Tony Sullens and Julia Barkley have clinched their second podium this season, placing third at the Scouts Rally SA, closely followed by team mates Adrian Coppin and Tim Batten in fourth. Held in South Australia’s Barossa Valley, the rally took place across three intensive days of competition, with circumstances bringing out the best in both team rivalry and mateship.
Heading into Heat 3, Coppin and Batten led Sullens and Barkley after a successful Heat 2 campaign on Saturday and were looking for a repeat to secure their potential third podium for the year. Sullens, hungrier than ever after his recent podium at the International Rally of Queensland, was eager to settle the score, and opened the day on fire, taking time from Coppin in both morning stages.
“We went really hard in the first two stages today, and it paid off. The car is feeling better than yesterday, and we’re more familiar with the stages now,” said Sullens.
For Coppin, the morning left much to be desired, collecting a few experience points along the way. “This morning has been probably the worst we’ve had all year. In the Dewells stage I dipped a wheel too deep into a puddle and we took on water through the intake, which left me driving on two cylinders. I probably tried too hard to make up for the in the next stage and it didn’t go to plan. 700-metres in, I out-braked myself, over-corrected and unfortunately went off the road, right where there was a rocky creek. It was a big hit, we crashed over a couple of walls and ended up down in a ditch, straddling the causeway.”
After returning Coppin’s car to the service park, an all-in group effort from both teams repaired the Citroen DS3, allowing Coppin to return to competition, albeit a little too late. Coppin was unable to re-join in time to contest the remaining forest stages of the afternoon, leaving his final dash to be the super special stage in Gawler.
In a twist of fate, Sullens and Barkley were not to come through the day unscathed either, suffering their own set of issues in the afternoon stages which threatened what was looking to be a secure podium.
“Shire stages were going well, and then second one, for some reason, the gearbox didn’t like changing gears, and we had to do the whole stage in third. We couldn’t fix it, and had to drive the long transport back to service stuck in gear,” said Barkley.
“We did the whole stage on the limiter pretty much and managed to make it back with a few minutes worth of penalties. There’s no damage, and it’s a very simple fix. A circlip in the gearbox popped off, which is not uncommon in rallying, and very easily done with the way we drive these cars around,” said Sullens.
Both cars made it to the final Super Special stage at the Gawler Showground to battle it out for the last time, in front of a record-crowd. With Coppin taking it tentatively given the recent repairs on his DS3, and Sullens having to contest in second gear only, both saw the final stage as a more of a celebratory finish lap than a competitive stage.
“We had to do the last stage in second, but, we got to the finish! I’m ecstatic, this weekend has been really up and down, mostly down really, and then it’s finished on a high, so we’re really happy, and it feels great to get on the podium again,” said Barkley.
“We couldn’t have asked for a better result from the weekend. No damage, just one simple fix. We’ll change the oil, give it a wash and it will be right for Rally Australia. They’re unbreakable that car and I’m really finding my groove with it. I can’t wait for Rally Australia,” said Sullens.
“Have we got a story to tell! This weekend has been amazing, good and bad. We came across the accident with Jack’s car on fire in the middle of the road, thankfully they are OK. We went to re-join the afternoon, and then the organizers stopped us as it was getting too dark. Then this morning we were doing well, maybe a bit over exuberant perhaps, and had a big off. The guys did a mammoth job to get us out on the stages again, only to have them cancelled. And saying that as well, Tony then had his gearbox issue too; there’s just been so much going on,” said Batten.
“We finished fourth overall, and it was so close in the end, with Tony getting us by only one point. Unfortunately we couldn’t re-join in the forest where we really wanted to crawl back time, but we’re happy for Tony and all in all, a good result. To its credit, the Citroen DS3 has held up really well out of the beating it took this morning. Once we get back to the workshop we’ll pull it apart and have a closer look, but I am very confident it will be OK and we’ll be back at Rally Australia," said Coppin.
The penultimate round of the 2014 Australian Rally Championship is the biggest event of the year, matching drivers against the world’s best at Rally Australia in Coffs Harbour, for Round 10 of the World Rally Championship.
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