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Evans Makes It Four From Four In Rally Championship |
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Tuesday, 14 August 2007 |
Defending Australian Rally Champion Simon Evans made is four wins from as many starts by claiming victory aboard his Caltex-backed Toyota Corolla in the Toyota Kluger Rally of South Australia, round four of the NEC Australian Rally Championship, over the weekend.
After being pushed all the way by local ace, and defending round winner, Steve Glenney throughout the weekend Evans and co-driver wife Sue won both heats to maintain their perfect record in 2007.
During yesterday’s opening heat the battle for the win went down to the
wire with Evans prevailing by virtue of his superior speed across the
tarmac Angaston Special Stage. He secured his eighth heat win of the
year by the slender margin of 0.9 seconds.
Today’s second heat was another tight affair with Evans and Glenney going ‘head-to-head’ throughout the eight stages contested.
After acting as a ‘road sweeper’ during the morning’s loop of stages,
due to being first driver on the road, Evans once again proved to be
the class of the field when he extended his lead by 15 seconds across
the final two stages to claim the overall victory.
"That was a really satisfying win. (Steve) Glenney pushed us the whole
way, and to come through and beat him on his home roads was a great
achievement,” said Evans.
“It was pretty hard towards the end of Heat Two, but we turned up the wick on those last stages and pulled out the win.
“It was a pretty wild rally - amazingly fast and really slippery. There
were some slightly out of control moments, but it is always a great
thrill to win a tight one.
“The team has just built a bulletproof car - if I was ever going to
break the Corolla it was going to be this afternoon, but we did not
have a problem all day.
“We've now got a massive 95 point lead in the championship, which is almost unbelievable."
After finishing third in the opening heat, team-mate Neal Bates spent
the day recovering from a slow start to Heat Two aboard his
Caltex-backed Toyota Corolla Super 2000 entry.
Bates and co-driver Coral Taylor fought back throughout the day with
some good times to climb up the order and finish the day fourth.
Combined with his opening heat result, Bates and Taylor finished equal
third with Dean Herridge on points - but missed out on the podium on a
count back.
Bates leaves the Barossa Valley thrilled to have completed two full
events with his brand new Corolla Super 2000 car without suffering a
single mechanical failure.
"I am over the moon with the reliability of our car during its first two events,” said Bates.
“We didn't quite have the speed this morning, but we picked it up again
this afternoon which meant we could get past some of the cars that had
snuck past us early.
“The team has made a remarkable car and it is only going to get better.
We were battling with Dean for the whole rally - it's just a shame that
he pipped us for the last podium place today on count back.
“Simon and Steve were just so fast this weekend - congratulations to Simon and Sue for coming out on top.”
With two rounds remaining in the championship Evans holds a 95 point
lead over Bates. Herridge is in third place a further 10 points adrift.
The next round is the Rally of the Great Lakes to be held on the mid-north NSW Coast on September 15-16.
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