After a massive season that has seen the DSA Rally team compete in seven rallies, the team are now heading to Launceston for the final state championship round for 2009. The Southern Cross TV Mountain Stages Rally will start from the Archers Manor-Newnham at 8.00am on Saturday (Oct 3) and with nearly 30 of the states best teams out to finish the season on a high, action is guaranteed.
Starting fifth on the road, Mark Butcher and his co-driver James Heinrich hope that they can deliver a good result after showing some good potential in recent events only to have some minor issues set the team back.
“2009 has been an awesome year for me and the team and we have really got the most of our Subaru WRX that is now nine years old! We have won some stages and also were running 2nd outright in the Tasmanian Championship earlier this year. With the latest improvements on the car we really hope to squeeze a bit more and finish on the podium this weekend.
"We are up against some hardcore competition including current state champion Lynn Rattray, Nathan Reeves from Melbourne, Craig Brooks in his ex-Cody Crocker Subaru who is returning from a big crash earlier in the year and another big name of rallying – Les Walkden who is running a brand new Subaru that Cody Crocker ran in the WRC rally only a month ago. With this sort of field – we are going to have to pull out all stops to even make the top 3 – but we will and see how we go!†said driver Butcher.
The all black DSA Subaru only required some basic maintenance and a new steering rack after the last event which has meant the team could catch up on work and sleep.
“We have some great support from sponsors but we are entirely self financed and do all the work on the car ourselves – so it’s a major effort especially seeing we are about do our 4th event in eight weeks. We have rebuilt the entire car including having the engine out twice, respray of inside and out as well as plenty of other upgrades and repairs.
"Our aim has been to show that we can run a team on a tight budget, finish events and get good results with this car to hopefully attract some backing for the 2010 Australian Rally Championship. We are confident that we will be competing in at least 3 of these rounds next year but with some additional support we believe we can do the entire series and hopefully achieve an outright result†said Butcher.
The team have a new promotional package including a video available that includes TV interviews with Butcher at events. This is available by contacting Mark or Amy at Driver Skills Australia on 1300 880 956 or visit www.driverskillsaustralia.com for more information on the team.
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