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After suffering a series of disappointments over the past three years, the Barbados crew of Roger Mayers and Max Ferri finally won the island's premier motor sport event at the weekend (May 28/29), claiming the Rally Barbados 2005 crown by a margin of more than 50 seconds.

In a weekend of lively competition, fought out under the watchful eye of the organising Barbados Rally Club's (BRC) guest of honour, 1994 World Rally Champion Didier Auriol, the best drivers in Barbados faced strong opposition from the wider Caribbean and Europe, as the fifth Barbados Rally Carnival reached its conclusion.

From the Start at Simpson Motors on Saturday morning, Mayers and Ferri took the advantage in the Trivial Pursuit/McEnearney Quality Ford Focus WRC, fastest on four of the first six stages. At the prize-giving on Monday evening, Mayers said: "It was important to push from early, as we wanted to build up a cushion." And the strategy proved to be a good one.

Jamaicans Gary Gregg/Hugh Hutchinson were fastest on the two Digicel Dark Hole stages early Saturday in the KFC/NGRacing Ford Focus WRC, but the fast times for Mayers were coming on the longer stages - Automotive Art Shell Canefield and DMSDistributors.com Sailor Gulley - so he was steadily extending his advantage. Mayers and Gregg claimed another fastest time each before the lunch break and, although Mayers was some way off the pace in the final Sailor Gulley, he led by 13 seconds after the first eight stages.

And it was Gregg's fellow-countrymen John Powell (flying the Trinidad & Tobago flag)/Michael March in second place in the ex-Carlos Sainz Intercontinental Shipping Toyota Corolla WRC, not Gregg; although Powell failed to log a fastest stage time until Sunday morning, his consistent pace had given him the edge over the rest of the chasing pack.

Gregg was third, with 10-time winner Roger Skeete fourth in his first run on this event with his new Havoline/McEnearney Quality/Michelin Ford Focus WRC and new co-driver Stuart Maloney. He was already experiencing drive-train problems, however, and would not finish the day.

Another previous winning crew was in trouble, too - Paul Bourne/Louis Venezia ran out of fuel in the second Dark Hole stage in the Banks/Pirelli Subaru Impreza WRC, then missed the next two stages; they had been lying in third place, but dropped out of overall contention. By way of consolation, they went on to win the Texaco Sunday Cup, setting four fastest stage times in the process, and winning the Cingular Award for being fastest overall on the four Malvern stages.

Between Saturday lunch and the overnight halt, no-one beat Mayers and Ferri, so they went to bed with a lead of just over 30 seconds. Powell/March were second and Gregg/Hutchinson third (another seven seconds adrift), while the younger Mayers brother, Barry, was a remarkable fourth overall with co-driver Adam Hart in the two-wheel-drive Trivial Pursuit/Nassco Toyota Starlet.

Roger Hill/Graham Gittens had topped the Modified 8 times on all but four of the day's stages to lie fifth overall in the Mobil 1/Nassco Toyota Celica GT4, around 8secs ahead of the highest-placed European crew, Kevin Procter/Mike Gilby from England in the rare Procters Coaches/Motoscope Ford Puma Evo 4 x 4. Two more Jamaican crews were next up: Doug Gore/Mark Nelson (Mistubishi Evo VIII) and Peter Moodie Jnr/Mike Fennell Jnr (Mitsubishi Evo VI) had run well in their respective Groups, Moodie claiming three fastest Modified 8 times during the day.

The top 10 was completed by the crowd-pleasing BMW M3 of Jonathan Still/Heath Hazell and the consistent Mitsubishi Evo V of Sean Dowding/Jason Cozier.

With a total of 80 starters, and 13 different Groups being contested, there were battles all through the field to entertain the thousands of spectators who packed the popular viewing points along the 80 miles of special stages. One of the largest crowds ever seen at a rally finish in Barbados gathered at the Vaucluse Raceway for the Total Sport SuperSpecial, mid-way through which Auriol did a demonstration run in Powell's Corolla WRC. The island's motor sport fraternity was already proud that the French former World Champion had accepted an invitation to attend their event . . . the demo run was the icing on the cake. They'll be talking about it for months to come.

Rally Barbados 2005 was organised by the Barbados Rally Club in association with Automotive Art Shell, Banks Breweries, Cingular, Da Costa Mannings Autocentre, Digicel, DMS Distributors.com, McEnearney Quality, Simpson Motors, Texaco West Indies and Total Sport. The event was supported by Abacus Builders, The Boatyard, Nassco, SBI Distributors, Stoute's Car Rental and Williams Equipment.

Article extracted from www.rallybarbados.bb

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