The first Targa rally of the year saw us back at MoD Woodbridge, but this time in much better weather than previously with a warm sunny day.
Seeded at Car 6 & 106 – i though I would be doing well to even match the seeding given the strength of the entry list with 75 odd entries.
The first set of tests saw me driving first, which lead to a few moments learning where the tests went, but they all flowed well and were a good test of both driver and nav. Given the amount of gravel that was used I was pleased to be scrubbing out old knobblies rather than road tyres for once. After swapping seats we (Suze driving) had a great fun including a second fastest test time which was very pleasing.
The second set of tests went a lot better for me driving, with us knowing the venue and tests, we pushed on and apart from a cone penalty it went well, with the car running well. I managed to set one 2nd fastest test time and if you discount the cone penalty (if only I could!) one test fastest time too.
The second batch of tests started well for Suze driving, but then front tyres let go firstly in terms of grip and then holding air ability and we ended up losing a load of time due to this L
After lunch it was a move away from the gravely areas to the ‘Haz’ area of the airfield, which was fortunate as we only had v well worn Yoko A048R’s left to use up now. These went well and this continued during the third set of tests. However as we and many others were beating the bogey times, it meant there was little be made up on the results.
The last set of tests, saw the tyres starting to go off for Suze (driving first in the afternoon) which cost us some time. A quick swapping of the tyres front to rear before my final set of tests, with the hope the that the fronts would last all of the final tests, and that the rears (now very worn) would provide enough grip. The last set of tests, were tightened up a bit, but still saw us beating the bogey on all of them, apart from when I hit yet another cone L These last few sets were great fun, with some very fast flowing tests and a slight lack of rear end grip making the car very tail happy. However it nearly all ended in disaster on the last test when I selected 1st instead of 3rd….. luckily the engine (touch wood) survived the buzzing, however the engine moved so much in this moment that it damaged the exhaust manifold, which created a horrible metallic noise. Even with all this going on during the last test, I still managed to set a joint fastest test time.
At the end of the event, we finished :-
Matt Endean (Driving) / Suze Endean (Nav) : 5th overall and 1st in class (would have been 2nd overall without those pesky cones….)
Suze Endean (Driving) / Matt Endean (Nav) : 13th overall and 4th in class (would have been 6th overall without the punctures….)
Project MGZR 