This article (incomplete) highlights feedback of the drivers and co-drivers from TTRC Rally Shakedown.
Written by Nicholas “Dumplin” Bhajan.
1. Cristian Bourne x Jesu DeGannes
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CRISTIAN BOURNE x JESU DEGANNES
“The Team STAG/ULTRA/Peak Performance/Mileage Mack/CRISM.com Evo 8 went to the shakedown event with a fresh locally built engine, new turbo, local engine re-mapping done on a dyno and with slightly wider tires. We didn’t know what to expect exactly from the changes and improvements made,but we were certainly confident that the car would be stronger than before.
With a field including Powell, Betts, Johnson, Coelho and other 4 wheel drives,we knew it would be no walk in the park as all these guys are well prepared and excellent drivers.
The event was a shakedown sprint event,requiring competitors to only score the fastest morning run and fastest evening run. There were 4 runs on the stage in the forward direction and 4 in the reverse. The fastest time in each direction would be added, and the goal is the lowest total time for scoring of position. This allowed all teams to test different settings during the day,but only add the fastest forward time and reverse time!!! An interesting format for pushing the limits,and they were pushed!
We did not make many adjustments to the car as everything felt pretty good, just doing the usual checks between runs.
We put the fastest time down in the morning forward session, and up to the end of the 3rd and 4th runs in the reverse format, we were 1-2 seconds faster than the best of the rest of the field, and it looked like it would not be taken away.
It seems Mr.Powell was particularly interested in showing everyone that he’s not taking licks just so, and he did what I thought was impossible, and beat our time on his last run. I want to see that go pro footage!!! However after adding both times we managed to come out 0.33 seconds faster than him to take victory Overall, Group A and also team!
Looking forward to Rally Trinidad, while there will be no WRC cars this time, there is going to be some intense competition in the Group N and Group A classes. It’s not necessarily going to be about the fastest!!!
It’s going to be interesting indeed…”
” It started with a mission to ‘shake down’ the car and wake ourselves up from the extended slumber we suffer through at the end of every year into the next, that only lasted however until the we got the start. Then the ‘vibe’ was replaced with “Let’s do our thing,we’re going to give these fellers a good run for their money.” When we saw that the car was behaving nicely, and our time on the first stage was competitive, it was even more encouraging.
The second stage of the day we lost transmission control, “what do u mean you mean by you don’t have any gears Cris? Let’s go!” Lol me in my ignorance pushing faster, this resulted in our only DNF ,sadly we didn’t escape all incident. The balance of the morning was great,watching John’s times drop to meet ours, and hoping that we won’t be beaten, wishing that were seeded behind him, so that he won’t see our times to motivate him further. It was clear though that we were setting the pace and driving the other teams to push harder than they, (or we) have intended to. Our teammates DDS led by Donald Gopaul seemed to be doing similarly in among the 2WD teams.
At the end of the morning session we returned determined to sustain our lead and where shocked at how similar the times between forward and reverse were with us, we set a time that ultimately proved unbeatable,but definitely not without some serious effort by Mr.Powell to capture our lead.
The weather was excellent, our team was excellent,the car was quite sure footed and quite a bit more powerful and reliable. I hope (and expect) that it continues throughout the rest of the year ahead for us. It started as a far cry from our difficulties in 2014,maybe this year will be good and one for us and the ‘rally gods’ to smile in our direction.
Best of luck to all the teams for Rally Trinidad 2015 and the rest of the year to come,we will be posing a bit more of a challenge this year.”
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