At the season opening National Capital Rally, Michael Boaden admitted he was down beat. Not only was he still recovering from a back injury, he’d also just blown the turbo-charged motor he’d installed into his Volkswagen Polo.
“I was pretty disappointed after Canberra, things just didn’t go our way. So our focus in Queensland was really just to get time in the car,” explained Michael.
So having missed the second Round in Western Australia, and focusing all his efforts on developing a brand new two-litre, normally-aspirated engine, Boaden arrived in Queensland cautious, but quietly confident.
In the end the brother and sister combination of Boaden and Helen Cheers not only made it to the finish, completing their objective they’d set themselves at the start of the rally, they also claimed fourth outright.
“To get to the end of the event in Queensland and finish every stage has made me very happy. I’m incredibly happy! I feel like I’ve got the rally bug back again and that makes me feel good.”
With reliability paramount Boaden confirmed that the engine in his Polo was running on a lower spec tune to ensure it reached the finish line in tact. “We ran the test engine in Queensland with a relatively low rev limit, it was only 6,500rpm where as the proper race engine will be more like 7,500rpm,” he said.
The family run team from Wauchope has a higher spec race engine ready to be fitted to the Polo for the next Round in South Australia, now confident that they have proven its reliability in Queensland.
“If we can get the new motor up and running I think it’ll be terrific. It’ll probably make about 15 to 18 kilometres an hour difference in the fast stuff. We were clocked at about 170km/h during the Power Stage, so that’s a fairly good difference.”
“Up around the 185km/h mark would get us more on level pegging’s with Scott Pedder. That’s the outright speed we believe Scott’s Renault was achieving during the (ARMOR ALL) Power Stage in Queensland,” Michael added.
With his confidence back Boaden said the team will pull out all the stops to make sure their VW is in perfect shape for when it attacks the ultra-fast roads at Scouts Rally SA.
“We’ll pull the car apart, even the gearbox, between now and South Australia just to make 100% sure everything is perfect. It’s been a long while since I’ve felt this positive about everything, and I don’t want that feeling to end anytime soon!”
SUBSCRIBE BELOW TO READ THE FULL STORY
