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INTEGRALLY MOTORSPORT JAMES HANCOCK / STEVE SCHWARTZ www.oocities.org/hondaintegrarally RALLY REPORT- GREG TODD MEMORIAL RALLY ROUND TWO- Winger Subaru Top Half Rally Series We’ve now completed round two of the Winger Subaru Top Half Rally Series, The Greg Todd Memorial Rally was held on the weekend of the 14th /15th June 2003.The Auckland Car Club event attracted about 75 starters and 55 finishers. The Greg Todd Memorial rally is based in the Maramarua forest, not my favorite place for rallying but then I don’t have much experience there and the roads are not what you would call forgiving. The threat of wet weather meant that the clay surface would offer very little grip if it rained. The big thing about the Maramarua forest (for us) is that in places it’s rutted and bumpy, our lightweight car is not really suitable for such roads. We started with a seeding of 28th and set out to gain class points, we were confident of a reasonable finish but knew that we could not get close to Grant Liston who drives a 1600cc CRX, good car and a good driver with years of experience, We drove to finish second in class and that is eventually what we achieved. Stages One and Two (ARANUI) were rough and bumpy in places with a fast finish over yumps (jumps) but we didn’t push too hard for fear of breaking the car. Stages Three, Four, Five and six, used two roads through forest headquaters which were medium speed roads with changeable surfaces, the stages were different every time we ran through them, the ruts were more defined and the gravel had been cleared by the other cars. We did a lot better on these last two stages than we did on the Aranui stage. We serviced once at lunchtime, not much to do to the car except bolt tyres on and refuel, these little Hondas are so reliable! The afternoon stages were a carbon copy of the morning stages, but our times were very close, often slightly slower than the morning stages. ARANUI was r o u g h ! It shook the car really badly, we got a good time but the shaking and banging took it’s toll. On stage 9 the VTEC controller ( an electric switch in the car that changes the profile of the camshaft) decided to work now and then, then, not at all, the last three stages we drove without any V.T.E.C., the car had significantly less power and was flat after about 5,000 rpm. Our stage times suffered, then the intercom stopped temporarily and to make matters worse my harness unlatched it’s self. That’s scary, I think I’ll be changing to camlock type harnesses. I wasn’t prepared to drive on without them secured so I slowed down whilst Steve managed to do them back up for me , we lost a lot of time.If that wasn’t bad enough the windscreen started to fog in the rain, our twin 12V Hairdryers (anything to save weight!) couldn’t handle the pace, so we reverted to the old faithful anti-fog treatment. It rained for the last two stages and this made the roads pretty slippy in places, the car handled pretty well really, as long as it wasn’t too bumpy, The car seems to perform well on smooth roads and tarmac but in the forest the front wheels leave the ground too often which can turn long undulating corners into a Hollywood filmset. In reflection it was a day of sensible driving, we didn’t want to break the car, we didn’t want to go off and we didn’t want to drive slowly. We achieved 2nd in class and were the 5th 2wd home. The Integra is still quite close to standard configuration in almost every department and being 17 years old I reckon she did OK. Interesting that the only parts of this car that have failed or broken have been parts not manufactured by Honda, the rest of the car is mechanically reliable but certainly not top shelf performance items. We still hold a 15 point in our class but unless we can make the car accelerate faster and stop faster this lead will diminish. Thanks must go to Jamie Fowler and Pete Antwiss for servicing, Strong for Honda, Onlinemotorsport.net and Wally Elders Service Station. I will be posting photo’s on our web site and HYPERLINK "http://www.onlinemotorsport.net" www.onlinemotorsport.net when they arrive. Our next event is the Rotorua International, 12th / 13th July 2003. |
