Lindisfarne Rally - Otterburn
9th September 2007

   Just a quick report, I did The Lindisfarne on Sunday and the organisation of the event springs two words to mind "piss-up" and "brewery", with a full entry of 120 there were no scrutineering slots just queue and one and a half organisers doing signing on, I could see this working on a small event up to say 60 cars.

   Anyway whinging over I ran at car 65 with Steve "Titson" Titmuss in his Opel Manta 400 (www.titsonrallying.com) Had a fairly steady run over the first 10 stages gradually getting quicker and taking some off the blind crests flat out, that Eddie Blackwell warned me about at the Denbigh and Flint, we had  some really big jumps with some heavy landings, one so heavy on Stage 9 that it dislodged the battery in my co-pilote rally watch losing all stage times and putting it back in time to 2001.

   We lasted until stage 11 when about a third of the way in, the engine decided enough was enough and the head gasket blew, she didn't even get hot. I checked the location map and we were at junction 32, sorted we rolled back to a crossroads pushed the car 50 metres under some tape, let her freewheel downhill to near the airstrips where a farmer kindly towed us with his quad up the next hill, freewheeled down to the next junction under some more tape and rejoined the stage, helmets on and got a time at the finish. the only problem we couldn't get back to the finish, ah well we tried. So it's off to Baneveld in Holland in October if the engine can be rebuilt in time.

Geraint Lloyd-Williams