Today's Shakedown for this weekend's Toyota Kluger Rally of South Australia didn't go according to plan for Pirtek Ford Rally Team's Darren Windus. His Fiesta suffered a broken gearbox just two laps into the Shakedown stage, and was loaded onto a trailer before being taken away for repairs.
There is precious little time for the Ford mechanics to repair the gearbox, with tonight's Super Special to get underway at 6.40pm.
Spencer Lowndes' team are also under the pump, as they seek out a replacement for their in-car fire extinguisher which was accidentally triggered by event officials during scrutineering. A replacement is proving difficult to find, and this could mean a non-start for the privateer Mitsubishi team.
Toyota duo Neal Bates and Simon Evans, together with Subaru privateer, Dean Herridge, were all equal fastest today. Herridge, who arrived in Adelaide on Wednesday directly from China where he and co-driver Bill Hayes finished second in the Chinese National Rally Championship round, was feeling a little tired, but that didn't affect his performance today.
Brendan Reeves, Michael Guest and Darren Windus finished equal fourth, only two seconds behind the pace setters, with Spencer Lowndes, Steve Glenney, Declan Dwyer, and young Molly Taylor rounding out the top ten.
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