We were back at Fulbeck airfield on Sunday 1^st August for the Jane Cowling Memorial Phoenix Stages. We were ready to attack our previous times and hopefully improve on our 4^th in class finish from the last time we visited this fantastic venue. Could we get that 3^rd in class trophy?

Our weekend started on Saturday afternoon, as we made the two hour journey the day before and camped over. It saves the early wake up call and helps make rally day a less tiring experience. We arrived for 2pm, set up camp and gave the Rover a spanner check. As the evening approached, other members of ‘our team’ arrived and a good natter was had around the cars.

Morning arrived and we were all keen to get going, although Roger was a little too keen, waking the camp at 5am with the sound of hammering! Nothing unusual there though.

As usual, we started stage one with some caution, until we got used to how slippery the surface was. It was raining and there was mud everywhere, which made for some very fun driving. We managed a good clean run though, and on returning to service, we were hearing of several of our friends having hit bails due to how bad it was. We were happy with our run.

Stage two we did more of the same, although a little quicker, improving our time against our previous run. We did clip a bail, meaning Sam had to wait for the door to be bent back into shape before she could get out of the car. We had a quick check of the results to find we were currently 3^rd in our class, which came as a nice surprise.

By stage three, the day was starting to dry out although the threat of rain still lingered in the distance. This made the surface even more slippery than earlier, resulting in a collision with a bail half way round. We lost about 10 seconds but we were able to carry on. It cost us a drop to 4^th in class allowing Brett Murray to move up. Back at service, Steve was able to pull the metal work out making us look a little more presentable. We adjusted our tyre pressures too, in the hope that it would offer us more grip.

We headed out on stage four and had a much improved run, with better grip. We couldn’t quite get that 3^rd in class position back though, but we were now only 1 second behind Brett overall.

Stages five and six were also good clean runs. Some discussion was had about changing our tyre choice, but after stage five we felt like we were in a good rhythm and decided not to upset that. Things were going well, we took back 3^rd in class, and we seem to have the car set up perfectly for the conditions.

I’m aware that this might be a little repetitive for a blog post, but stages seven and eight were another two clean runs. The battle for 3^rd in our class was close all day, with only a few seconds between us and Brett Murray. Overall, we were only 9 seconds faster than Brett. In fact Brett was 2 seconds faster than us on stage seven and we both had the same time on stage eight! I don't think it could have been a closer race for third place.

It’s been a long time coming, but finally we managed to win a trophy!

Thoughts now turn to how we can be quicker, and looking back on the day we should have softened our suspension and moved to slick tyres part way through the day. Mechanically, our next step is to swap the cylinder head with one from the 1.8 MG ZR160 VVC. This requires some machine shop work to mate it up to the 1.4 K-Series, but should be a worthwhile investment.

Our next event is the AGBO Rally at Western Park on the 26^th September. Although, it isn’t a Championship event, it is local for us and a venue we have previously competed at, albeit in the Escort.