A dominant performance has seen Ben Calder and Steve Glenney sweep the stages on Saturday to win the Shannons Adelaide Rally Modern Competition section, while Matt Selley and Hayden Mckendrick scored in Classic Competition.
Tim Sinclair and Karl Radziszewski (BMW M3) took out the Challenge Modern class while Challenge Classic came right down to the wire: Karl Von Sanden and Alexander Visintin (Porsche 944) holding on to win their class after leading by just five seconds going into the final stage – winning their class by just 1.9 seconds after more than an hour of competitive rallying.
Steven Mahalo and Shane Wood (BMW M3) won the Regularity competition.
Both Modern Competition and Classic winning combinations shared similar stories throughout their Rally journey – close battles with rivals in the first two days turning into healthy leads when their closest competitors struck issues.
For Calder and Glenney, outlasting the quick duo of Tim Ramages and Lisi Phillips on Friday was enough to hand them a comfortable lead when the latter withdrew engine issues.
“It was a very long four days and there were some challenges early on,” Calder said.
“We had a ball all weekend and we look forward to coming back next year.”
“It was a fantastic event and these roads are great to drive on. Ben drove brilliantly and is getting better and better every time so we fought hard,” co-driver Glenney added.
Photo: Matt Talbot
“We minimised the time lost when we lost boost on one stage and Ben did a good job to keep going.”
Selley and Mckendrick trailed in the Classic Competition early in the rally however also benefited when their nearest rivals, the Streckesen’s Porsche 944, struck Turbo issues and unfortunately retired.
They also survived a wild spin on Castambul, narrowly missing both the barrier and a rock wall by inches before regrouping and carrying on.
The challenge for both combinations from there was to maintain their margins throughout nine challenging hills stages on Saturday – and the final sprint around Victoria Park.
Three manufacturers filled the top three in Modern Competition, Richard Lovell and Bernie Webb finishing second in their Subaru Impreza WRX STi.
They were under pressure until the very final stage of rally to decide the final step on the podium; the BMW E46 M3 of Martin Farkas and Tristan Catford less than 20 seconds behind at the end of the event.
Photo: Matt Talbot
Competition Classic saw Roger Patterson and Richard Geue take their Porsche 911 RS home to second place while Roger Lomman and Annie Bainbridge grabbed third in their Datsun 240z.
Sinclair and Radziszewski took a comfortable victory in Challenge Modern, with Tony Zytveld and Colin Zytveld second in a Nissan 200SX.
Gregory Bass and Peter Cooke (Subaru WRX) finished third.
The tight competition in Challenge Classic was a feature throughout the rally, Von Sanden and Visintin starting the day with a 22-second lead that gradually got whittled down across early stages through Mount Lofty, Iron Bank and Stirling.
By the time they got to Basket Range it was less than 10 seconds and the margin never got to double figures for the remainder of the day.
Von Sanden led Feggans by five seconds heading into the final sprint at Victoria Park and lost a further 3 seconds on the stage – winning the rally by just 1.9 seconds.
Daniel Beck and Benjamin Gillespie finished third aboard their Mazda RX2.
Photo: Matt Talbot
The regularity victory by Mahlo / Wood came over the Corolla of Graham Modra and Tony Trewren and the Mazda MX5 of Gerry Bashford and Peter Bell.
Full results from the Shannons Adelaide Rally can be found at rallyresults.com.au or the Adelaide Motorsport Festival website.
WINNERS LIST:
Competition Modern:
1. Ben Calder / Steve Glenney
2. Richard Lovell / Bernie Webb
3. Martin Farkas / Tristan Catford
Competition Classic:
1. Matt Selley / Hamish Mckendrick
2. Roger Patterson / Richard Geue
3. Roger Lomman / Annie Bainbridge
Challenge Modern:
1. Tim Sinclair / Karl Radziszwski
2. Tony Zytveld / Colin Zytveld
3. Gregor Bass / Peter Cooke
Challenge Classic
1. Karl Von Sanden / Alexander Visintin
2. Hugh Feggans / Jim Callahan
3. Daniel Beck / Benjamin Gillespie
Regularity
1. Steven Mahlo / Shane Wood
2. Gerry Bashford / Peter Bell
3. Graham Modra / Tony Trewren
