The 6^th round of the P-WRC (Production car World Rally Championships), “Repco Rally New Zealand” was held from 28^th August to 31^st, on the outskirts of Hamilton in the North Island of New Zealand. One of the features of this rally were the ridges along the courses and the smooth rhythmical roads. This year has seen a lot of rain, compared to last season, and the condition of the course was worrying all the drivers.

 

The TYPE Gr.N equipped A.Araujo and E.Vertunov both took part in the pre-rally tests and their vehicles were set up with TEIN engineers. A.Araujo, driving a Lancer Evo.IX commented about the set up of his car, "This is my set up. Vehicle is under my control.” His facial expression gleamed with enthusiasm for this rally. E.Vertunov, driving the Impreza GRB, had his car set up based on the settings used in the last round in Finland. Minor click adjustments were made in the tests, but in the end, he decided Finland set up was the best to challenge this rally.

 

Day 1 included 7SS covering a total 139.5km. A.Araujo in his TYPE Gr.N equipped Lancer suffered from transmission trouble in SS1 ending his day. E.Vertunov was the 7^th car off the start line in SS1 but immediately suffered drive system problems. His car became unstable thereon, and as a result, he ended up crashing off the course in SS2. The damage to his car was too large and unfortunately he had to retire from the rally. Day 2 included 6SS totaling 130km, and this rally’s longest SS, covering 31.6km. A.Araujo was able to restart thanks to the super rally system and set respective times to prove every one of his abilities. But with the time difference too large to be competitive, he used the remaining time to set his car up for the forth coming, Rally Japan.

 

The final day had a total of 5SS covering 85km. A.Araujo set good times as in the previous day and finished the rally in 12^th overall position. You can see how difficult this New Zealand rally really was with only 14 of the 24 PWRC entrants finishing. Retirements included many of the top ranked drivers.

The next round, Rally Japan, will be held in Sapporo form October 31^st to November 2^nd. We all have high hopes for the performance of all TEIN equipped drivers.