15th Anniversary Targa – Day 6 (Saturday)

TARGA TALES

Tony Quinn has won the 2009 Dunlop Targa Rally with a margin of 5 minutes and 35 seconds. 2nd was Clark Procter and 3rd Jason Gill.

Wellington turned on a cracker of a day. The southerly had blown through and the sun was out and 15°.

There was still 71 main event starters plus 18 doing only the Wellington stages.

SS39 was Shelley Bay from ‘outside to inside’ as I heard one kid put it.

Spectators were out in force.

It was to be the un-doing of Leigh Hopper and Michelle Bain as they ended up on the rocks and they had to crane him out.

Procter, Manuell and Ron Scanlan (down in 28th) all put down 3:03. Next was Brent Early on a 3:07, then Quinn 3:09 and Gill 3:11

SS40 was an old Targa favourite, Whiteman’s Valley in Upper Hutt. I was told Procter finished, then limped into control and Jason Gill towed him to his Service Crew. Apparently it was not the alternator that was the problem, it was the battery.

SS41 was the first run over Moonshine, this time from the Upper Hutt end.

Mike Sexton’s M3 had come out of Parc Ferme for a gearbox problem – worse, they had no clutch at all and the ground was covered in brake fluid. The sequential box had to come out as the centre push clutch seals had blown. They finished at 1 am.

SS42 was Paekak Hill (Paekakariki) from the sea side to the top. Not for the feint hearted but at least with right hand drive, the driver was on the side of some huge drops.

Into lunch at Maidstone Park in Upper Hutt and we can look at the half-way point’s overall results.

Modern:

• Tony Quinn / 07:02:08
• Clark Procter / 07:08:10
• Jason Gill / 07:11:51
• Martin Dippie / 07:24:12
• Paul Manuell / 07:25:35

Classic

• Mark K-B / 07:28:22
• Anthony Butler / 07:29:09
• Nigel Ppatterson / 07:40:50
• Brent Emerson / 07:43:00
• Rex Alder / 07:45:57

On a charge and up to 6th was Barry Kirk-Burnnand on 07:47:10 – unfortunate that whilst leading he got taken out by another car.

All they had to do was ‘keep their noses clean’ with only four to go.

I found it soo frustrating that at noon the results were down yet again and when you looked at individual stage times, those times in the overalls differed. In Motorsport and Motocross we use transponders and you cannot beat the system unless you cut the track. Grrrrrrr.

SS43 was Moonshine again. Spectators can be soo stupid walking on the narrow road when cars are still coming through very fast. The Marshalls were quick to send them back over the fence.

The 996 Turbo Porsche of Greg Russell and Dwayne Cocker limped into Control with what looked like a broken half-shaft as the left rear wheel was well out from the body. It turned out to be the tyre well off the rim and just about to shred itself to pieces. They changed it and were away again.

Then it was back for Paekak Hill as SS44.

SS45 was the tight and narrow Makara stage which started at Johnsonville and finished near Karori. Wellington is where co-drivers can get in trouble as it’s very easy to miss a Touring Stage call.

Peter Johnstone (PJ) and Russell Burling (aka The Uncles) in the 003 Lexus ISF were still busy with their VIP guests. Today was Paul Lambert, Promotions Manager from Upper Hutt City and in the afternoon Kerry Prendergast, Mayor of Wellington.

SS46 was the final Special Stage – the last of 901.5 klms of Special Stages and by the time they got back to the Taranaki Wharf it was plus 1808 klms of Touring Stages. It was Shelley Bay in the opposite direction – inside to outside !!

Plenty of spectators enjoying the racing and the sunshine. It’s been a big event for Wellington with 8 Special Stages.

Classics were on the road first and whilst Mark Kirk-Burnnand had 60 seconds between he and Anthony Butler he was still driving hard.

Tony Quinn’s car was so quiet that I almost missed it again with the camera on each occasion.

Clark Proctor’s hybrid Metalman Escort was popping and ptu, ptu as it came towards my photo position and he was still going very, very hard.

The M3 BMW’s and there was a few of them, all had glorious induction sounds.

You could hear the Mehrtens Mercedes-Benz CLK63 AMG from way off, up and down it’s sequential gearbox.

No Allan Lewis in the 1972 supercharged V8 Datsun 240Z. He arrived barely a minute after the stage was closed and the #999 car had gone through. They had broken a half shaft and once fixed, slow traffic hampered them getting there on time.

Congratulations to Tony Quinn who had won it again.

• Tony Quinn/Naomi Tillett / 07:29:06
• Clark Procter/Tony Callaghan / 07:34:45
• Jason Gill/Jody Somervell / 07:39:15

As for the Classics :

• Mark & Chris Kirk-Burnnand / 07:55:42
• Anthony Butler/Joanne Butler / 07:56:43
• Nigel Patterson/Andrew Patterson / 08:09:25

Next year Procter may be in a Nissan R35 – he already has one. Whatever, that little Escort flew all week and his 2nd was well deserved.

Congratulations also to Jason Gill on an excellent 3rd. There is still a bit more ‘tweaking’ coming for the very quick 2006 Lancer EVO.

Congratulations to all finishers.

Results are courtesy of the TVD operations and results management solution and vehicle tracking by TVD’s AVL solution Dash.

ends

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