TIGHT AT THE TOP

As the surviving crews in the Pirelli International Rally pulled into the Hadrians Camp Service Area, it was almighty close at the top of the leaderboard with Mark Higgins and Paul Bird, both in Ford Focus cars, separated by a mere two tenths of a second, this after almost 15 hours of hard driving. The top two are pulling away from current championship leader Austin McHale, whose Ford Focus is some 30 seconds in arrears but just behind the five times Irish champion is none other than his eldest son, Gareth, driving the families Toyota Corolla.

David Higgins,was hoping to fit a new gearbox to his Mitsubishi but may be pushed for time, he drove the 29 miles from Chirdonhead and the P-Zero stage, complete with hairpin, stuck in 4th gear. The P-Zero stage again attracted a big crowd who `were entertained by John Lloyd’s Subaru going sideways through the watersplash, Ronnie Dale losing his Clio’s front bumper at the same point and numerous cars getting airborne over the specially built “Yumps”

Behind the main International event come some 40 crews competing in the Pirelli National Rally and this is currently led by Welsh Wizard Gwyndaf Evans who, having retired from the main event last night, after only two stages, has started todays National Rally to get some valuable testing miles on his Ford Fiesta S1600. Lying second was the older MK2 Escort of Bob Astley, followed by the Peugeot 205’s of Tom Curtis and Micheal Bradley.

Like the drivers in the main event, the clubmen have had their share of troubles, Matt Barker’s Peugeot 205 hit one of Kielders larger potholes and bent the steering, Graham Roberts MG ZR hit a rock which punctured a huge hole in the cars floor Jody Bowcott caught a car in front of him, the flying rocks puncturing his radiator

International Leaderboard after Stage 11.

M.Higgins/ B.Thomas 1.11.13.2, P.Bird/ I.Windress, 1.11.13.4, A.McHale/ B.Murphy 1.11.42.3, G.McHale/ P.Nagle 1.12.15.8, S.Ling/ I.Allsop 1.12.31.8, S.Perez/ N.Dashfield 1.12.42.9, T.Laukannen 1.12.47.2, D.Higgins/ D.Barritt 1.12.54.2, R.Gower/ A.Davies 1.14.03.5, J.Milner/ N.Beech 1.14.41.0