. A big thank you to Des for trying to stop the crooks. It wasn’t his gear being pinched so it takes a brave man to go after them.
A huge thank you to Andrew Challen and Kimberly Franklin for their awesome efforts in organizing the event and the last minute changes with the weather which I am sure is no easy task. Also huge thanks to the event committee and all the volunteers and officials that make Robertstown such a wonderful event.

Our SARC campaign continues at Sprint Auto Parts Rally SA at the end of this month with Andrew Challen back in the navigator’s seat, we look forward to continuing to improve our performance and go out and have some fun!.

Andrew Gooley
SARC Car 555