Christchurch’s Dylan Thomson heads to the final round of the New Zealand Rally Championship, the Waitomo Rally, looking for a result that will secure him third in the championship.
In what has been his first season in a four-wheel drive car, Thomson aimed to learn across the season, looking to complete every rally. His consistency and increasing speed saw him move into third in the championship after the fourth round, Rally Canterbury, then maintain the position through round five.
The final round has seen several new supporters join the team, notably the good sports at Stadium Cars and the team at Ingham Hyundai Hamilton, who along with the multiple partners that have sponsored the Specialised Auto Services Subaru Impreza STi have made the final round, and the opportunity to secure a podium championship result, a possibility.
Thomson holds a 21-point margin over fourth place and with 30 points the maximum available, knows that realistically a clean run should see him bag the position. However for co-driver Amy Hudson, there is only a six point gap back to fourth place in the co-drivers standings, leaving the pair with a decision to make as to how they will attack the event.
“We’ve probably never had so many people come on board for one event to get us to the final round, which is humbling and massively appreciated, so we have to make sure we repay them and secure this third in the championship,” says Thomson.
“Obviously we’ve got a couple of different situations to balance, I’ve more or less got to finish to take third but Amy equally deserves third in the championship, which means we’ll need to push on a bit. We’ll have to play it by ear a bit on the day and just do what we’ve done all season.”
The 2019 Handy Rentals Waitomo Rally starts from Piopio at 7:25am, with six mammoth special stages totalling 198.04km of special stages in the Waikato region, before the rally finishes at Southwell School in Hamilton from 5pm.
SUBSCRIBE BELOW TO READ THE FULL STORY
