Competition Modern
The battle in the Competition Modern wasn’t over until the final stage was done with Peter Rullo and James Marquet in a Porsche 996 Turbo protecting their lead of 1:14 minutes, while Will White and co-driver Matt Thompson in their 2006 Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 9 did everything they could to catch them.
Despite White/Thompson putting the pedal to the metal winning the first five of the day’s six stages and second in the last stage to close the gap to 51 seconds, it wasn’t enough to beat Rullo/Marquet who played a strategic game and protected their position to finish on the top in their maiden victory.
No longer the bridesmaids, ten-year Targa West veterans Rullo/Marquet, were fighting nerves during the day and drove at a steady pace, which paid dividends.
“This has been ten years in the making and I couldn’t be happier, I’m ecstatic!” said Rullo, who celebrated Ricciardo-style with a ‘shoey’ on the podium after the champagne spray.
“I’d like to thank Ross and Jan Tapper and the organisers, all the volunteers, my fellow competitors for keeping me honest, Team DDTB, Peter Major for leasing me his winning car, my family, my co-driver Jimmy and everyone who’s helped us over the past ten years,” said the Gooseberry Hill resident.
Grappling the bittersweet feeling of wanting the win yet proud with second place, White said he did everything he could to try and claw back the lead.
“It’s one of those things – we lost 50 seconds on the second day when we blew an intercooler hose and I got some speed penalties which put us behind, and we put up a good fight but just couldn’t get there - credit to the Porsche, it’s a very quick car,” White from Dardanup said.
“The Mitsubishi has done us proud, I’m stoked, it’s been a fun event and all possible thanks to my sponsors Store Local, Tyre Power Bunbury and High Speed Engineering. I’ll be back next year,” White said.
Finishing in third place was Mark Greenham and co-driver Stephanie Esterbauer in their 2006 Mitsubishi Evo 9, 2:58 minutes behind White/Thompson and 3:48 minutes behind winners Rullo/Marquet.
Greenham/Esterbauer endured losing turbo early on in Day 1, struggling and unable to push, dropping time. After the turbo was replaced on Thursday, the duo put in consistent good performances to take the final step on the podium.
“I’m stoked and given the issues we started with, it’s a brilliant result,” said Greenham from High Wycombe.
“We started today with big gap on either side of us, so there was no point pushing or doing anything crazy. Finishing third is amazing and a massive thanks to Race Torque and to my co-driver Steph.”
Not having the luxury of big gaps either side of them, John O’Dowd and last year’s Targa West champion co-driver Ben Searcy had three competitors within 15 seconds behind them at the start of Leg 3. The gap had closed to just 1 second at the start of the City of Perth stages as Brendan Templeman and Peter Howlett in their a 2003 Mitsubishi Evo 8 pushed to catch them.
O’Dowd/Searcy did what they had to do to maintain their position and drove like the clappers in the last three stages to finish the event in fourth, 7 seconds ahead of Templeman/Howlett, and 5:12 minutes behind the winners.
The crowd favourite on the city stages was the impossible-to-ignore 2007 Chevrolet Corvette of Chris Caruso and co-driver Alex White who put on a show with plenty of tyre screeching and sideways cornering.
Rookies Mark Cates and co-driver Pete Davies who suffered some mishaps in what was their only second rally ever (the duo competed in Targa South West in May) had nothing to lose after sliding down the rankings yesterday due to two missed stages because of a burnt out $1.50 fuse. Cates/Davies gave it everything in a bid and notch up a stage win. It’ll have to be added to their goals for 2019 because their best result was a second fastest time on SS28 just three seconds off the pace.
“I’ve had an absolute ball and will be doing a whole lot more rallying in the future,” said Cates. That’s a good thing because he bought Peter Rullo’s 2012 Nissan GTR that finished second last year and has proven he has the pace to keep up. |
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